In the chapter An Awakening, male desire is given precedence over female desire when the men are able to decide what will happen to a women without the women’s confirmation, and the men become angry when their decision is not followed by the women. Ed Handby meets with Belle Carpenter for one evening. Readers are told that he “was ready to marry and to begin trying to earn money for the support of his wife, but so simple was his nature that he found it difficult to explain his intentions… taking the milliner into his arms and holding her tightly in spite of her struggles, he kissed her until she became helpless” (Anderson 109). In this way, Ed Handly forces his desire for Belle onto her and ends up demanding that she stay with him by claiming …show more content…
Ed Handly handles his desire differently from female characters like Louise who have a desire but are unsure exactly what this desire is and how to achieve this desire. Ed Handly just decided to take what he wanted without regards for Belle’s desires. This same male desire being forced onto women is presented in the interactions between George Willard and Belle. Readers are told that “as [George] walked behind the woman up the hill George Willard’s heart began to beat rapidly and his shoulders straightened. Suddenly he decided that Belle Carpenter was about to surrender herself to him. The new force that had manifested itself in him had, he felt, been at work upon her and had led to her conquest. The thought made him half drunk with the sense of masculine power” (Anderson 113). George decides, just as Ed had, that Belle is in some way right for him, and the narrator implies that this thought links into masculinity. Belle Carpenter seems to have “learned” how to react to men’s desires. She does not try to resist as she had with Ed. Instead, “when he kissed her upon the lips she leaned heavily against him and looked over his shoulder into the