Character Analysis Of Firdaus In Woman At Point Zero

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Character Analysis on Firdaus Coming to Age
The character of Firdaus in Woman at Point Zero by Nawal El Saadawi is seen to be influenced by several circumstances which changes her unique perspective of life overall. Some of the dominant and prevailing forces that cause Firdaus to experience several metamorphoses were exerted by men upon her. Throughout the novel, Firdaus reveals her resentment against men as she believes that the male sex has only used her and has undermined her dignity and pride. The control that men have upon her not only changes her perspective towards her standards in society but also in her life to a certain extent where it caused Firdaus to measure and reevaluate her level of self-worth and as a person.
At the beginning of the novel, Firdaus responses are in a passive, lethargic manner towards men whom she has encountered with like if she has not yet seen much self-worth. Her first encounter is with Mohammadain; he’s another kid that lives in the same town. Mohammadain is the first male that has given her a strong sensation of pleasure: “I saw Mohammadain lying on a bed of straw under the open shelter. The smell… crept up my nose… My whole body shuddered with a faraway yet familiar pleasure arising from some unknown source, from some indefinable spot outside my being… something I tried to hold on to… but it slipped away… I wept in my sleep as though it was something I was losing now… and not something I had lost a long time” (El Saadawi 25). The use of “shuddered, “whole body”, “my being”, and “wept”, gives the sense that Mohammadain did not only exert an emotional force upon Firdaus, but has also caused her to assess and examine her sense of “being” and identity. Her first experience shows how naïve an...

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...er father a sexist, but her society was as well. The way Firdaus is treat made her be aware of the dominance of men in both the household and the society itself. From Bayoumi, her roommate; Fawzy, her client; and her pimp, she learner to have the dangerous sensation effect of a woman wanting to hurt a man’s pride. Ibraham, her true love, shaped her to become a cynical, emotionless prostitute once again he unveiled the truth about her statues and the nonexistence of “love”. She realizes that the impact of money can be confused with lust. Finally, Firdaus freed herself from the male grasp by ripping apart the only thing expressing her true self, money. Lastly, by entering the prison after killing her pimp, where she is ironically freed. After she has been asked to sign the pardon, she rejects it and she buys her ticket to the internal freedom by the penalty death.

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