The Strength and Struggles of Women

Both Marie and her foil, Queen Eleanor, embody the struggles and strength of women living in a patriarchal society. The novel is set in the 12th century, at a time in which the systems of power—the state and the church—were entirely male-dominated. However, both Marie and Eleanor manage to achieve a great deal of power using their intelligence. Eleanor makes herself indispensable to her husband and sons as they rule England, using her political gifts and charms to maintain their power, and by extension her own. Marie works her way up to abbess at the abbey by steadily improving the conditions there, using ingenuity and political machinations to make people both inside the abbey and outside it respect, and in many cases even fear her.

Most of Marie's visions are symbolically associated with this theme, as they revolve around...