The gift of terrifying freedom.
Beauty's Gift is really a wonderful title for the novel. It's as if Magona is saying that Beauty's gift to her friends was the horror of her death and her desire for the other women to avoid her fate. In other words, the sacrificial gift of Beauty is her own life, and the fact that the terror of her death with stir up the kind of bravery in the women that it will take to leave their husbands.
Doing the right thing often involves personal sacrifice.
One might expect that doing the right thing will bring an instant reward, but in situations of social injustice, doing the right thing almost always means accepting the fallout. For the women in the book, their bravery is returned with guile and hatred, but that irony is exactly the point of the book.
The irony of HIV.
The idea that a deadly virus such as HIV can be transmitted by the very act required for the possibility of new life is ironic. Sex is the natural process by which new life is born, but for these women, it is the instrument of death, as Cordelia notes in her comments about 'the black penis.'
The irony of misogyny.
One of the ironic components of this narrative is so obvious, it's easy to overlook. Simply put, the irony is this: Why would someone marry a woman if they hate women and think they're better than women? It's ironic to mistreat someone who depends on you and who has given you the opportunity for lifelong friendship.
The irony of reversed gender roles.
In the story, the men are all complicit with the zeitgeist of their culture, and they have taken advantage of the misogyny of their culture as license to have affairs. And the implication is that every man in this story is likely guilty of that sin. On the other hand, women in this story are shown to be powerful, competent, and formidable opponents. Their bravery means that this time, woman is the hero, and man is the passive agent for evil. This novel shows that girls are people too, and they often suffer as the victims of their husbands' indiscretions, meaning that their bravery is extra brave, since it depends on their willingness to suffer.
