A personal view: I always saw it as a book about wanting. I think the core of the book is the moment when the narrator talks about her future as a fig tree with all the options open to her (the editor, the poet, the wife and mother) as figs ripe and ready to be picked- but they all look so inviting thatits frightening to have to decide on just one and let the others all wither and drop away, in case it turns out that it was the wrong one after all. As she stands paralysed trying to decide, one by one all the figs drop to the floor- leaving the tree completely bare. I don't think the parralels with the Tree in the Garden of Eden are accidental. The reason the fruit is forbidden is because it will give us knowledge, choices, the ability to be whoever we choose- and all our lives metaphorically and actually we are told we must not eat that fruit because it will be bad for us, too much choice, too much fruit, too much of what we want, is bad for us. We can't have everything we want. We cannot have our cake and eat it. We can't have the job and the family, we can't have one more designer dress or one more slice of chocolate cake or one more love affair. And sometimes, when we want everything, and know we can't have it its very easy to get paralysed - our refusal to make a choice, results in us withdrawing and not really wanting anything at all. Too much drive, the audacity to want everything all at once (more!more! more!) ends up falling flat into its exact opposite- wanting nothing at all. SOmetimes that fruitless, desperate wanting just makes a person tired, and they give it up, don't see the point in moving towards a tree where all the figs are already falling. The book views the manic depression experienced by it's protaganist in these terms- a fight to carry on wanting battling against the obvious fruitlessness of that in a world where the greatest sin is always to want. I always saw it as exploring very similar ideas to those in Christina Rosetti's "Goblin Market".