Effects of Submission

Since my last blog post not much has changed towards the memoir i'm reading "This Boy's Life" by Tobias Wolff. It's still very controversial, but now it's somewhat to become somewhat frustrating for me. This is mostly because while i've been reading it's hard not to put myself inside Tobias's shoes. A kid who lives with his mom because his parents are divorced, so he just wants his mom to find happiness again. Because of this he allows himself to get run over by people. Mostly suitors to his mom which means that he has to face every time she gets heartbroken, and see guy after guy behind her. Worst of all Rosemary (his mom) had a particular knack of finding the worst and most messed up guys for a relationship. First came Roy whom I mentioned on an earlier post, then came Dwight he sure was a "keeper". At first he seemed to be very polite and quite the gentlemen, but then after his mom made a an agreement to move in with him everything changed. Tobias came to live first in his house while his mom was making some arrangements, so she wouldn't be there for a few days or months. Meanwhile during this time Dwight became this really evil person, he became what had always been. This is when he started to physically and verbally abuse of Tobias in a very cruel and harsh manner. This is where I was very frustrated because Tobias didn't tell his mom what was going on. I'm still not sure if it was out of wanting to see his mom happy or not wanting her to continue to be sad. Still I found this to be a very noble and loyal act from Tobias, but there is a point when not telling her from the beginning backfires. Rosemary moves in and Dwight knowing that he already has her in his grasp brings out his normal self, and the abuse starts towards her as well. This was very controversial as this search for happiness that Tobias and his mom were trying to find became a search for freedom and normality. Out of nowhere that house became a prison for both Dwight was a really volatile person. He just didn't think of his actions. I wish I could write what I really think of him, but there would just be to much cursing (although he deserved every word). This sham continued for many years it just got worse.

After reading i'm still not able to think what I would do in that type of situation. There is one thing though that makes me think which is the timeframe of when all this happened. It was around the 50's, which means society was very different from today's. Something like that nowadays would be frowned upon and punished by law without any doubt. My question is if at that time was this type of household behavior frequent? was violence normal within the average household? I would really like to know more about that subject. As well as women rights at that time, because this book really reflects the inferiority and degradation of women. It makes them seem completely submissive in a patriarchal society. This is reflected in Rosemary as she has always been stepped on by men, and really not much has been done by her in this subject. After all she has been trough I wouldn't of thought twice to move out immediately from that house. What would you do if you were in Tobias's and Rosemary's shoes?