I really liked The Long Arm story by Mary Wilkins Freeman.
The story kept me wanting to discover who had actually killed her father.
I think that it is interesting that the sheriff and others were very quick to lay blame to Rufus even though there was not sufficient evidence to convict the man. And then after Rufus was cleared the blame then went to Henry. It made me think that perhaps in those days, people would not think about a woman as being a killer. Perhaps it is because they were suppose to be so fragile that a woman could not possibly have done such a deed.
I also found it interesting when without any real evidence, aside from no other suspects, the sheriff and the town blamed Sarah for her own father's death. And even then they found no evidence to convict her. Under normal circumstances I would have thought that the sheriff would have done a thorough examination of the clues left in the house. Perhaps this, searching for real evidence, was normal for the time period.
I love that Freeman made Sarah a detective! The character showed that women have more to offer than simply childbearing and taking care of the home. She showed that women of the time period had brains! To have the character go so thoroughly through the home looking for the tiniest clues was a true testament to the way in which a woman's mind can work. To me, she had done the majority of the work in finding the crucial clues that would help Dix to discover who had actually perpetrated the murder of her beloved father. This made his job easier.
I wonder if Freeman was taking on stereotypical images of women when she wrote this story. I also wonder why, after making Sarah so strong she made her a bit weak (having her pass out) upon the revelation that Phoebe had killed her father. I am also curious as to why she threw in the line about Demonic possession. Was she saying that demonic possession was the only way a woman could do such a dreadful deed? I hope this is not the case, because this line takes power away from the character and makes the woman appear to be a weaker sex.
The fact that Phoebe was willing to kill to keep her family intact took on the typical stereotype of family. I wonder if Freeman was actually intending this when she wrote the story or if it was unintentional? Any ideas?
~Amy N.
I agree with your assessment that women were probably mostly viewed as being incapable of such a crime. Sarah herself has difficulty accepting the truth when she finds out that her neighbor killed her father, not because she was her friend but because she was a woman. I think that society at that time would prefer to place the blame onto a man rather than a woman.
ReplyDeleteI also really liked that Sarah was made to be a detective. She found clues that nobody else was able to, such as the ring in the chair leg because she was smart. I liked that Freeman created strong woman characters that contradicted a lot of the social norms and expectations of the time.
~Amanda Renslow
Amy, Freeman certainly does like creating powerful female characters that break the stereotypical view of weak women. I like your ideas that they did not immediately jump to women as suspects because they viewed women as too weak. They probably did not think of women as violent in nature.
ReplyDeleteIn my opinion, Phoebe was not just killing to keep her family. She certainly killed him neither to protect Maria nor in Maria’s best interest as every sign demonstrated that Maria would have been very happy with Sarah’s father. To some extent, Phoebe may have killed Sarah’s father in order to keep her house in line, but to me she did it more to avoid losing control. The first engagement she easily quashed, but when Maria agreed to marry him the second time, Phoebe knew that the only way to keep her power over Maria was to kill him. Phoebe needed someone to dominate over; she wasn’t afraid of losing her family, but rather of losing her control over another person. She might have had some fear of being alone, but I would think that she would not go to such extreme lengths just to avoid being left alone. Just some thoughts… As people are rarely motivated by just one impulse, Phoebe’s decision probably came from all of these. I just don’t think it is purely stereotypical since part of her wanted to maintain her power (which as woman was unusual), but in order to maintain her power, she needed to have someone under her.
These are interesting ideas about the relative strength (and intelligence) of women and the amount of both that they are credited with by the law. Sarah can accept, after a fashion, her father's need to dominate her and show his power over her, but it seems unnatural for her to credit Maria with the same desire.
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ReplyDeleteI really liked this one as well. It was fun to see how Sarah used deductive logic to piece things together. It was very much like a detective story or Sherlock Holmes. It is also interesting that you bring up the ideas of strength and intelligence in women as compared to men. I think that she wrote it this way to break out of the stereotypes because, yes, women are capable of murder and in her time people needed to see that. Especially since this was based off of the Borden case and Lizzie Borden was acquitted. ~Alyssa G.
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