The Portrayal of Relationships in Margaret Atwood

Margaret Atwood is an extremely prolific writer, prominent for her interest in Canadian culture, feminism and activism. A recurring theme in her works is having a female protagonist tied to a male love interest, narrating her experience with a husband or lover. Analysing different couples in a novel and four short story collections ranging from 1973 to 2023, this dissertation explores how Atwood’s narration of relationships between men and women changes throughout the years. Taking into consideration Surfacing (1973), Bluebeard’s Egg (1983), Wilderness Tips (1991), Moral Disorder (2006) and Old Babes In The Wood (2023), we can see how Atwood often chooses a female first person narrator or figural narrator to reflect on the role of women in relationships, and the power imbalance between men and women. The relationships portrayed are often the products of adultery, where the protagonist is the mistress or the wife who is being cheated on. This will allow us to study the role of the woman in the couple portrayed. Denoting the involvement of Atwood’s personal life in her writings, the latest collection deals with problems of the old age in a relationship and was written after the death of Atwood’s husband Graeme Gibson in 2019. Through the lens Nathalie Cooke provides in her biography of Margaret Atwood, I will explore how autobiographical materials are employed in Atwood’s latest short story collection. In this dissertation I want to draw attention to a focus change from the feminist power struggle in heterosexual relationships to the problems of aging, the death of the loved one and remembering in Atwood’s latest and more autobiographical works; as well as to determine how her approach to writing stories of couples evolved throughout the years.