One\ndefinition of insanity, often attributed to Einstein, is performing the same\naction over and over and expecting different results. What else can everyday\ndomestic activities be, then, but a descent into insanity? <\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
Daddy\u2019s\nGone A-Hunting<\/em>, written by Penelope Mortimer,was\nreleased in 2008 by Persephone Books as their 77th<\/sup> novel. The\nindependent publisher aims to celebrate forgotten female creativity by\nreprinting books predominantly written by women authors from the mid-twentieth\ncentury before female voices were beginning to truly be heard. Although Daddy\u2019s Gone A-Hunting <\/em>isn\u2019t a light,\nentertaining read like their most popular bestseller, Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day<\/em>, Mortimer\u2019s novel fits particularly\nwell with the publisher\u2019s goal to depict the situation of women during this\ntime. It presents a realistic portrayal as opposed to a potentially\nentertaining exaggeration of a housewife\u2019s experiences. The book follows the\nmonotonous existence of a married woman living in a community of similarly\npositioned wives who must entertain themselves while their children are away at\nboarding school and their husbands are at work in the city. Weeks living with\nno one else, a life so isolating it could quite literally drive a woman insane,\nas the protagonist discovers. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Ruth Whiting is trapped in a loveless\nmarriage that resembles \u201ca long war in which attack, if not happening, was\nalways imminent\u201d (9). After eighteen years and three children, Ruth is living\nin an affluent neighborhood, the Common, as one of many housewives left to tend\nthe home while their families are away. The wives are all \u201clike little icebergs,\u201d\nonly showing a happy, bright surface while concealing their true selves under\nthe surface (33). The Common is likened to a prison by Ruth. There, she is\nisolated in her home and confined to a repetitive existence, \u201cmonths of anguish\nand boredom\u201d in domestic seclusion (7). <\/p>\n\n\n\n Ruth narrates her own descent into\nalcohol and insanity at the beginning of the novel, aware of her deteriorating\nstate and how visible it is to her family and neighbors but unable to seek\nproper help. A doctor and a live-in nurse are hired to care for her, but they\ndiminish her depression to \u201cthis little affair of yours\u201d and provide no help\n(68). She builds fantasies to distract from \u201cunvarying days,\u201d indulging in\nself-deception to pass the time as she grows older and remains unchanged (9). Ruth\nhas trained herself to ignore unpleasant facts of life. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The expectations of women in the\n1950\u2019s when this book was originally published adhere closely to the life Ruth\nsuffers. Confined to the home, women were expected to handle domestic affairs\nand rear children. Ruth is trapped by her gender, social class, and era to an\nunsatisfying existence; she is intelligent enough to recognize the pointless\nrepetition of her life but unable to find a way to escape the limitations\nsociety has placed on her. However, a woman\u2019s role began to change during this\nperiod as feminism started to spread. This ideological shift is apparent in\nRuth\u2019s daughter, Angela.<\/p>\n\n\n\n An Oxford University student, Angela\nis described as intelligent even as the expectation of marriage is still\npresent from her father and the neighbors. The main conflict in the novel\ncenters on generational difference. Angela\u2019s situation mirrors her mother\u2019s;\nAngela is the same age as Ruth was when she faced these domestic issues. However,\nAngela takes action to change her fate while Ruth passively followed her\nfather\u2019s demands. Angela acts as a foil to Ruth in her decision to preserve the\nlife she wants rather than conform to societal expectations. She also\nrepresents a generational gap as ideas about gender equality that weren\u2019t\npresent during Ruth\u2019s youth enter British society. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Recognizing that her daughter needs\nher, Ruth pulls herself out of her depression. Her actions are driven by a need\nto help her daughter escape the fate Ruth currently lives. Despite the effort\nRuth goes to and her success in helping her daughter, Angela ultimately leaves\nto move on with her life and Ruth is left unable to share her \u201cbelated love, a\nsmall, painfully achieved humanity\u201d with her daughter (239). The inability of\nRuth and Angela to connect and bond is due to a failure to communicate with one\nanother. The writing style reveals the characters\u2019 thoughts and feelings that\nare never spoken aloud in a third-person omniscient point of view that focuses\non Ruth but extends to all the characters throughout the novel. This at times\nuncomfortably intimate perspective highlights how the social environment these\ncharacters occupy dissuades them from honest conversation. Ruth is part of a\ncommunity of women who must meet strict expectations of appearance, manner, and\nattitude while Angela actively rebels against such uniformity and\ncategorization. She strives for independence in a way Ruth was unable to even\nidentify as a possibility.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The novel begins with Ruth sending\nher sons Julian and Mike off to school and then going shopping. Sequestered\nfrom the outside world in this private system of privilege with no demand for\nher contribution, Ruth\u2019s only way to occupy her time is to shop, the packages\nshe purchases \u201cher guarantee for the future\u201d (6). The ritualistic unboxing and\nsorting and storing of items she doesn\u2019t need gives her purpose in an otherwise\nempty life. By the end of the novel, Ruth is again unloading parcels from her\ncar; the fulfillment she found in helping her daughter is gone, leaving a void\nshe once more fills with unnecessary purchases. Her existence remains\nrepetitive and dull as shown by this reoccurring scene in the beginning and\nending of the novel.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Ruth\u2019s reliance on shopping to fill\nempty hours and an empty house is reflected in today\u2019s focus on consumerism and\nthe ideology of buying happiness. Until recently, women were most commonly\nplaced in the role of consumer as it was assumed the wife would take on the\ndomestic responsibilities of maintaining the house and will therefore make the\nmost purchases. In Mortimer\u2019s novel, Ruth and the other wives living in the neighborhood\nhave nothing else to do but shop and maintain the house, bringing to life this\nplacement of women now considered outdated in a text that will horrify and\nfascinate readers. Ruth\u2019s excuses to leave the home in search of help for\nAngela all center on going to London to buy Christmas presents; even when\nactively going against the mold she is placed in, Ruth must do so by following\nthe expected narrative of the housewife consumer. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Persephone Books has successfully\ncultivated a recognizable brand by sleeving their books in uniform grey covers\nand pricing each at \u00a313;\nyet, all of their releases are unique in content. They publish a wide\nrange from cookbooks to non-fiction. The specialized artwork that decorates the\ninside of the front and back covers and a personalized bookmark further\ndifferentiates each book from the next and highlights the tone or other aspects\nof the novel. The artwork for Daddy\u2019s\nGone A-Hunting<\/em>\u2014a women alone in the frame, dressed in yellow and dark blue\nand green, colors that merge with those of the background until she is nearly\nindistinguishable\u2014reflects how insignificant Ruth finds her own existence. The\npicture is surrounded by a white border, trapping the woman in her small,\nisolated section. This visual representation summarizes the novel for potential\nreaders perhaps better than a synopsis or excerpt. Persephone Books is\ndedicated to reviving lost works and giving a voice to the struggles of women\nbefore, during, and following the Second World War; this novelis one of many examples of their\nsuccess.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Stories\nlike Daddy\u2019s Gone A-Hunting <\/em>are\nimportant to inform readers of how generations of women were once treated;\nignored, pitied, and domesticated. The wives of the Common are brilliant\nindividuals in their own right and, \u201ccombined, their energy could start a\nrevolution;\u201d yet, there is never any movement of these women (34). This wasted\npotential suggests that perhaps the true source of domestic insanity lies not\nin the repetitive motions themselves, but the society that forces women\ninto this\nmold. The circular nature of the book, the return to conformity at the end,\nencourages readers to consider how we can break similar often unacknowledged\nand potentially harmful patterns in our own society. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" By: Anna Maltbie One definition of insanity, often attributed to Einstein, is performing the same action over and over and expecting different results. What else can everyday domestic activities be, then, but a descent into insanity?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2819,"featured_media":778,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_bbp_topic_count":0,"_bbp_reply_count":0,"_bbp_total_topic_count":0,"_bbp_total_reply_count":0,"_bbp_voice_count":0,"_bbp_anonymous_reply_count":0,"_bbp_topic_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_reply_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_forum_subforum_count":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[211,1],"tags":[177,41,178,179],"class_list":["post-776","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-books-we-like","category-uncategorized","tag-anna-maltbie","tag-book-review","tag-daddys-gona-a-hunting","tag-penelope-mortimer"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.miamioh.edu\/creativewriting\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/776","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.miamioh.edu\/creativewriting\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.miamioh.edu\/creativewriting\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.miamioh.edu\/creativewriting\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2819"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.miamioh.edu\/creativewriting\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=776"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sites.miamioh.edu\/creativewriting\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/776\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.miamioh.edu\/creativewriting\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/778"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.miamioh.edu\/creativewriting\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=776"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.miamioh.edu\/creativewriting\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=776"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.miamioh.edu\/creativewriting\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=776"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}