Self Control In Mona Gardner's The Dinner Party

In a tense situation, who would have more self control, a man or a woman? Well no matter what you chose, the story, “The Dinner Party,” shows that it doesn't matter at all what gender you are. The dinner party featured a few variety of guests at the host and hostess house. An argument then spikes up between a little girl and a high ranking Colonel. The young girl says that women are out of there stage of being freaked out and screaming during a tense or frightening situation. The colonel strongly disagrees with the girls statement. Later in the story their dispute is solved when a cobra is present in the room and the guests reactions will resolve the conflict in different ways. In this same fashion, Mona Gardner uses the guests to express her message that the amount of self control is not determined in any way by gender. One of the characters that supports the authors theme is the colonel. The colonel represents the point of view on how males have more self control than females. While on the other hand, the young girl reinforces how women have just as much self control as men. The dispute both creates the

The hostess was also seen little throughout the story but actually had a reason for her silence unlike the naturalist. The reason she kept quiet was because she was aware of the cobras presence which later on, this reaction would make the colonels statement incorrect . The hostess represents the author's message by proving that women have just the same amount of self control as men. She sustained the message by stating, “Because it was crawling across my foot.” Although the statement seems small and contains little information, that was actually what the author was going for since in the end the hostess and the american’s actions did not require any explaining. Without the hostess, the colonels remarks would have remained true and the little girl’s statement would have been shut