Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, September 17, 1995 TAG: 9509150139
SECTION: BOOKS PAGE: F4 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: REVIEWED BY MARIAN COURTNEY
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Primarily a satire about goddess worshippers turning the quest for feminine equal rights into a vendetta against men in general, "Hunters and Gatherers" also probes a number of contemporary issues.
Francine Prose tells her story through the eyes of Martha, a single 30-year-old fact checker for a fashion magazine. Still smarting six months after being dumped by Dennis, an appliance repairman/actor who treated her with critical contempt, Martha spends Labor Day weekend on Fire Island with a friend's parents. While walking along the shore, she stops to watch a goddess-worshipping ceremony. By chance rather than design she joins them when she saves their leader, Isis Moonwagon, from drowning in the chilly ocean.
Somewhat skeptical of the cult's beliefs but hungry to belong to something, Martha provides us with a sympathetic yet cynical picture of the goddess worshippers. They wear flowing costumes; practice bizarre rituals; and engage in drumming, sweat sessions and vision quests. Paradoxically, the goddess worshippers find themselves succumbing to many of the behaviors they disdainfully attribute to a patriarchal society - the struggle for power and notoriety, petty bickering and passive acceptance of the group's will, even when it means going against one's own convictions.
Though Martha believes she is on the periphery of the group rather than an integral part of it, she accompanies the cult on a trip to Arizona to seek spiritual enlightenment from an American Indian shamaness. An omen that things won't go quite as planned appears right from the beginning in the guise of a signpost reading: "Four Feathers Institute; Be Welcome; Go in Peace; Trespassers Will Be Prosecuted."
Dismayed that their teacher has left and without notice has turned their instruction over to an unknown priestess, they are even more unhappy when the priestess serves the women, half of whom are vegetarians, roadkill for their first meal.
Through Martha's character, Prose explores the destruction of buying into any relationship in which one person is treated with disrespect by another. She criticizes the impossible standards of beauty imposed on women in this country and points out the irony of women supporting institutions that perpetrate society's standards for physical perfection. She touches on the detrimental effect caused when guilt-based religious dogma is imposed on children and the resulting low self-esteem that follows individuals into adulthood.
During a crisis toward the end of the book, the goddess women relinquish the decision-making role to a man, even though he is someone they all dislike and distrust. When Martha and another woman decide to take matters into their own hands, a man who exhibits all the good qualities they assume men lack stops to help them. They are as guilty of passing judgment based on a stereotype as those who jump to conclusions about them.
Readers who enjoy tongue-in-cheek humor will love this book. "Hunters and Gatherers" lends credence to the adage that good things come in small packages.
\ Marian Courtney lives in Charlottesville.
by CNB