Reviews with content warning for Rape - Rosemary's Baby

Reviews tagging 'Rape'

Rosemary's Baby by Ira Levin

123 reviews

bdingz's review against another edition

dark tense slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.75

I haven’t seen the film, but I know the basics of the story, so I wasn’t sure if I would get much out of the book. I was wrong! While some aspects of the story are dated (some casual racism and homophobia here and there), the relevant bits surprised me.

The real horror story here is medical gaslighting!

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servemethesky's review against another edition

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dark funny mysterious fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

5.0

Wow! I absolutely loved Rosemary's Baby and am blown away by how well it held up. What a fun, fantastic novel!

Ira Levin writes with short, punchy sentences that give you just the right amount of information to feel immersed in this world and time. As much as this book is a product of the 60s, it still feels shockingly relevant today. I knew the plot was about Satanism and giving birth to Satan's child, but I didn't know how much the themes would actually be about bodily autonomy and women's rights.

I saw some reviewers ranting that Rosemary is unbearably passive and a terrible protagonist, but it feels spot on to me that she would behave this way. We forget that women had so little autonomy, even as recently in the 60s! Women couldn't even get their own credit card until 1974! No wonder Rosemary felt she had to keep seeing the best in her husband. It was terrifying to see how trapped she was.

People also complain about the rape scene and that it's 'barely touched on' and 'not taken seriously enough.' That's kind of the point! She has no bodily autonomy and because the hold of the patriarchal system is so strong on her, and she has so little agency to leave, she can gaslight herself into thinking spousal rape 'wasn't so bad.' Marital rape was not considered a crime until 1993!!! Before the 1970s, it was perfectly legal in every. Single. State.

The horrors of real life in America!

It's also an excellent story of being trapped in a toxic/abusive relationship and family system, where in this case, Minnie & Roman and their friend group/coven is the family system. Everyone is constantly gaslighting Rosemary, dismissing her concerns and doing their utmost to convince her that all of this is absolutely normal and fine. It's hard to break out of a system that's hurting you when you don't know anything else!

The last 20-30 pages were thrilling!

It felt like such a familiar horror trope of "no, not the doctor! He's against you too! You can't trust anyone!" but in the best way. It was so well executed. And then when the hypodermic needle comes out? Omg. Chills. And then she wakes up and the baby is dead?! Horrifying.

Zero autonomy for this poor woman.

And then that ending!!! I think I'd heard the ending a podcast but totally forgot it.

Rosemary choosing to stay and raise her demonic son and try to exert a positive influence on him was just *chef's kiss*. She wanted motherhood *that* badly. I did love that she snatches back some of her autonomy by demanding that the baby be named Andrew instead of Adrian, and that he not wear black all the time.

It feels just like today, how many white woman accept patriarchy and white supremacy because it benefits them, and they might as well uphold a system that's working fine for them.

This book is so funny in such small ways, and was delightful all around. For those who read this book a little too seriously, it's worth noting that Ira Levin himself had misgivings about the novel's impact on society and culture ever since. He said, "now: if I hadn't pursued an idea for a suspense novel almost forty years ago, would there be quite as many religious fundamentalists around today?" Yikes. Now there's a scary idea! Dude didn't even believe in Satan and now right wingers are still Satanic-panicking in 2023.

Highly recommend picking up this book if you've never read it! It holds up quite well in 2023. Excited to watch the movie for the first time soon :)

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marageorge's review against another edition

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dark mysterious sad fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.0

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jaimc's review against another edition

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dark mysterious medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No

3.75

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velvet_young's review against another edition

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dark mysterious tense medium-paced

4.5

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mabelsyrup's review against another edition

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dark mysterious slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.5

Rosemary’s baby is one of a kind, like there’s a reason why it’s a cult classic.

Very mundane and slow paced, with characters that aren’t terribly interesting one way or another, very little actually happens... and yet... it really worked out for me! The pacing of the story and the deliberate monotony of their lives served imho to further the idea of this young woman possibly going insane. Rosemary isn’t an interesting main character; she’s a regular stay at home young wife that isn’t very wordly or experienced, TO ME that helps sell the horrible idea that this simple girl who lives and breathes for her husband still got sold to the devil in exchange for some acting gigs, it’s actually sickening, like the woman would leave. her. house if Guy’s asks her to bc he has to "practice his lines"and he has the audacity to let some cult r4pe her gaslight her and psychologically abus3 her... and you know what I hated most about Guy? that he had the balls to tell Rosemary that after it’s done they’ll move to Cali and live the dream life they always wanted SHUT THE FVCK UP LEAVE HER ALONE

But alas...

Another thing i really enjoyed was the writing and how, again going back to the mundaneness, every little thing that seemed a bit off or slightly suspicious would ring alarms in my head; as it did with Rosemary. Throughout the whole book we’re second guessing and plotting and thinking, is it actually a cult, or am i just paranoid? Are the next door neighbors being off-putting and pushy because they’re trying to bring the Antichrist or because they’re elderly and lonely?

Obviously the book has its faults, the slow pacing can only work for so long and there’s the occasional homophobic line that i expected from a white man in the 60´s, but despite all that I would highly recommend reading this book; if you’re intrigued by it, if you’ve seen the movie (like me) and want to see if it’s as good. but not if you DIDN’T like the movie and hope that this is better, it’s about the same or perhaps sliiightly lower.

"there are good houses too, houses where people keep falling in love and getting married and having babies" "Probably there are, only one never hears of them. It’s the stinkers that get the publicity"
"She opened her eyes and looked into yellow furnace-eyes, smelled sulphur and tannis root, felt wet breath on her mouth, heard lust-grunts and the breathing of onlookers. This is no dream, this is real"
"she stopped reacting, stopped mentioning pain, stopped referring to pain even in her thoughts. Until now it had been inside her; now she was inside it; pain was the weather around her, was time, was the entire world"
"She didn’t know if she was going mad or going sane"
"He has his Father’s eyes"

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