Women As Lovers

First published in Germany in 1975, this novel by Nobel Prizewinner Elfriede Jelinek is the story of two women trying to improve their lives through the lives of their men. Brigitte, a seamstress in an undergarment factory, sees Heinz as her ticket out of life as a drudge, and sets about attracting his interest with a new dye in her hair and a voracious appetite for sex. Paula initially wants to be a dressmaker, but when she sees woodcutter Erich she changes her mind. This novel tells how they get and keep their men--despite other women, opposition from parents, and the stubborn obtuseness of the men themselves--and how they live afterwards. Jelinek's militantly feminist view of marriage as a trap is not a pretty one.