Maternal Rambles V | Oranges Are Not The Only Fruit
Moving away from the prescriptivist mother...
Building on themes of rigid parental control and the clash between prescribed paths and personal identity, Jeanette Winterson's Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit delves into the autobiographical exploration of a mother-daughter relationship strained by religious dogma, much like Antonia White’s Frost in May, which we discussed in the previous episode.
In Winterson’s narrative, it is the mother who dictates the daughter’s future, creating a hostile dynamic between them. The title itself, Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit, symbolises the idea that there is not just one prescribed path in life, whether imposed by a mother or by religion. Winterson, through her portrayal of young Jeanette, who is queer, underscores that there is more than one "fruit," more than one type of relationship, and more than one way to live authentically.
The act of giving an orange to a daughter serves as a metaphor for attempting to mold her into a specific version of what the mother deems acceptable, keeping her hands busy and her mind confined to a narrow set of possibilities. Yet, the novel’s structure, divided into chapters named after books of the Bible, mirrors Jeanette's journey away from her mother’s prescriptive path. Key chapters such as Joshua, where Jeanette explores heterosexual ideas, Judges, where she is judged for her sexuality, and Ruth, where she freely explores her sexuality without her mother’s constraints, all signify stages of her liberation.
Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit is a poignant and often heart-wrenching novel, highlighting the impossibility of forgiving a mother who enforces such rigid limitations under the guise of religious righteousness. The story underscores that even though religion can be a source of conflict, it is ultimately the mother’s unyielding control that is at the heart of their troubled relationship.
The Church
On the note of biblical chapters, the church plays a significant role in shaping the daughter in Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit, a force from which Winterson has never fully disentangled herself.
“I loved God and I loved the church, but I began to see that as more and more complicated. It didn’t help that I had no intention of being a missionary.”
Here, I’m not talking about religion in terms of its beliefs and values, but rather the toxic institutions that can be constructed around it. A healthy mother-daughter relationship within the church is possible, but it heavily depends on the forces at play.
In Oranges, the church embodies a patriarchal force, with the mother holding power over the father. Young Jeanette observes:
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