A Sorrowful Woman

A Sorrowful Woman Gail Godwin’s short story “A Sorrowful Woman” depicts the life of a woman with a terminal illness in her final stage of life. The short story opens up with the wife looking at the husband and her child describing the husband as “durable, receptive, gentle; the child a tender golden three. The sight of them made her so sad and sick she did not want to see them ever again” (33). The …

…and a dark liquid. When the husband and the child returned home “the house smelled redolently of renewal and spring” (37), which symbolized the wife’s passing and the beginning of a new life for the husband who turned his life upside down to be with her in the final stage. When the husband entered the room the child says, “Look, Mommy is sleeping” (37), which brings to the conclusion of the of the wife’s life.