51 pages • 1 hour read
Women Talking
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Part 5Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Part 5: “June 7: August Epp, After the Meeting”
Part 5 Summary
August hides in the loft, listening to the voices of Neitje and Autje and the Koop brothers as they kiss and laugh. He hears the girls tell the boys to close their eyes, and then he hears nothing. When Salome calls him from his hiding place, he sees her, the girls, and the motionless Koop brothers: Salome has sprayed them with the belladonna spray used to anesthetize the women, making sure the brothers can’t inform the men until the women are safely on their way. She then tells August she has also sprayed her son, explaining that just as she would carry a child out of a burning house, she is carrying him away from the colony to save his life. Salome admits she sprayed Scarface Janz after finding out she was planning to go to the city to tell the men of the women’s plans. August agrees to spray the boys again if necessary.
Salome tells August that Peters kept the belladonna spray in his barn, and August wonders what his intentions were in this. As Salome says she must hurry, August reminds her that the women are not fleeing but leaving. She agrees. Then August tells her that they must never return. He stops her one last time to give her the minutes he has been taking. He asks her to give them to Ona, and Salome laughs, reminding him Ona cannot read. August says, “Her child will read them” (208). They say goodbye, promising in the traditional Mennonite farewell that they will meet again. He watches her run to the waiting buggies.
As August waits to re-anesthetize the Koop brothers, he thinks of where his life will go from this point. He intended to die by suicide after their departure but instead finds himself watching the brothers. He watches the women leave from the window, realizing he returned to the colony to find peace and purpose and that the women are leaving for the same reasons. He wonders why he didn’t offer his gun to the women for protection and realizes he needs it for the same reason.
August thinks of when Ona asked him to take the minutes: She had found him with a gun because he was preparing to shoot himself. Though she did not speak directly of this, she described him as “a physical reminder of goodness and of hope, and of life after violence” (213). He remembers the real reason his family was sent away when he was 12—because of the resemblance he bore to Peters. He muses about love and how it can result in violence and considers the lessons the women have taught him about the power of faith. He realizes he is of more use alive than dead and that Ona asked him to take the minutes to save his life.
Part 5 Analysis
In this closing section of the novel, the women’s discussions about leaving finally play out. They are not stopped; they are determined and steadfast in their action. The women at the end of the novel are not the same as they were at the beginning, and Salome illustrates this point in this final section. She has softened: She is affectionate with August, and she has dropped her armor, which she no longer needs. She has found the strength to do what she must to move on and save herself and her children.
August too is willing to do what it takes to save himself and the others. His character comes full circle and is figuratively standing in the same field he is at the beginning of the novel. However, he is not the same person: He has evolved from the despairing man Ona found to a man who realizes he can work to save the boys from the violent and repressive nature of patriarchy.
Toews’s decision to end the novel with August, just as she began with him, could seem at odds with its title and subject—women talking. However, August’s journey is just as important as the women’s, and their evolution is intertwined; his growth is only possible because of his exposure to the women, and he is invaluable to the women as they evolve, if only as a man who listens, respects, and values who they are as human beings. While the novel points directly to the violence and terror of patriarchal control, it also illustrates the possibility of men and women coexisting and benefiting from each other. All that is needed, the book suggests, is to listen to each other with respect and an open heart.
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By Miriam Toews
