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Book beginning: page 3

Sarah

• Sarah’s main identity was “the French Lieutenant’s Woman” as that was how this story began, it is the identity that set her on this course and how Charles identifies her when first seeing her at Ware Commons (p70). Unless the reader believes her curse of seeing through people was what sent her down this path, as it isn’t impulse or a lack of judgement that gets her into trouble, but her own way of playing men which would appear to come from her personality, her essential being. Which means that what set her up for this destiny wasn’t the French Lieutenant, but her own personality, which didn’t suddenly come into being in adulthood.

Sex

• It is a strange sort of novel when it comes to the theme of sex. There isn’t much explicit connection between the female characters and sex, and all mention is really limited to the three young ladies. However, the entire novel centres around it, including the title. Ernestina had one encounter where she looked at herself and mused (p29); there was the time Mrs Poulteney saw “her stable-boy soliciting a kiss, and not being very successfully resisted” by Mary (p75); however, Mary was considered more flirtatious until her trips to Ware Commons with Sam, which was her future husband; and Sarah had two encounters with sex, the first time, if we believe her second story, didn’t even take place.
• The young women’s appearances are continuously mentioned, but not as they would be now, they are not sexualised, but we are very aware that being beautiful and well-bred is important, and for what other reason than to marry and create a family?

Evolution

• Were gentlemen the fittest, or was there a need for their extinction in society? (chapter 37 and 38).
• Charles is angry at the new age, even though it welcomes him (p299).

Symbols

• The fossils on the Cobb could represent the dead at sea, or even Sarah’s resemblance of only being half there, she has a dead presence about her but she is physically there.
• There are comments such as Charles “had wandered more slowly than he meant,” (p51) for his literal walking pace back to town, but it feels to the reader as though they reference his general life as well.

Questions

• On one of Charles’ first visits alone to the rock-pools, he muses “would it not be more fun, no, no, more scientifically valuable, to take up marine biology? Perhaps to give up London, to live in Lyme… but Ernestina would never allow that” (p49). Is it enough just to ponder the thought? After all, we keep being told he’s not much for taking action. Is Ernestina his new excuse to not have to do anything of value in life? Is this all marriage is, being tied down, made to do something that isn’t first on your list. Wives keeping their husbands sensible and not veering off into escapades unsuited to society’s needs?
• Charles goes back and forth between thoughts, one moment he is enraptured in science then the next thinking of love. Could it be that he tried to incorporate a use for his beloved hobby into his life, trying to make everything fit and give it a meaning? Science alone was useless to his life, but providing pretty gifts for his fiancee made it have a purpose.
• Who can you trust in the novel? Mrs Fairley only gave the information she deemed relevant to serve her own interests (p63); the characters have a tendency to lie, hide information, or idealise situations; the narrator is unreliable: he admits to not knowing certain details and evidently relates characters’ misinformation; and the narrator can’t even choose just one ending.
• Was this the first dilemma in Charles’ life? It was stated that he was packed off to Europe as a young boy after wanting to go into the church, but this would seem like the first time in his adult life he finds himself lost and with no one he is obliged to listen to for direction. It is a situation that shows the importance of marriage.
• Would Sarah have been more agreeable if she were rich? Several of the rich widows are portrayed as strong-willed independent characters.
• Science vs. religion: is this where science leads a person? When someone turns from God, do they really lose their moral compass and the importance of having one?
• Is it interesting that the author of the book is male, and that he gave the male character everything in life, but made the female character the outright winner?

Fowles, John. The French Lieutenant's Woman. Vintage Books, 2004.