The Edible Woman

At Seymour Surveys’ office, the female workers have a Christmas party. Marian is unable to eat most of the food present. She sits with the office virgins as they discuss Millie’s friend in London who suddenly stopped washing herself then just as suddenly began again a few weeks later. Marian is preoccupied by examining “the women’s bodies with interest, critically, as though she had never seen them before” (181) and comparing their physical appearance with what she knows of their identity. Marian experiences a moment of identity dissonance in which she feels herself to be no different from the women around her and therefore not certain where the physical boundaries of her body end. She wishes that Peter, or a man in general, were in the room to help ground her identity.

One of Marian’s supervisors announces to the party that Marian is now engaged. Marian is angry as one of the office virgins must have reported her, and the supervisor’s speech of congratulations “made it clear to Marian that she would be expecting her to leave her job whether she wanted to or not” (182). Marian leaves the party in the middle of a snowstorm but can’t bring herself to return to the apartment yet.