Vinegar Tom by Carly Churchill - Book Report/Review Example

While Jack, the neighboring farmer of Alice and her mother Joan is continuously fantasizing about Alice, Alice on the other hand is able to engage in promiscuity without any feelings being attached, as characterized by the opening song of the play that goes "A devil's woman is never satisfied", to indicate the power of women to engage in sexual relations with men, without attached feelings. This is where the men in this society have been overcome by the women power of sexuality, and without any other way to defeat them; the men have turned into witch hunting.

Therefore, four of the women in the play are accused of witchcraft, starting with Alice, then Joan who is her mother, and then Ellen the midwife for assisting abortion, and Susan who aborts. Even Betty, the fifth woman in the play is also accused of being mad or ill, simply because she does not want to marry. All these has been done by men, out of their frustration on being unable to control the power of sexuality in the women, even though women are less powerful than those men in terms of authority.