Before the 1920’s women had very few rights in politics, education, sports, and fashion. Suffragists fought for a long time against those who said they would never get what they want. In this essay we’ll also be connecting to The Great Gatsby to see how F. Scott Fitzgerald showed examples of the struggles women had went through when they were coming up in the world. The biggest right many women fought for was their right to vote. Men believed that women were too emotional and uneducated. Women then were a lot stronger than the men thought. They “cared for one another in childbirth and sickness…they toiled from sunup to sundown…and tended the ground the men had cleared” with no appreciation by men of the hard work they did (centuryofstruggle). If there were a sense of weakness they would have quit. These women soon found their will power to start the suffrage movement. This wasn’t the first time they organized a group, “it was in the abolition movement that the women first learned to organize [and] hold public meetings.”(centuryofstruggle). “Votes for women were first seriously proposed in the United States in July, 1848 at the Seneca Falls Woman’s Rights convention organized by Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Lucretia Mott.”(womenshistory). This was the beginning of the struggle for women to become equal to men. “In [the] war, women [were] the most silent victims.” This quote was very true about the women (womenshistory). During the war it was obvious that the men were victims considering that the men had to actually go to war and die for their country but women were still home being treated unkindly all over the world without any choice. “Women took up jobs in factories to support the war as well as taking more act... ... middle of paper ... ...aughter, her gestures, her assertions became more violently affected moment by moment and as she expanded the room grew smaller around her until she seemed to be revolving on a noisy, creaking pivot through the smoky air” (Fitzgerald 35). Myrtle represents the “need” of women to be known for having money and wealth so that she is much more popular. Myrtle wears the dress to disguise her current status and act as if she is a part of the rich, but in reality she is poor and naive, but the transformation of the dress changes her to rich and conceited. In conclusion, Fitzgerald did an astonishing job at portraying all aspects of life in the 1920’s in his book through his characters. Women really made a change not only during their era, but in today’s society. Women are more willing to go and do what they want without any restrictions limiting their potential.
However, the writers of the Constitution had omitted women in that pivotal statement which left women to be denied these “unalienable” rights given to every countryman. Gaining the support of many, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, the leader of the Women’s Rights Movement declared at Seneca Falls that women had the same rights as men including the right to vote and be a part of government. The Women’s Rights movement gained support due to the years of abuse women endured. For years, men had “the power to chastise and imprison his wife…” and they were tired of suffering (Doc I). The new concept of the cult of domesticity supported women’s roles in society but created greater divisions between men and women.
Today, women and men have equal rights, however not long ago men believed women were lower than them. During the late eighteenth century, men expected women to stay at home and raise children. Women were given very few opportunities to expand their education past high school because colleges and universities would not accept females. This was a loss for women everywhere because it took away positions of power for them. It was even frowned upon if a woman showed interest in medicine or law because that was a man 's place not a woman’s, just like it was a man 's duty to vote and not a woman 's. The road to women 's right was long and hard, but many women helped push the right to vote, the one that was at the front of that group was Susan B. Anthony.
F. Scotts Fitzgerald uses his description of Myrtle to tell the reader of her social class and structure. During the novel the narrator states “She had changed her dress to a brown figured muslin which stretched tight over her rather large hips as Tom helped her to the platform in New York. At the newsstand she bought a copy of Town Tattle and a moving
Myrtle appears as the total opposite character to the Daisy. She is ‘thick, faintly stout” (Fitzgerald 29), but “sensuously” and “immediately perceptible about her vitality” (Fitzgerald 29). She is the woman from “the bottom” who wants to be acceptable as a lady from the upper class. She is terribly vulgar, but she is more alive and natural than Daisy is. The unpleasant scene in their apartments, where Carraway appeared because of Myrtle’s invitation, is full of the philistine contentment and boasting.
F. Scott Fitzgerald wrote The Great Gatsby which reflects the extravagance of the roaring twenties. Fitzgerald grew up facing adversity, but gained success from his publishings. Just as Gatsby’s reign of wealth and fame came to an end, Fitzgerald soon became an alcoholic. Fitzgerald wrote his third novel, The Great Gatsby, based off his own life experiences. Throughout his life he faced many obstacles that are mirrored in the lives of the characters in the novel. Growing up, he was constantly aware of the lack of privilege and wealth surrounding his family. Nick faces the same struggle to fit in socially because he lacks wealth and social status. Similarly, his relationship with Zelda was tainted by his adultery which he acknowledges as acceptable for men, but not for women. The sexism that Tom’s character exudes shows Tom’s underlying morals. The Great Gatsby resembles a reflection of
Set in the Roaring ‘20s, The Great Gatsby focuses mainly on the lives of men as Tom Buchanan and Jay Gatsby. However, it also clearly outlines the lives of several women : Daisy Buchanan, Myrtle Wilson, and Jordan Baker. On the surface, the lives of these women couldn’t be more different. Daisy, a rich debutante, is torn between her husband, Tom, or her first love, Jay Gatsby. Lower on the social ladder is Myrtle, who is having an affair with Tom, hoping to rise above her station in life. Jordan, on the other hand, is unmarried and a successful golfer, who travels the country participating in tournaments. While these women may have seemed independent, they’re still subject to the will of society which sees them as inferior and objects to be controlled by men.
During America's early history, women were denied some of the rights to well-being by men. For example, married women couldn't own property and had no legal claim to any money that they might earn, and women hadn't the right to vote. They were expected to focus on housework and motherhood, and didn't have to join politics. On the contrary, they didn't have to be interested in them. Then, in order to ratify this amendment they were prompted to a long and hard fight; victory took decades of agitation and protest. Beginning in the 19th century, some generations of women's suffrage supporters lobbied to achieve what a lot of Americans needed: a radical change of the Constitution. The movement for women's rights began to organize after 1848 at the national level. In July of that year, reformers Elizabeth Cady Stanton(1815-1902) and Lucretia Mott (1793-1880), along with Susan B. Anthony (1820-1906) and other activists organized the first convention for women's rights at Seneca Falls, New York. More than 300 people, mostly women but also some men, attended it. Then, they raised public awar...
All in all, American suffragists sacrificed their time and risked their lives just to claim themselves the right that they should be given for long time ago. The Nineteenth Amendment was ratified in 1920 which give American women a voice in politics by voting. Following the ratification was the time of World War II that gave women opportunity to get back to the work force. Men were being sent out to war, women were recruited actively in working forces. Despite the contribution of women to the war, they were still seen as secondary to men. Because of that, the hope for equality in gender in the United States grew even stronger after World War II.
Considered as the defining work of the 1920s, The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald was published in 1925, when America was just coming out of one of the most violent wars in the nation’s history. World War 1 had taken the lives of many young people who fought and sacrificed for our country on another continent. The war left many families without fathers, sons, and husbands. The 1920s is an era filled with rich and dazzling history, where Americans experienced changes in lifestyle from music to rebellion against the United States government. Those that are born into that era grew up in a more carefree, extravagant environment that would affect their interactions with others as well as their attitudes about themselves and societal expectations. In this novel, symbols are used to represent the changing times and create a picture of this era for generations to come. The history, settings, characters, and symbols embedded in The Great Gatsby exemplify life in America during the 1920s.
The fight for women’s rights began long before the Civil War, but the most prominent issue began after the fourteenth and fifteenth amendments joined the Constitution. The rights to all “citizens” of the United States identified all true “citizens” as men and therefore incited a revolution in civil rights for women (“The Fight for Women’s Suffrage”). The National Women’s Suffrage Convention of 1868
Myrtle’s perception of reality is blurred. She fails to recognize her social standing as someone of the lower class, and instead brings upon a self lead pretentious charade that she is of the upper class. She has an acquired habit of stating that various aspect in her life are under her expectations. She insists that she only “married him because (she) thought he was a gentleman”, and that he “fit to lick ...
While her, Tom, and Nick are in the car she spontaneously decides she wants Tom to buy her a “police dog”, so he buys her what the sales person calls a police dog without questioning her (Fitzgerald 27). Hence, this shows Myrtles craving for the materialistic things that come with money. On the other hand, at her party, she talks about how marrying her husband was a mistake, and leaves you to believe it is because of his lack of money. “I knew right away I had made a mistake. He borrowed somebody’s best suit to get married in” (Fitzgerald 35).
Throughout time women have been written as the lesser sex, weaker, secondary characters. They are portrayed as dumb, stupid, and nothing more than their fading beauty. They are written as if they need to be saved or helped because they cannot help themselves. Women, such as Daisy Buchanan who believes all a woman can be is a “beautiful little fool”, Mrs Mallard who quite died when she lost her freedom from her husband, Eliza Perkins who rights the main character a woman who is a mental health patient who happens to be a woman being locked up by her husband, and then Carlos Andres Gomez who recognizes the sexism problem and wants to change it. Women in The Great Gatsby, “The Story of an Hour,” “The Yellow Wall Paper” and the poem “When” are oppressed because the fundamental concept of equality that America is based on undermines gender equality.
This movement had great leaders who were willing to deal with the ridicule and the disrespect that came along with being a woman. At that time they were fighting for what they thought to be true and realistic. Some of the great women who were willing to deal with those things were Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Lucretia Mott, Jane Hunt, Mary McClintock, and Martha C. Wright. These women gave this movement, its spark by conduction the first ever women 's right’s convention. This convention was held in a church in Seneca Falls in 1848. At this convection they expressed their problems with how they were treated, as being less than a man. These women offered solutions to the problem by drafting the Declaration of Sentiments and Resolutions. They cleverly based the document after the Declaration of Independence. The opening line of their document was “We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men and women are created equal” (Shi & Mayer 361). In this declaration they discuss the history of how women have been treated and how men have denied them rights, which go against everything they believe in. This convention was the spark that really
Why is the novel so intrigued by Myrtle Wilson’s “immediately perceptible vitality” (30), on the one hand, yet almost viciously cruel in its mockery of her upper class pretension on the other hand? (see for example, pp.29-35 where Nick contrasts Myrtle’s “intense vitality” with her and her sister Catherine’s laughable attempts to posture themselves as modern society women. Indeed, Nick twice remarks Catherine’s plucked and redrawn eyebrows as affronts to her “nature” (see p.34, and again at the very end on pp.171-172). What’s up with that?)