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Lopez 1 Katia Lopez Dr.

Haas Writing 37 30 January 2014

A Womans Worth The great Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie once said, We teach them [girls] to shrink themselves, to make themselves smaller. We say to girls, You can have ambition, but not too much. You should aim to be successful, but not too successful, otherwise, you will threaten the man. Our society has drilled into both men and womens heads that women should not do anything that may threaten a mans masculinity. I believe since the beginning of time Adichies statement has been true. Till most recently though, women in the 21st century have learned that they are much more than just a wife to their husband and a mom to their children because before their husband and children were there for them, they just had themselves. I strongly agree that the biggest different between a woman in the 21st century and a woman in the Victorian Era like Mrs. Stapleton is that a woman in the 21st century knows what she is worth rather than lets herself be told what she is worth. The reason I am writing this essay is to enlighten my audience on the roles of women in the Victorian Era and how they have changed throughout the years. Let us face it, it has never been easy to be a woman in a mans world. Women are constantly objectified and looked down by men. Aside from being objectified, women also face expectations that they must meet in order to be considered a woman; one of them being marriage and the other being to bear children. But believe me when I say that as a woman in the 21st

Lopez 2 century, we could do it all. Women nowadays are able to hold high-powered positions in corporations and at the end of the day still come home to a family. A great example would be Ivanka Trump. Not only is Ivanka Trump a business woman/model/writer, but she is also a mother to two children. Oprah Winfrey without a doubt is a great example of a powerful woman in the 21st century. Not only has she been on the Forbes 400 list but she is also the wealthiest African American in the 20th century and still has time for her significant other. Clearly, these two women know what they are worth and know what they are capable of. Women in the Victorian Era did not know that and allowed themselves to be mistreated, like Mrs. Stapleton did. In Sir Arthur Conan Doyles The Hound of the Baskerville published in 1902, Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson are asked to help a young man uncover the secrets of his family. Along the way, Sherlock and Watson meet an interesting duo, Mr. Stapleton, a naturalist and his beautiful sister Miss Beryl Stapleton. Throughout the novel, we learn that Mr. Stapleton is in fact married to Miss. Stapleton and has been abusing her both mentally and physically. Mr. Stapleton had been making his wife help him with his crimes. In one of the passages of Hound of the Baskerville we learn that Mr. Stapleton tied up his wife after he hit her for not cooperating with him. On page 256 Mrs. Stapleton (notice she is no longer Miss. Stapleton) says the following, Oh, this villain! See how he has treated me! She shot her arm out from her sleeves, and we saw with horror that they were all mottled with bruises. But this is nothingnothing! It is my mind and soul that he has tortured and defiled. I could endure it all, ill-usage, solitude, a life of deception, everything, as long as I could still cling to the hope that I had his love, but now I know that in this also I have been his dupe and his tool (Doyle 256). Mrs. Stapleton has allowed herself to be manipulated by her husband for many years and it is in this passage where

Lopez 3 she is speaking to Holmes and Watson that she learns there is no chance of her husband changing. Back in the Victorian Era, women did anything to keep their husbands happy, like Mrs. Stapleton would do for Mr. Stapleton. Women back in the Victorian Era did not know what they were worth. They believed everything they did was a reflection of their husband and so in order to avoid embarrassing their husbands they would not do anything that would call unwanted attention to them or their family. Women in the Victorian Era were not allowed to do many of the things men did either good or bad. For example, women were not allowed to have jobs men usually had. Women had three duties, those duties included taking care of: their husband, their children, and their home. Aside from not being able to have the same jobs as men, women were not allowed to act like men. For example, in Silver Blaze one of the 56 Sherlock Holmes short stories tells the story of a horse trainer who tried sabotaging the horse he was training because he had bet against it. The only reason he bet against his own horse was because he knew he could stop his horse from winning. But why would a trainer want to hurt their own horse you may ask? As it turns out, the trainer had a mistress who had very expensive taste and in order to keep her satisfied, the trainer had to spend all of his money on her, leaving him in debt. Because the trainer was a male, it was still frowned upon to have a mistress but the degree of punishment was not as bad as it would have been for a woman who was unfaithful to her husband. If a woman were to be unfaithful to her husband she would be ostracized and deemed impure. So why was it that women in the Victorian Era allowed themselves to be mistreated? I firmly believe it had to do with the lack of rights women had. Women had to do as they were told and were not allowed to do anything about it. As time passed and women gained rights they gained a voice as well. Women in the 21st century do not allow themselves to be talked down to

Lopez 4 anymore. They have learned from history that as long as they let themselves be demeaned, they will continue to be treated that way.

Work Cited: Doyle, Sir Arthur Conan. The Hound of the Baskerville. United Kingdom: The Strand Magazine, 1902. Print. Doyle, Sir Arthur Conan. The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes Adventure 1: Silver Blaze. England: Newnes. 1894. Print. Adichie, Chimamanda Ngozi. We Should All Be Feminist. Ted X Talks, 29 Apr. 2013. Web. 2 Feb. 2014.

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