"All this is simply because of Michael"

When first opening The Golden Notebook I felt as though my literary bloodcells were swelling over with these women we keep encountering, and for a moment exhaustion and weariness overwhelmed. And again women come in twos, like Ursula and Gudrun, Kate and Edith, like little debbie cakes. But my initial malcontent was mostly petty griping, and, while I cannot yet provide a verdict as to my personal like or dislike of this book, I do appreciate Lessing's attempt to give us real women, "free" women--similarly flawed but more sympathetic portraits of Hermione. For, of course, neither Molly nor Anna are free: "because after all, our real loyalties are to men, not to women"(46). Lessing subtly parodies the self-aware, independent woman with both characters, whose badgering of Richard is excessively aggressive and ridiculously self-righteous (not to excuse his caricaturistic responses of self-pity and condescension). The two remind me somewhat of Ruth and Mary Magdalene--Molly being Ruth, so self-assured, committed to her role as the liberated, unmarried woman, while Anna is Mary, less concerned with appearances and good works, but highly reflective and truth-seeking. But with this element of parody there is a realism to these women that we have yet to receive from the other novels, and Lessing's characters start out as good examples of Beauvoir's notion that women exist in ambiguity.