I thought this story was interesting because the stigma for having children out of wedlock in Ireland was very bad. Many women-- as I have learned through the films we watched in class-- were sent to asylums to go through a process of reformation. But in the short story Sara the only thing that was said about Sara was that she had a bit of a bad name. Even the people in her community would go to defend her. It makes me wonder why the views in this story did no match the views that I have seen in other parts of Ireland. Yet at the same time none of the other town women trusted her around their husbands. Another interesting difference I noticed between the short story and the film was that in the story when Katty was telling her husband about what happened to Sara she said that she was found where women like her belong, in a ditch. Why did she not say a magdalum asylum? It is clear to me however that at the end of the story Katty did believe that the father of Sara's child was her husband. And I do believe that as well because of the husband's reaction. Did he react the way because he actually had emotions towards Sara or because she was carrying his child? This story for me leaves a lot of room for the reader to make inferences, it does not give a lot of detail about the mindset of Sara or any other characteristics for that matter except for the fact that she was a religious woman.
I am having a hard time grasping onto the fact that these nuns in the asylums truly believed that these children from the penitents were born as bad children. How did they think that denying them a mother was going to fix anything. How can a woman deny their motherly instincts?
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