Thoughts on The Shrouded Woman

 The Shrouded Woman was my second reading for this class. Compared to our first reading Swann's Way, I found this novella not only easier to follow but far more capable of keeping me fully engaged as well. Before starting the reading, I can honestly say i was a bit worried that i might not understand it, or like it enough to read through it comfortably, but I can truly say I enjoyed reading it from beginning to end! This story is narrated by woman who had recently passed away. My guess is that it takes place at an open casket funeral. Ana Maria, or the shrouded woman, recounts key moments of her life while she lies dead. With each person that approaches her lifeless body, Ana Maria shares a detailed story on how they had impacted her life. She struggles to rest peacefully before facing these individuals and the hardships they caused her, one last time. Her stories involve life with her children and past lovers. 

There were two key men/lovers that played a huge roll in the woman's life; Her first love, Ricardo, and Antonio, the man she ended up marrying. To summarize, her first love was passionate, fun and new until Ricardo was forced to leave her for his studies. A while after, she met and married Antonio, who at first she wasn't too crazy about at first but after spending time apart realized he was someone she loved (even though he was everything BUT an ideal husband). There are a few reasons why i can't help but feel sad for the shrouded woman. Probably the biggest reason being that she never got over her first love, despite marrying and having kids with a different man. She admits that "the love she thought was dead, had slept hidden," and even though she was devoted to her relationship with Antonio, years later she felt excitement to hear that Ricardo had split from his wife. 

I imagine that being married to someone while still having deeply buried feelings for a past lover would be awful. However her relationship with Antonio made me equally as sad. I think the fact that this story was written and experienced by woman made it resonate with me even more. Not saying i have experienced marriage or a relationship the same as Ana maria, but i do think a lot of her experiences and emotions are relatable as a woman. Essentially, her entire relationship with Antonio was miserable. He was abusive and undeserving of the love Ana maria offered. She did nothing but try to please him, while all he did was tolerate her. This just resulted in a lifetime of anger and misery for the poor woman. 

I realize this is getting extremely long, but I just wanted to mention one last thing that i found quite interesting about this text. There is quite an obsession with a woman named Maria Griselda. She is married to Ana Maria's son, Alberto. She's is essentially seen as the epitome of beauty and every man in this novel seems to be in love with her. She is seen as so desirable that one woman even takes her own life because her husband admits to writing letters to Maria. When the shrouded woman finally speaks with Maria, she essentially tells her that she was loved less, and had to to deal with more hardships in her life because she was that beautiful. The shrouded woman then feels pity for her. I may have read that part wrong so please correct me in the comments if i am haha. But i just wanted to throw this in here because I found their attitude toward jealousy very interesting. In todays society, you would never catch people being so openly envious of someone else. Furthermore if a woman ever expresses herself as Maria did to the shrouded woman, it would be seen as arrogance.