Herland: Blog #3

My regards towards Herland and McTeague contain a similar mannerism towards each other. The restrainment on McTeague's society is the greed in which they nourish. I could see McTeague trying to escape this restrainment on himself as he goes back to his old bachelor ways as he departs from his marriage. This similar restrainment is seen in Herland as Terry, Vandyck, and Jeff are examining different schemes to escape. Both Norris and Gilman present a realistic depiction in which a society is enclosed towards experimentation and dignity. They both encapsulate the idealized form of how a society should behave, similar to Romanticism as well as a smattering of Rationalism. 

The altering views between the three main characters in Herland strike me. Every opposing view seems to deal with women, and every view is a differing view from each character. Terry, the rich, absent-minded, and outspoken character, view women as possessions, or better, as fruits - to take a bite out of and leave to rot. He always has to speak out first. Jeff, on the other hand, carries a completely contrasting discernment about women. He believes women are perfectly capable of successfully establishing a civilized society and views them as competent human beings, not as little women - the "weaker sex." He always speaks after Terry. These two are representations of the different kinds of men in the world today: the type to treat women as inferior, or the type to think highly of them. Vandyck, the narrator, seems to be the between the two and carries a rationalistic point of view on women. Gilman's purpose of this is really unclear to me, but I have an idea that it might represent the society as a whole, how the middling person always will speak up only after both opposing sides are through addressing their opinions. This type of writing is one that I haven't seen in any of the pieces of writing which I have studied prior to reading Herland.