Woman on the Edge of Time by Marge Piercy Summary and Reviews
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Book Reviews of Woman on the Edge of Time
Book Review: Full of Stuff
Summary: 3 Stars
In this novel the main character Connie time travels to a "utopian world" in which she must do battle, not only with herself, but with the enemies of the place she visits. I don't believe in time travel as of now. Maybe in the very far future time travel will become possible and maybe some very good things could come of it, but I think that mostly only negative things can come out of time traveling. Connie is imprisoned in a mental institute because of a happening between herself, her niece and her nieces' fiancé. Connie is fighting a war not only in Luciente's world but also with herself. Connie must cope with the realization that she is in a mental hospital and that she must overcome her illness in order to break free from this bondage. Also Connie is fighting a moral/physical war in Luciente's world in order to help their fight against the machines. Connie helped people in Luciente's world to understand a different culture and why people in her time did things the way they did. Connie even put doubts in some of the others minds about whether what they were doing was right or wrong in a moral sense. In this novel there are a lot of moral issues for you to contemplate on. Mothering, as the book calls it, cloning, intense sexual freedom and also political views. I would not want to live in Luciente's world because there is no formal religion. They do speak of a higher being, but do not talk about "it" or any religious rules they must follow in order to be part of this higher place. As a reader you will be fighting with yourself on many of these issues and it will draw you even further into Marge Piercys' novel. In Luciente's world they have a lot of sexual and expressive freedom in much stronger ways than we do. Kids at the age of twelve were involved in "sex" and there was nothing wrong with that. Also everyone could say what they wanted without the worry of Government being involved because in Luciente's world there was really no organized Government either. People in Luciente's world have the freedom to wear what they want and to have their own political beliefs and social beliefs, much in the same way that we do today. Even though today we have a centralized government and a set way of running things, Luciente's people could still choose how they wanted to run things and could change things with a vote. Throughout Connie's struggles she fades in and out of Luciente's world, each time the visits become stronger and more meaningful. Pretty soon she is stuck in between a war with Luciente's world and with the machine world. Luciente and Connie grow a strong connection with each other and begin to teach each other things, where as before Connie had been the student all along. Near the end of the novel I believe Connie murders the people knowingly and not in self defense. I think this because she says "I murdered them dead. Because they are the violence-prone. Theirs is the money and the power, theirs the poisons that slow the mind and dull the heart." That quote alone makes me believe that she did it in cold-blood. Connie couldn't reach Luciente anymore because her mind had "hardened" to the realities of the life that she truly belonged to. Also after she had killed those people she realized the reality she was living in and lost touch with the world inside of her mind.
Book Review: Will You Believe?
Summary: 2 Stars
Woman on the Edge of Time is a science fiction novel about a woman's hallucinations of another world. Connie Ramos is a middle aged Chicana woman who seemingly has had a rough past; multiple husbands, a daughter turned over to the state, a whore for a niece, and she's severely insane. Her relationships with others, or lack there of, in my mind, have driven her insane. While her re-admittance to the "crazy house" may seem unfair in the beginning, I soon understood why she had a bed and padded walls, and rightfully so. While in the ward, Connie feels someone beckoning her from somewhere. Turns out that it is her friend Luciente from the year 2137 and a town called Mattapoisett. Connie actually time travels. Now, I'm not against science fiction, but time traveling seems unrealistic to me. Time traveling, in my opinion, is beyond the mind's level to function. How much concentration and effort and energy can a person spend trying to time travel? I do not believe that a human being can allow themselves to slip into the almost comatose stage that was necessary for Connie to employ for time travel.
In 2137, the world has changed greatly. Children are not birthed anymore; they're made in an incubator. Serious relationships don't exist in the future; everyone can have relations with anyone, there is virtually no gender. Socially, everyone has the same standing, there are environmentally sound, and nothing is used more than it's needed. Democracy would be too light a term to describe the extent the government goes to to make sure everyone has a choice. Serving as a utopia for Connie, Mattapoisett would not be such to me. The way things are handled socially would not be in my best interest as they have wormings, or mandatory peer mediated sessions for people who have a problem with each other. As Connie becomes used to this world, she reaches it more and more often throughout the book.
The doctors in her mental ward are holding an experiment in which she is one of the" privileged" patients to have metal plates put in their heads. The plates are being surgically placed there, so that the doctors will be able to monitor and possibly control the patients' emotions. While Connie is fighting against the doctors, Mattapoisett is fighting with another world, described totally opposite to that of Mattapoisett's. Connie and Luciente are both fighting against metal heads as the people from this "other future" are robots. Since trying to escape the ward and rid herself of surgery, Connie is found and brought back to the ward where she has the surgery. She tries to stay with Luciente because she hopes that the doctors will take the plates out of her head, thinking that the plates are what make her fade in and out of consciousness. It works amazingly, and the plates are taken out. Connie kills a doctor in a desperate act of murder to finalize her dominion over the "enemy" and to ensure that Luciente's world will be the future.
At the end of the novel, Connie can no longer reach Luciente's world. I think that since she is preoccupied with living her life, she no longer has needs for Luciente's friendship, and therefore cannot continue to time travel. Connie's desperation for friendship in the ward forces her to hallucinate about having a utopia and friends and a life; a life she never had.
Book Review: Connie' s Hard Knock Life
Summary: 4 Stars
Woman on the Edge of Time was a pretty exciting read. It hooks you from the moment you begin to read. The main character is a woman named Connie. Connie has been in an asylum before because of hitting her daughter, Angelina. Now she is on welfare. Her life has many pitfalls along the way. She grows up an a household where males were thought to be the strongest and best in all things and that women should get married, take care of the house and kids, and submit to their husbands. Connie is determined to go to school and become somebody and because of this she feels out of place at home and that her mother likes her brothers better than her.
Connie is sent back to the asylum for hitting her niece's pimp/ boyfriend Geraldo in the nose for trying to beat up on Dolly. Dolly, her niece, was of afraid of Geraldo so she told the doctors that Connie beat her up.
In the asylum Connie visits the future and meets all types of people and creates friends. Her time traveling is an arguable subject: Is she really time traveling, is she really crazy, or is this just an alternate universe that she has unconsciously created for herself. I don't believe in time travel, therefore I would say that she has made up this society in the way she would want the world to go. Her futuristic world is one that is quite different from our world. They have basically done away with the gender roles and a standard family life. The villige that she visits does seem to connect and communicate better or more than we do.
The book continues with her struggles in the asylum- to out think the doctors, to somehow find freedom, and to survive experiments.
Book Review: Crazy or Not
Summary: 3 Stars
Daniel Johnson
2/11/05
Dr. Hamilton
Crazy or Not?
Woman on the Edge of Time is a Sci-phi novel by Marge Piercy. The story is about a thirty-five year old woman named Connie Ramos. Connie comes from a large poor family and struggles to get by. Under the stress of her life, Coonie develops a drinking problem and loses her daughter Angelina to child services. Once Connie loses her child she goes into a severe state of depression and is placed in a mental hospital.
While in the institution, Connie starts making contact with a woman that's suppose to be from the year 2137. The woman's name is Luciente and she shows Connie how to time travel into the future. Throughout the novel Luciente and Connie make contact with one another and move back and forth between the two worlds. Connie tells Luciente about her life and daughter and Luciente tells Connie about her life in the future. Luciente shows Connie how people can have sexual relations with different people, how babies are no longer birthed through the natural means but instead they are genetically prepared and stored until someone dies, and how they use solar energy in the future. Luciente shows Connie how people have three mothers and how people don't have personal property.
Throughout the novel Connie has to struggle with the doctors in the institution because the want to put electrodes in her brain. Connie also has to stuggle with the fact that she might be losing her sanity. She discovers that the fate of the future rest on her actions and whether the doctors can control her or not.
Overall the story is pretty interesting because it shows how the action of people can affect the future. In my opinion I believe Connie is engaged in a war with herself and the doctors. She is fighting with herself to keep her sanity while at the same time she is fighting with the doctors to keep them from controlling her. I believe Connies stuggle for sanity and expeiences in both worlds keeps the novel alive. Overall I would recommend this novel to anyone who loves a good sci-phi book.
Book Review: Like Psycho?
Summary: 4 Stars
Do not let the title fool you; I did like Marge Piercy's Woman on the Edge of Time. Although I did not choose to read this book on my own, (it was for English class) I will admit that it is one of the better books I have read for school. If you do not enjoy science fiction, you probably will not be entertained by this book. A lot of things happen in this book, time travel, escaping from a hospital, skewed love relationships, and the whole nine yards. However, in brief, Woman on the Edge of Time is about a slightly middle aged woman, Connie, who battles with mental health issues. The audience finds her in the mental ward for most all of the novel. Connie time travels to the future to meet with her friend Luciente, who is also form the future. Connie then has to play an important roll in somewhat "saving" the future world.
Throughout the whole novel it is hard to tell if Luciente and Luciente's world actually exists, or if it is more like a hallucination that Connie is fixated on. It is somewhat like a challenge to figure it out. You have to pick up on clues that Piercy gives you throughout the novel, yet you are never told if in fact Luciente is real or not. In the beginning of the book, there is a big clue that Luciente does exist. When Dolly, Connie's niece, comes over to her apartment and sits in a chair, she says it feels warm like come one had been sitting in it, and she thought she heard voices when she approached the door. Connie says no one was there, but right before Dolly came Luciente was at the apartment. This looks like a hint to prove that Luciente is real; however, I do not believe that she does exist.
When I first read this part the first thing that came to mind was the movie by Alfred Hitchcock, Psycho. At the end of this movie, the audience finds out that the main character, Norman Bates, has a split personality. He is himself and his deceased grandmother. He goes as far as talking and dressing up as her. He even carries on conversations between himself and the "grandmother". I believe that this is the same type thing that is going on with Connie. The audience knows that she already has mental health problems, so I do not believe that this theory is too far fetched. That could explain why the chair Dolly was sitting in was warm and why she was hearing voices.
I also feel that the future world that Luciente lives in is made up. The characteristics of the world all seem to be things that Connie wants in her life, but does not have. The future world is to some extent a goal that Connie has. It is what she wants in life but cannot have. The future world is not necessarily a perfect world, but much better than the world and state at which Connie lives. For instance, in the real world Connie's daughter was taken away, and in this world there is a girl that looks exactly like her. Things that Connie wants are in this world.
All in all it probably is not too important whether or not Luciente is made up or not. However, it is fun trying to figure it out. It makes the reading go by quickly. Although I was "forced" into reading this book, I will admit that it is one of the better books that I have had to read for a class. Again I did thoroughly take pleasure in reading this book. If you like a good science fiction book, I promise, you will be engulfed by Marge Piercy's, Woman on the Edge of Time.