7.6 /10 1 Votes
Cover artist Malcolm Tarlofsky Publication date September 1993 Publisher McClelland & Stewart | 3.8/5 Goodreads Country Canada Originally published September 1993 Preceded by Good Bones | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Media type Print (Hardcover, Paperback) Pages 546 pp (first edition, hardcover), 528 pp (Paperback Ed.) ISBN 0-7710-0821-X (first edition, hardcover), ISBN 0-385-49103-4 Genres Fiction, Novel, Speculative fiction Nominations Governor General's Award for English-language fiction Similar Margaret Atwood books, Canada books, Novels | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
The Robber Bride is a Margaret Atwood novel first published by McClelland and Stewart in 1993. Set in present-day Toronto, Ontario, the novel begins with three women (Roz, Charis, and Tony) who meet once a month in a restaurant to share a meal.
Contents
Plot summary
During one outing, the three friends see Zenia, a long-dead university classmate who had stolen, one by one, their respective beaux. The novel alternates between the present and flashbacks featuring the points of view of Tony, Charis, and Roz, respectively. Zenia has given each woman a different version of her biography, tailor-made to insinuate herself into their lives. No one version of Zenia is the truth, and the reader knows no more than the characters.
Their betrayals by Zenia are what initially bring the three together as friends and bind their lives together irrevocably; their monthly luncheons began after her funeral. The novel, like other works by Atwood, deals with power struggles between men and women; it is also a meditation on the nature of friendship, power, and trust between women. Zenia's character can be read as either the ultimate self-empowered woman, a traitor who abuses sisterhood, or simply a self-interested mercenary who cunningly uses the "war between the sexes" to further her own interests. One reading posits Zenia as a kind of guardian angel to the women, saving them from unworthy men. This proposition comes as the conclusion of Atwood's later short story, "I Dream of Zenia with the Bright Red Teeth", which features the same characters.
Atwood claims that of all the characters she has written, she identifies most "with Zenia. She is the professional liar, and what else do fiction writers do but create lies that other people will believe?"
In the novel's present, Roz, Charis, and Tony each individually confront Zenia in a Toronto hotel room, where she tells each of them that the men they'd been with got what they deserved, and gives various versions of her earlier staged death, each as implausible as the accounts of her life.
Canadian literary critic Brian Busby claimed in his book Character Parts: Who's Really Who in Canlit that the character of Zenia was based on journalist Barbara Amiel.
Film adaptation
A film adaptation of The Robber Bride, starring Mary-Louise Parker as Zenia, Wendy Crewson as Roz, Greg Bryk as Henry, Shawn Doyle as John, Susan Lynch as Charis, Amanda Root as Tony, Tatiana Maslany as Augusta and Brandon Firla as West, aired on CBC Television in January 2007 and the Oxygen Network in March 2007.
The adaptation altered the plotline, choosing not to show Roz, Tony and Charis' childhood flashbacks and adding several new characters. As well, Augusta is taken by Zenia and the Toxique has been changed to Absinthe.
Sequel
In 2014, Atwood published the short story "I Dream of Zenia with the Bright Red Teeth", which revisits Roz, Tony and Charis in the present day, when Charis believes that her new pet dog Ouida is possessed by the spirit of Zenia. Originally published by the Canadian magazine The Walrus, the story also appears in her 2014 short story collection Stone Mattress.