In My Ántonia, by Willa Cather explores the hardship life of living in the wild prairies of Nebraska as people immigrant further west from already established areas of civilization. While many themes are presented during the novel, the subject of gender roles within her female characters of the novel question the stereotypical norms of men and women. The women portrayed in the text become independent, active and strong through the situations presented to them by their surroundings. The physical geography of the novel lends a heavy hand on who the characters are in the novel and shape who they will become through the journey of life in the plains of America. The women in My Ántonia are the product of their harsh environment and it forces
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The group of girls consisting of not only Antonia, but Tiny and Lena who come from almost the same background, they strive to move forward in life with their drive to be something more than country girls and escape the cruelty of life. All three girls reinvent themselves to adapt and survive in their given situation and new environment beyond the herding and cropping fields. As females, they push the boundaries and definition of the gender roles in their manner during the novel. Lena Lingard, in the country side is scantily clothed with a ratty dress because she comes from a poor family with no money to afford better clothes for Lena. Once in Black Hawk as a ‘hired girl’, she is taken under the wing of Mrs. Thomas the dress maker and is able to succeed and afford to dress properly in fancy dresses. Lena claims her independence by rejecting the idea of her own family, “I don’t want to marry Nick, or any other man.’ Lena murmured. ‘I’ve seen a good deal of married life, and I don’t care for it. I want to be so I can help my mother and the children at home, and not have to ask lief of anybody,” (Cather 137). The three girls lose their femininity in result of the rough work in the fields and gain it back when they explore the freedom of dancing and interacting with the opposite males without the disregards of adult supervision in the dancing pavilion, “now there was there a place where the girls could wear their new dresses, and where once could laugh out loud without being reproved by the ensuing silence,” (Cather 155). In the novel they represent, the strength of women with desire to move forward in life with their own
The group of girls consisting of not only Antonia, but Tiny and Lena who come from almost the same background, they strive to move forward in life with their drive to be something more than country girls and escape the cruelty of life. All three girls reinvent themselves to adapt and survive in their given situation and new environment beyond the herding and cropping fields. As females, they push the boundaries and definition of the gender roles in their manner during the novel. Lena Lingard, in the country side is scantily clothed with a ratty dress because she comes from a poor family with no money to afford better clothes for Lena. Once in Black Hawk as a ‘hired girl’, she is taken under the wing of Mrs. Thomas the dress maker and is able to succeed and afford to dress properly in fancy dresses. Lena claims her independence by rejecting the idea of her own family, “I don’t want to marry Nick, or any other man.’ Lena murmured. ‘I’ve seen a good deal of married life, and I don’t care for it. I want to be so I can help my mother and the children at home, and not have to ask lief of anybody,” (Cather 137). The three girls lose their femininity in result of the rough work in the fields and gain it back when they explore the freedom of dancing and interacting with the opposite males without the disregards of adult supervision in the dancing pavilion, “now there was there a place where the girls could wear their new dresses, and where once could laugh out loud without being reproved by the ensuing silence,” (Cather 155). In the novel they represent, the strength of women with desire to move forward in life with their own