"The doll", a gender issue

Today’s topic is an other short story I read at school, “The doll” by Jean Rhis, which deals with a child who act in a different way from the other women of her age. As a matter of fact, the story begins with two presents arrived from the Irish granny of the protagonist, which are two beautiful dolls, one fair and the other one dark. As soon as the little girl saw the dark one, she realized that she wanted her like she had never wanted anything before. Unfortunately her little sister made a quick move towards the object of the desire. She tried to explain she saw the dark doll first, but her mother immediately rushed to her sister rescue, reminding her that she was the elder one and she should have been pleased to make her little sister happy, also because nobody would have loved her if she had  been so selfish. The girl was so angry she ran away in the garden and decided to smash the poor fair doll’s face, even though she didn’t really know why. Her mother was so uneasy that she asked the help of her husband, a figure that we can guess was not so present in her daughter’s life. He looked disappointed and he scolded her for her bad gesture, and he also threatened her not to let her go to her great aunt Jane, a person we can guess was very important to the protagonist. However he recommended her not to worry her mother once again and decided not to give her a punishment. Only when she was in her great aunt’s arms she felt guilty about what she had done and she wept.

Perhaps we can interprete the implicit moral of this short story as a description of the behaviors that people expected from women in the historical period of the author. In fact, the little girl of the story has a way of act that isn’t as compliant as that of the other women in her family, apart from great aunt Jane, the only one that really knows her, ‘cause she is rebel, headstrong, she has her own ideas, she wants to makes his own decisions and she fights for what she wants, not fitting in. In the text we also read that there was an other aunt that didn’t like the child just because she hated sewing, a task considered proper for girls at that time, and this is an other example of the nonconformism to the society rules of that age.

Also nowadays there are still differences between the behave and the way of be that society consider appropriate for male and female gender, for instance in sports, clothes and even feelings: boys are pushed since their childhood by their families to be strong, aggressive, powerfull and competitive,in order to achieve positions of power and prestige, for example in the world of work. On the contrary, girls are encouraged to dedicate themselves to more delicated sport, such as dancing, just ‘cause they appear weak and fragile.

I think is time to mix this behaviours, also swapping the roles model that we consider inappropriate for us!

Do you agree with me? Let me know your ideas! :)

"The weapon" by Frederic Brown

Hi! How are you? :)

Today I’d like to talk about “The weapon” by Frederic Brown, a short story we studied at school in our English classes. It deals with Dr. James Graham, who is the key scientist of a project, which consists in the developing of an ultimate weapon. One evening a stranger, Mr. Niemand, visits him. While Niemand starts talking about the potential danger of the ambitious project, the scientist’s mentally arrested son comes in, so his father introduces the boy to Niemand, who seems to like him. The discussion between the two man continues until Niemand ask for a drink. While Graham is in the kitchen, Niemand gives Harry, the boy, a gift. Only when Niemand is gone, the scientist discovers what the gift really is: a loaded revolver, which makes him wonder that only a madman would give a weapon like that to a retarded child.. So we can think that Niemand had tried to make Graham realized how his weapon could be dangerous for the entire population, which is not ready to use it well, even though he doesn’t feel responsible for what people may do with what he’s giving to them.

I think that we can interpret the moral of this short story as a kind of comparison with actual conflicts between science or progress and moral or ethics. I’m thinking, for instance, about the discussion on nuclear power, which is an important case of the development of science which can also become a danger for the environment safety and the human being’s health. As a matter of fact, in history we can find a lot of cases of ecological disasters such as what happened in Fukushima last year or in Chernobyl in 80’s, or what has been caused in Hiroshima and Nagasaki by the explosion of the atomic bomb, which is an other example of misuse of scientific power.

So, in my opinion, this text aims at explain that we really have to pay attention to scientific discoveries and, above all, we have to learn to use knowledge in a proper, responsible and positive way.

What do you think about this issue? Are you in favour or against nuclear plants? Tell me :)

Let's cook!

Hi guys! Today, as soon as I woke up, I prepared some delicious pancakes for me and my family for breakfast :) I also added some maple syrup, and here's the result:


They were absolutely gorgeous! :)
And what about you? Do you like cooking? Let me know and feel free to add comment or photos if you want :)