Feminism | English Essay-1

Running head: ENGLISH ESSAY
ENGLISH ESSAY
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Note

1ENGLISH ESSAY
Feminism is nothing but the concept of securing the equality of different sexes from
different sphere that is social, economic and political. It is a collective behavior where the
effort is provided to secure women’s rights. In order to secure feminism the incorporation of
the system into theoretical aspect is considered to be as feminist theory. The objective of the
theory is to establish gender equality. It has witnessed multiple transformations through ages
and different approaches can be placed to interpret feminism. Gender role on the other hand
is the conventional attitude according to which a male or a female should behave. There are
some appropriate and acceptable set of attitude, distracting from which is considered to be the
violation of it. The text “The Rockinghorse Winner” by D. H. Lawrence can be read from a
couple of feminist approaches and the gender role can be interpreted accordingly. The first
among the two approaches would be addressing how the character of Hester has been
portrayed throughout the story and the other would be analyzing the prevalent gender role
that is probing deeply into the masculinity and also the femininity present here (Ward 150).
The essay tries to concentrate on the visible traits of the multiple characters present in
the short story. The paper initiates with a male character and then it moves forward to analyze
a female character and thus the whole paper is structured and supported with feminist view.
The characters define how the gender role is a strong instrumental aspect of the story that
adds a new dimension without a doubt. Hence the objective of the paper is to determine how
the gender role is challenged throughout the text with feminist theory.
Paul, the protagonist of the story is a scapegoat because he sacrifices his entity for the
sake of fulfilling his mother’s dream. He is merely a teenager who could never exist freely
for himself rather he had to digest his mother’s indifference towards them and move forward
according to her wish. He also had to take part in the horse racing betting even without his
willingness. Although Paul is thirteen and his age is not the right time to determine the role of
gender yet being the protagonist his role whether confirming to the convention of the gender

2ENGLISH ESSAY
or not has to be assessed. Paul is at his tender age where he is utterly disgusted with his
mother’s attitude and feels helpless about the fact that his mother’s sheer pretension is
evoking trouble in his family. Troubled and perturbed Paul ponders upon “Although they
lived in style, they felt always an anxiety in the house” (Lowe-Evans 427). Paul, according to
the convention should have been less emotional and behave more like a man but he feels
extremely broken at his mother’s reply on asking why they were poor. He sets out to make
his luck and discovers that when he rides a horse without even knowing its name he finally
gets to know the name of the horse and wins it ultimately.
Paul had fire in his eyes and he feels anxious like women do. Paul is scared of losing
that is why he pairs up with the gardener, Bassett whenever he is certain about winning but
when he observes that the five thousand pounds that he sends to his mother without revealing
his identity her mother spends them extravagantly. He cannot keep calm when he learns that
his family needs more financial support (Frame 169). Conventional readers associate
confidence, rigidity and a stoutness in a male character and it is a tendency of the readers to
try to fit him into the characteristics of a man. He lacks confidence and impulsively
participates in the betting. Paul fails to stick to his unique identity. He started spending his
whole time with Bassett which he could save from spending in his Latin and Greek class. On
losing in the gambling he not only loses money but also loses confidence and puts himself in
self doubt. He breaks the stereotype of gender role. He is scared and disappointed. He tries
and fails but he does not give up (SMAINE 118). His mother’s unstoppable obsession for
money affected him so badly that he enforced himself into the gambling like anything and
fell of his rocking chair while he was riding on it with a supernatural and uncanny way. He
died and proves that a man can fumble, stagger and fall down before the impossible desire of
women breaking the gender stereotype (Platt 67).

3ENGLISH ESSAY
Hester the mother of Paul is a woman who is often compared to other women created
by Lawrence as “man-devouring woman”. Although she is a mother and woman at first yet
her attitude towards life and her treatment towards her family does not really justify her role
as a woman. She is a perfect instance of reversal of the role of gender (Saberi 99). Everybody
has inflicted cold looks upon her pushing her to feel like she is at fault. She is an ambitious
woman who is always after making money and does not really restrain herself from fulfilling
her demands for being a woman. She adorns herself with all sorts of attributes of men. She
desires to achieve unconditional flow of power, wholesomeness, independence and the
capability of moving forward all alone by her. However, she knows that the conventional
roles of a woman of acting like a wife, a mother or a socialite are nothing but obstacles in the
way of making “more money” that she has always been looking for. Even after all these
vicissitudes she believes that she needs to come back to life cutting off all the shortcomings
she is carrying along with her.
She is somewhere portrayed as the truest form of villain existing in the short story
while she is looked as the victim of the gender binary that a society imposes upon
individuals. She is lost in a delusional dilemma where she cannot solve the puzzle of
autonomous subjectivity and the domain of her social relationship. She abandons the natural
quality of a woman of loving and showing affection (Joyce 155). No emotional turmoil could
touch her and could understand that she was failing miserably as a mother hence she had to
pretend to love her children like Ulysses had to arrange for his son, Telemachas. She lacks in
portraying emotions and could not value the essence of love therefore she had to be
estranged. In reality she was performing the task of a new king while changing into his new
clothes for the sake of pleasing the people. She was wearing the soul of a mother without
even being a real one (Tian 37).

4ENGLISH ESSAY
Therefore it can be concluded that the story that H. D. Lawrence had painted has
clearly broken the threshold of gender convention making the story of its time ahead. Hester
is a mother who does not conform to the role of it while Paul is a young boy who has no
preference of his own. The characters are scattered in their private world fighting against the
pain they are carrying within.

5ENGLISH ESSAY
References
Frame, Rachel. "The Greed Epidemic." tarboard (2015): 169.
Joyce, Justin A. "American gun rights: From national defense to self-defense." Gunslinging
justice. Manchester University Press, 2018.
Lowe-Evans, Mary. "Modernists at Odds: Reconsidering Joyce and Lawrence." English
Literature in Transition, 1880-1920 59.3 (2016): 427.
Platt, Alison. "Boys, ballet and begonias: The Spanish Gardener and its analogues." British
cinema of the 1950s. Manchester University Press, 2018.
Saberi, Sajjad. "A Psychoanalytic Reading of DH Lawrence’s “The Rocking-Horse
Winner”." (2016).
SMAINE, Saliha. "Unconventional Relationships in DH Lawrence’s Sons and Lovers’(1913)
and the Rocking-Horse Winner (1926)." (2017).
Tian, Ning. "On the Alienation of the Mother’s Image in DH Lawrence’s> The Rocking-
Horse Winner<[application of Fromm's theories to art]." (2015).
Ward, Jason Mark. "‘The Rocking-Horse Winner’in Five Genres." The Forgotten Film
Adaptations of DH Lawrence’s Short Stories. Brill Rodopi, 2016. 149-225.