Women Finding Their Voices in Jane Smileys A Thousand Acres :: Smiley Thousand Acres Essays

Women Finding Their Voices in A Thousand nation     Women, just like spirit or the land, have been seen as something to be used, says Smiley.Feminists insist that women have intrinsic value, just as environmentalists believe that nature has its own worth, independent of its use to man (Duffy 92). Larry Cook, the senile, old power holder and baffle in Jane Smileys A Thousand Acres, is a prime example of a man who believes that women and land are nothing more than objects that exist on this earth further so that he can mold them. Larrys compulsion with control begins in his marriage. In Larrys mind the only thing his matrimonial woman was necessary for was cooking and fairishing. Larry also becomes obsessed with controlling his daughters, not only through disciplinary actions but also through molestation. He continues to control Ginny and Rose well into their adult lives. Because of their mothers premature death, Ginny and Rose are force to take over the househol d. Their main jobs are to look after their particular sister, Caroline, and to cook and clean. Rose and Ginny continue to look after Larry on a daily basis well after they are both married and have lives and children of their own. Even though neither of the daughters really wants to cook and clean for Larry, both feel obligated to look after him because he has instilled so practically fear into them. Ginny tells the reader of this obligation My job remained what it had al manners been-to fertilize him what he asked of me, and if he showed discontent, to try and find out what would please him (Smiley 115). in like manner forcing his daughters to take care of him, Larry also controls Ginny and Rose through molestation. As wizard critic observes, The implication is that the impulse to incest concerns not so much ride as a will to power, an expression of yet another way the woman serves the man (Duffy 92). The women in this novel are fairly passive voice and tend to let the men m anipulate them. According to Martha Duffy, Smiley sees a striking between the exploitation of women and that of the land. The land is stronger than the women in this novel in that scorn the fact that men manipulate and attempt to change it as much as possible, it is still its own entity. This presents a contrast to what occurs when the women are dominated.