Similarly, Firdaus’s stepmother’s eyes are dull and unreflective, suggesting that although she is not cruel, she is unfeeling and does not bring life, hope, or love to Firdaus’s world.

Contrarily, when Bayoumi starts to beat Firdaus, his once-kind eyes reveal themselves to be “jet black,” suggesting that they have no light and that he is not a source of compassion as Firdaus once believed. This description is repeated almost verbatim for both Miss Iqbal and Ibrahim’s eyes (before Ibrahim betrays Firdaus), suggesting that Firdaus sees these individuals similarly, as people whom she loves that give life rather than take it. It is a fictional account based on the life of a female prisoner on death row that Sadawi met when she was conducting research on. The flowing light suggests that Firdaus remembers her mother as a life-giving source of comfort. Woman at Point Zero is a form of creative non-fiction. Every female reader of this literary piece, probably finds scattered pieces of her herself within the book. Firdaus, the imprisoned woman who El Sadaawi interviews, shares her life story from being a young child until she runs away. 'Woman At Point Zero' is a provocative piece of work, that brings up many unsolved issues that are seen and struggled with in the Arab world. Although Firdaus barely remembers her mother, Firdaus does recall that her eyes looked like two rings of bright white surrounding two circles of deep black, and the white glows as if light flows through them from some magical place. The death of the literary master, Nawal El Saadawi, has brought us back to one of many of her masterpieces.

In Firdaus’s narration, a person’s eyes reflect her perception of them and the way she judges their character.

Woman at point zero firdaus