Rosemary's Baby Sparknotes

They say that a mother’s love is unlike no other; Rosemary’s Baby by Ira Levin takes that to an entirely new level. The story of Rosemary has so many twists and turns including catholic and satanic belief systems, it will leave anyone confused with the final decision Rosemary must make. The story takes place in 1966, although Rosemary’s beliefs made her seem more in line with the 1950’s. She was always putting others before herself, and her naivety leads her to an uncomfortable and difficult decision.
The story starts out with a young couple moving into a new apartment, and of course the woman, Rosemary, wanted a child as soon as she could get her husband on board. The egotistical actor husband was worried about one thing and that was his

career, he cared for no one but himself. Out of all of the characters in the novel, witches, the devil, and cannibals, I believe it is safe to say that the scummiest person in this book is Guy Woodhouse. The only one Rosemary trusted to have her best interest at heart turned around and stabbed her right in the back for his career. After first dinner with the Castevets Guy magically gets the part that he lost out to and changes his mind about children stating, “Let’s have a baby, okay? Let’s have three, one at a time” (Levin, 75). Rosemary is too into the notion that Guy is finally ready to have a baby that she does not see that he really does not want kids right now, this has to do with the fact that she puts everyone’s priorities above her own, she ignores her natural instincts after Guy admits to taking advantage of her while she was passed out. In fact she ignores all red flags during this time because she is too blinded by the fact that her husband is ultimately ready to have a child, and now she is finally pregnant. Although it was a different time, she is still very upset that Guy went about “baby night” the way he had. “She was unhappy-whether or not it was silly to be so. Guy had taken her without her knowledge, had made love to her as a mindless body” (Levin, 98). The fact that she even questions if she should be upset saying “whether or not it was silly to be so” her husband had actually taken advantage of her while she was unconscious, that would be considered spousal rape now-a-days. However she puts her feelings aside for her marriage and the baby, again she is allowing someone else’s feelings and needs to be put ahead of her own even though “baby night” was supposed to be hers.
The pregnancy starts out with nothing but excitement, but is soon filled with stabbing pain and nothing but constant weight loss.

Everyone that sees her, excluding Minnie, Roman, Guy, and Dr. Sapirstein, all believe that she is extremely ill and needs to see a doctor. Rosemary allows for everyone to take charge of her pregnancy even allowing Minnie to make the pre natal shakes. Rosemary has no control over her body or her life at this point, however she is content because she knows that she will soon be a mother. “You look as if you’re being drained by a vampire. Are you sure there aren’t any puncture marks” (Levin, 123). Even though she feels terribly ill and is in severe pain she refuses to believe anyone but the doctor and the Castevets. Mothers will endure anything for their children, even nine months of the worst pain in the world. One evening Rosemary decides to throw a gathering for some friends of hers and Guys, even after three of her friends tell her she looks awful and she should maybe get a second opinion because she has been suffering from this horrific pain for much too long, she still trusts in Dr. Sapirstein. The minute she begins to question whether the doctor has her best interest at heart the pain magically stops and she agrees to keep drinking Minnie’s drinks and only see Sapirstein. Rosemary’s biggest downfall is her trustworthiness; it goes so deep that she somehow trusts others over

herself.
Finally she begins to put some things together after Hutch’s death and his last request for her to get ahold of that witchcraft book and she figures out that Roman Castevet is the child of Adrian Marcato.

She starts to fear that Roman and Minnie want to take her baby from her, after she immediately schedules to see Dr. Sapirstein, at his office she figures out that he too is into witchcraft and must be in on the plot to take her baby away. With no money and no where to go she tries Dr. Hill, the doctor that Dr. Sapirstein replaced, and as she starts to tell him the crazy story and plot against her baby he believes it to be false and tricks her into taking a nap and calls Guy and Dr. Sapirstein. They take her home and she runs and locks herself in the apartment not realizing that there is a doorway from the Castevets leading into there apartment and quickly she goes into labor and is drugged. When she wakes up she is with Guy and he tells her that the baby is fine and that she should get some rest. Long after she started hiding the pills they were making her take she began to feel stronger and wanted to look for her son. She took a knife and went to Roman and Minnie’s apartment and what she found was astonishing. The entire cult of witches was there including Guy, with a black bassinet and a silver crucifix hanging upside down, in the middle of the room. When she finally made her way over to her baby she looked into the

bassinet,
“‘What have you done to his eyes?’ They stirred and looked at Roman. ‘He has his father’s eyes,’ he said. She looked at him, looked at Guy-whose eyes were hidden behind a hand-looked at Roman again. ‘What are you talking about?’ she said. ‘Guy’s eyes are brown, they’re normal! What have you done to him, you maniacs?’ She moved from the bassinet, ready to kill them. ‘Satan is his father, not Guy,’” (Levin, 286).
After finally seeing her baby and what he actually was, Roman told her that she could be the mother to Satan’s child. As I stated earlier in this paper the love a mother has for her child is said to overcome any obstacle, but one would think your child being that of the spawn of Satan would be where you draw the line. However Rosemary firmly believed that her maternal love could transcend the evil of Satan. Her love for that baby trumped her own health and the safety of mankind.