One particular subject that struck me about Gods Go Begging is the power of women. Women serve as a catalyst of sorts—it is because of their deaths that the trial occurs and the reason it continues. Nevertheless, despite the fact that I found it interesting, I made the mistake of setting it on a shelf and not think much of it in my mind. However, upon finding an interview with Alfredo Vea, the interviewer, Randal Holdridge , draws the attention to women being such central force of the novel.
When asked the reasoning and process behind this, Vea admits, “Women became the core of the novel quite unexpectedly.” They became a response to the sexual license that men were starting to feel as though they have earned. As Vea points out, men at during this time period (and even in the present day) media has given young men this notion of war being equal to sex. By associating “John Wayne films [and] cowboy movies” (media that depicts war and power struggle) with a romantic plot in which the “hero” wins the girl, young men relate one to the other. In other words, winning the girl means you have won the war. It becomes the reason why men go to war—the heroism mirrors the media and the romantic notion of winning a girl (reminds you of the song in Mulan, “A Girl Worth Fighting For” doesn’t it?).
It does raise the question, however, of how this relates to the murder of these women. I personally think it’s an attempt at achieving sexual license by committing actions in the reverse: get the girl first in order to win the war. But in doing so the expectations that are associated with each also get swapped. Originally, the expectation of war is death; the expectation of the girl is glory. Now, the expectation of war is glory; the expectation of the girl is death. It becomes a reclaiming of this new heroism that requires one to murder for the sake of winning the war for the sake of the glory.