Woman on the Edge of Time Literary Elements

Fiction

Present-day America, and also in the imaginary Utopian location of Mattapoissett

The point of view is that of Connie Ramos and the story is told from her perspective.

Depressing and violent; fatalistic; hopeless

Connie is the protagonist, the general circumstances of her life the antagonist.

There is conflict between Connie and her niece who is being abused by her pimp, and whom Connie is trying to help; however, her niece sides with her pimp boyfriend and is instrumental in getting Connie committed to an institution.

Connie kills the doctors who are trying to do surgery on her brain and remove the part that controls violent impulse.

Connie becomes more and more depressed and beats her young daughter which foreshadows her daughter being removed from her care.

Connie feels she is constantly surrounded by violence which is an understatement because everyone in her family is lost because of a violent event, and she herself is also very violent when angry.

No specific examples

The imagery in the novel compares the depressing and hopeless real world that Connie lives in with the Utopian world that she escapes to. With the vivid description of Mattapoissett, the author enables the reader to picture both the real world and the imaginary one and to see why Connie prefers the latter.

Connie feels victimized because she is poor and feels that if she was rich she would not have had her daughter taken away from her but fails to comprehend that it is her daughter who has been victimized, and that she herself was the cause.

There is a parallel between the experimental vaccines that Jackrabbit was given whilst incarcerated and the experimental brain surgery that doctors want to do on Connie whilst she is in the asylum.

Mattanpoissettians describes all of the citizens of the Utopian dreamworld that Connie escapes to.

No specific examples