Mr. Marroner betrayed his wife’s trust by having an affair with their servant, Gerta who also became pregnant as a result of the affair. Although he did have an affair, he did not let social hierarchy become an issue like Mr.Lodge did with his relationship with Rhoda Brooks. Still, Mr. Marroner wasn’t around to support her and instead he just sent a fifty-dollar bill to try and make up for the wrong he had done and the trouble he knew he would cause.
The two main male roles in each of the narratives are portrayed as successes at the beginning of the narratives, they are wealthy, working and with their own homes. This does make it seem like both men have accomplished something and are a gender to be respected and congratulated in what they have achieved although their new actions go directly against how the author created the character’s backgrounds and really they have not been successful at all.
Unlike Mr.Lodge who seemed to ignore his son until he got into a predicament with the law, Mr. Marroner did try and confront his situation by visiting them after Gerta became pregnant, in the hope that it would resolve the matter. When he arrives at his old home, he is presented with an empty household “wholly vacant”, and he later receives a letter that read; “I have gone. I will care for Gerta. Goodbye. Marion.” After having read the note, Mr. Marroner is appalled at the fact that the two women had managed to up and leave without him “her name (Gerta) aroused him in a sense of rage”. He believed that it was Gerta’s fault that him and his wife had broken up and he put the blame on her. “She had come between he and his wife. She had taken his wife from him. That was the way he felt.” This is an example of a man ignoring the apparent truth and placing the blame on a female head. In the same way, Mr lodge in ‘The Withered Arm’ seems to make it out to be Rhoda’s fault that she fell pregnant with his child and he holds no responsibility for him after he was born.
Mr. Marroner eventually hires detectives to seek out his wife, mistress, and his child as he has been held in suspense since the day he arrived home and now he couldn’t “bear it any longer.” He is given an address and he goes to settle the problems that had existed and to put his mind at rest. When he turned up at the new residence of the two women and the child, he was shocked (“He looked from one to another dumbly.”) to learn that they had coped without him and that even after the events of nearly a year ago, Mrs. Marroner had stayed true to Gerta and had supported her. The two of them had begun to raise the child in a family environment. At the end of the narrative, the male role is not forgiven and the females had almost dismissed him for he was clearly not needed in the upbringing of the child. The last line in this narrative “What have you to say to us”, brings the story to a conclusion that leads the reader to believe that he is the person who needs to make amends and realise that men should answer to women.
Mr.Lodge was also not necessary in the upbringing of his child, although I think that Rhoda yearned for support from him and for the farmer to be a part of their son’s life, just as she wished to be a part of Mr. Lodge’s life. However, because of the social divide between an owner of a farm and a mere milkmaid and because Mr. Lodge was very conscious that he would be an illegitimate father to the child, he ended the relationship. Other than being present at a court case and supporting his defence, Mr. Lodge had no real active role on the boy’s life. He ran away from his responsibilities and ignored them while Mr. Marroner (in ‘Turned’) eventually faced the consequences of his unfaithful betraying actions. The two characters do try and make amends towards the end of each narrative both unsuccessfully but beforehand they both ran away form their problems. This creates a cowardly image of the two characters.
The two stories were both written at different times in history when the gender divide between men and women and also the restrictions on women were beginning to be addressed and tested by the feminists of the time. Charlotte Perkins Gilman, the author of ‘Turned’, had very strong feminist beliefs and I think that this was down to her own negative experiences with men. Her father left her and her mother while Charlotte was still very young. She also went through a divorce, which left her belittled by a man. She presents men in her story as being unfaithful and not trustworthy. She makes the male out to be the stereotypical “bad” character in the story doing the wrong. The two female characters in ‘Turned’, Gerta, and Mrs. Marroner have been devastated by the actions of a man and at the beginning of the narrative (which is not chronologically the start of the story) they are both in dreadful states. “Mrs. Marroner lay sobbing…. she sobbed bitterly, chokingly, despairingly.” “Gerta Peterson lay sobbing…. all her proud young womanhood was prostrate now, convulsed in agony, dissolved in tears.” Both of these women are in the state they are because of a man. Charlotte portrays Mrs. Marroner as being an honest, good woman who loves her husband, she evens explains that she kisses her husband’s letters “no one would suspect Mrs. Marroner of kissing her husband’s letters-but she did, often”, which makes the character of Mr. Marroner even worse because of the devotion of his wife. Mrs. Marroner is very questionable about him after she discovers what had happened between him and their servant. She looses her faith in men. “ ‘He would take care of her,’ said the letter. How? In what capacity?”
I think Gilman puts her opinions across through her characters. They don’t seem to have their own minds but are just a means of communication of Gilman’s own thoughts.
Thomas Hardy is the author of ‘The Withered Arm’. I think it is unusual that even though the author is male he chooses to depict males in a bad light. Hardy may have wanted to give the reader a different perspective of men than I have gained. The fact that when Mr.Lodge was really needed, (at the court case) he was there for his son might have been how Hardy wanted to show that men are there at crucial times. However, I feel that when Mr.Lodge only is there at a point of life and death, shows that he is not a very responsible parent. Hardy also shows that his male character swears. “ ‘Damn you! What are you doing here?’ He said hoarsely.” The language used in this short extract presents yet another negative image of men, while Gilman’s use of language towards the end of the narrative slightly improves the picture of Mr. Marroner.
In Conclusion, I think that although both authors represent the two male characters in a negative way, it is only Charlotte Perkins Gillman who presents a feminist view. I think this because even though Rhoda Brooks does manage to cope with bringing up her son on her own, there is no accomplishment of women over men in this story. This may be because the author was male and that Charlotte Perkins Gillman had very strong feminist beliefs anyway. I don’t think that the representation of men is necessarily fair because not all men are unfaithful or betraying, yet the two male characters in the narratives were portrayed in a negative way fairly as they had both carried out appalling acts at the expense of women.
