Women Rule!

The title is a bit of a joke.  But not really. 

It is time to discuss Ragtime and Gender.  Presenting the quote of the day, as given to me by the internet as I forgot to bring Ragtime  home with me, and I do not have a copy of Ragtime here: "He looked in Mother's eyes to detect there his justice. He found instead a woman curious and alert to his new being. He realized that every night since he's returned they had slept in the same bed. She was in some way not as vigorously modest as she'd been. She took his gaze. She came to bed with her hair unbraided. Her hand one night brushed down his chest and same to rest below his nightshirt. He decided that God had punishments in store so devious there was no sense trying to anticipate what they were. With a groan he turned to her and found her ready. Her hand pulling his face to hers did not feel his tears." (page unknown at this time)  This quote refers to Father when he returns from his exhibition to the North Pole.   I suppose in a certain way, he can represent his generation coming into a new era in which women began to gain control of their sexuality and to yearn for an active role in the world around them, besides simply the home.   Father finds, upon returning home, that his wife is not what he expected, she has changed into a woman much more in charge of her life and the world than he has previously believed a woman should be.   This can be seen as similar in many ways to men of Father's generation, living in a changing time in which women want more from their lives, and they themselves unsure of their own new role and how to react to changes contrary to everything they had previously experienced and believed.  This slow transition of gender roles, still in happening today, is seen to be a disrupting factor for not only the women working towards more independence and equality, but also for the men- who, perhaps like Father, have no clear, rigidly defined sexism, but nevertheless find themselves shocked and uncomfortable with the independence women were seeking at the beginning of the 20th century.  Gender roles and changes affect not only Men exclusively or Women exclusively, but also their relationships and how they are able to interact, raise a family, and learn to be happy in a new atmosphere.  The dissolving of Father and Mother's relationship demonstrates the havoc women's reach for equality caused for women, scared and determined to come into their own, men, shocked and unsure how to react to changes, and their children, at the outskirts, watching their world change, with expectations for their own generation changing at every passing moment.