Jeanette Winterson’s Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit consists of Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy, Joshua, Judges, and Ruth, parts of the Bible. Grafting the Bible with fairy tales, fantasies and a wide range of texts, Winterson produces Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit. She appropriates the Bible as the grand narrative and re-writes it into Jeanette’s story as a female narrative. Winterson’s ‘sexing’ the Bible becomes a challenge to the patriarchal heterosexual culture.
By focusing on the book of Ruth in the Bible, Winterson juxtaposes Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit and the Ruth, expands the Ruth story, and finds out the loyal relationship between adoptive mother Louie and Jeanette as well as between mother-in-law Naomi and Ruth. She makes two texts female texts where women’s voices resonate and their desires are flowing: Jeanette’s desire for lesbian sexuality, Louie’s for spiritual God, Ruth’s for a man, and Naomi’s for a son. The loyalty between mothers and daughters itself becomes part of mature subjectivity.
In blending Biblical references with Jeanette’s story, Winterson challenges the distinction between fact and fiction. She insists that the distinction between the two derives from self-delusion, history and story are not in opposition, and history is a hammock for swinging and a game for playing like ‘knots’ in ‘cat’s cradle’. So by ‘sexing’ the Bible, Winterson creates Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit as a new Ruth story.