Gender Roles in Happiness, as Such by Natalia Ginzburg Essay Example

Happiness as such by Natalia Ginzburg is set in Italy in the early 1960s, during the cold war fascist era that followed World War II. The novel gains its structure from the numerous letters written to a distant family member, Michele. The letters written to Michele are by his mother Adriana, his sisters, Mara, and Osvaldo. The two different generations of parents happen to also be in different economic and social classes. These factors influence the parenting style of the parents. Adriana and her now deceased ex-husband, the father of Michele, had a different parenting strategy than Mara and Michele. Although Michele is not the baby’s father for sure, he chips in whenever he can. The gender roles for parenting are very stereotypical and present no surprises for the reader. The author is a woman, so one could expect the gender roles to be realistic rather than stereotypical because a female author would not necessarily like to be a part of the gender roles. Mara is more involved in the baby’s life than Michele. Her main duty is to take care of the kid, and Michele just provides the money. The treatment of parenting in this novel is interesting. As the different generations and economic status impact the parenting strategy, there is a similarity due to the gender roles that are followed being cliché. 

Adriana is the prime example of the older generation of parent. Adriana is the mother of Michele and is in her 40s. Adriana is a complex character. Adriana was never happy with her ex-husband and now is a lonely woman who is helpless and solves that by writing her kids letters. Michele was not raised by his mother, but his father raised him. She was very involved in raising the other kids and now feels very lonely without them in the house. Adriana explains that even Matilde could live in the house because she is so lonely: “I told him that I was lonely and needed company. I preferred Matilde to no one at all” (47). Matilde is the very annoying aunt of Michele, who everyone despises, even Adriana. So, for Adriana to let Matilde live with her says a lot about how lonely Adriana is. The older generation’s style of parenting is to be so involved in the kid’s life that she writes Michele letters frequently with the hope that he will write back. At the start of the novel, Adriana has great hope for Michele. Adriana believes she will get to see him, or he will come home and build the cage. This hope diminishes a bit daily as Michele continues to move further away from his family in Italy. From the novel, it seems as though the older generation parents have strict expectations for their kids and like to be involved in the kids’ lives greatly. Adriana seemed to get disappointed in Michele many times but continued to have faith in him for a while. She letters her disappointment in Michele by saying: “I called in a carpenter to build cages. I knew I wouldn’t be able to rely on you for this tiny favor. I understand it’s not your fault. But the way things go it seems like I can never count on any little favors from you” (29). In this passage, it is clear Adriana is disappointed in Michele as he failed to build the cage for the rabbits.

Mara is the newer generation parent who also happens to be in a lower economic class than Adriana. As Adriana has the availability of all the resources at her leisure, Mara is the complete opposite. It is known that Adriana has money because her ex-husband was a great artist of his time, and with that, he accumulated a great deal of wealth. On the other hand, Mara goes from house to house for shelter because she doesn’t have the funds to rent out a place. Osvaldo describes Mara as: “he says she’s just a lost soul with no money. There are no chairs in her apartment, or blankets…” (27). Mara’s main source of money at this point is the money she receives from numerous people, like Michele, Osvaldo, and even Adriana. She has fewer resources available to her than Adriana and must raise the baby completely by herself. Mara is more spontaneous, which could reflect being in the newer generation or just a necessity of the lower social status. Mara is not impacted much by Michele not being available to raise the kid. Adriana, on the other hand, was quite upset that Michele was only raised by his father and that he had no role in the daughter’s lives. The difference in social class impacts the parenting strategies more than the difference in generations. It is not because of the generation that Mara must ask for favors or sleep around with other men just to have her baby sleep in a comfortable bed at night. It is wrong to say one generation is a better parent than the other because they had different circumstances, which were essentially determined by their social classes. 

Lastly, the trite representation of parenting is consistent for both Adriana and Mara. The stereotypical way of parenting is that the mother takes care of the kids at home while the father earns the money to take care of his family. Stereotypes about parenting have existed since the Paleolithic era of human society. In the Paleolithic era, women were expected to take care of the kids and gather fruit while the men were out hunting and bringing food for the family. Adriana and Mara hold very conventional gender roles when it comes to taking care of their kids. Adriana raised her daughters whilst her only son was in her ex-husband’s care. Adriana explains how Michele’s father never cared about his daughters: “But he didn’t care about your sisters. You are his light. From the moment you came into the world he got it stuck in his head that you are the only person in the world worthy of his kindness and praise. We talked about you, even though he’s well aware I don’t understand you at all and that he is the only one who really knows you” (6). This follows the standard gender role where the father only cares about the son and places all his focus on him. Michele’s father did not care about his daughters compared to how much he seemingly cared about Michele. The father was not very present in the daughter’s lives as they lived away from each other after the divorce. 

Mara also follows the cliché gender roles set by society prior to her. Mara’s situation is quite different than Adriana’s was, but they share similarities by both following the stereotypical gender roles. Michele was never confirmed to be the father of the kid, but he was never present in Mara’s life with the kid. He fulfilled his stereotypical fatherly duties by chipping in money to Mara for the baby’s needs. Michele himself did not have a good amount of money as he was always switching professions and seemed to be chasing something. Michele asks his family for help with the money and gives her some for an abortion: “I gave her money for an abortion, but she didn’t get it. I slept with her a few times so the baby could be mine. She was with a lot of men though. Bring her a little money if you can” (32). Although this money is for an abortion Michele is still abiding by his gender role of providing the money for the family. Michele is as distant as his father was from his daughters. The gender roles were followed strictly by Natalia Ginzburg, which could be surprising to the reader. It could be surprising because Ginzburg was a woman   she would fight the stereotypical gender roles, but she complies to them greatly. This could have been a technique to make the novel realistic and believable because the reader is likely used to these roles.

All in all, Ginzburg uses Adriana and Mara to show the connection between the two generations and social classes. The connect between the two women is the typical gender roles they both fulfill. Adriana and Mara share similarities in their parenting because of the gender roles they follow. As for being different generations, it does not really impact the parenting strategies too much, although the reader doesn’t know for sure as Mara’s kid is very young. Adriana being in a different social and economic class than Mara certainly has a greater impact on the parenting. Adriana has all the resources available to her, whilst Mara must do a great deal just to have a roof over her kid’s head. The difference in parenting strategies between Adriana and Mara stems from being in different social classes and being of different generations. The difference between their parenting styles is masked by the stereotypical gender roles that they both follow.