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The Midwife's Parentice Analysis

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Historical Fiction Novel Analysis The novel The Midwife’s Apprentice by Karen Cushman is about a 13 year old girl called Brat who has not found her place in society until she meets Jane the Midwife. Brat undergoes several identity changes when she changes her name from Brat to Beetle then eventually to Alyce. This novel is set in a small village in England during the 14th century. Brat was accustomed to the lifestyle of sleeping in dung heaps and traveling on foot from village to village begging for her next meal. While begging she encounters the Jane the Midwife. She is surprised to get the response, “Those who don’t work don’t eat” (Cushman 4). To this Brat responds, “I will work, Mistress. I am stronger and smarter than I seem” (4). This is how Brat became Alyce the apprentice to Jane the Midwife. Karen Cushman’s The Midwife’s Apprentice accurately portrays the relationship between a midwife and her apprentice and the technology and methods used by a midwife in medieval England. Often, midwives did not treat their apprentices with respect. Midwifery was a craft involved in the guild system. Within guilds there are superior positions and inferior positions. In this case, the midwife Jane holds a superior position over her apprentice Alyce. Towards the beginning of the novel Cushman writes, “Beetle waited outside while …show more content…

Both the relation between a superior midwife and her inferior apprentice and the use of humors and herbs in medical practice were accurate in Cushman’s novel. Midwives treated their apprentices with no respect because the apprentices were there just to learn, not to make a profit. The technology used by Jane the Midwife was confirmed by several sources; both primary and secondary sources. It appears that before writing her novel, Cushman did her research to provide readers with the most accurate information about 14th century

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Laurel Ulrich’s A Midwifes Tale is a book over Marth Ballard who was a New England women living in America. Ulrich uses Marth Ballard diary entries along with other historical documents from the eighteenth century to show her audience the life of women specifically a midwife in the American society, and the sexual standards that were present during the eighteenth century. Martha Ballard the wife of Ephraim Ballard was midwife during the eighteenth century in Hallowell, who not only played the role of a midwife in the society, but also the role of a wife and a mother. Ulrich starts to book by talking about scarlet fever epidemic that had taken places in Hallowell during the summer of 1787. During the time of the fever and after the epidemic had ended, Martha played the role of an important member in the community, even though the social structure in Hallowell was giving more importance to male doctors.

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The midwife had used no magic. She had delivered that baby with work and skill, not magic spells, and Alyce should have been able to do it but could not. She had failed.” (Pg. 70, 2nd paragraph) After this event, she runs away from the village to John Dark’s inn, and learns that Jane Sharp came to talk to Magister Reese.

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Ultimately, as a woman, she is a limited agent and can only do so much indecently. Jane breaks off from the domestic sphere to which she is confined

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Throughout this piece of literature, “The Midwife’s Apprentice”, Alyce (or Beetle) went from having no self esteem to having self esteem back to no self esteem. Beetle self esteem raised in chapter 5, “The Merchant”, when a merchant gave her a comb and a compliment. The compliment was “Comb those long curls till they shine, girl, and sure you'll have a lover before nightfall.” This compliment was the first one Beetle ever had received and it made her feel better about herself. She was also called a person she was not, Alyce.

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Around the late 18th to early 19th century, colonial American New England life was centered on living independently and being finally free from the British Empire after the Revolutionary War. Establishing control of a newly founded government with set functions and a first president, there were progressive changes that America had to act upon post-war. However, behind the political aspects that are greatly highlighted in American history, the roles of women in society, particularly midwives shouldn’t be cast aside. Although women were largely marginalized in early New England life because of their gender, nevertheless Laurel Thatcher Ulrich’s A Midwife’s Tale is instructive because it demonstrates the privilege of men’s authority in society

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This is evident in the letters that were sent by Miss Strangeworth. For example the letter directed to the Mrs. Foster, “You never know about doctors. Remember they’re only human and need money like the rest of us”. (5) This shows that she is jealous of Mrs.Foster and her wealth because she is able to afford an expensive operation.

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Mrs. Reed likewise separates Jane from the Reeds’ social circle by confining her to the nursery while her cousins spend their days in the drawing room (22) and calling Mr. Lloyd, the apothecary for “ailing servants,” instead of the family physician for Jane’s illness (15), thus placing her among the servants. However, the servants too reject Jane from their group—Miss Abbot told Jane that she is “less than a servant” because she does “nothing for [her] keep” (9). Jane thus

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To develop the setting of the house, Gilman uses vivid diction to craft an image of the house to show how men a imprisoning the minds of women in Victorian society. Gilman introduces the house as a “colonial mansion, a hereditary estate, I would say a haunted house, and reach the height of romantic felicity” (1066). Although her description uses the words “romantic felicity” which seem to carry a light tone, these words are preceded by the dark statement that the estate is a “haunted house”. By contrasting these two tones, Gilman foreshadows that the house in which the narrator is interned for treatment might seem magnificent and grand, but in reality, the house and the rest cure will turn out to be her doom. The foreshadowing hints that Gilman uses the contrasting description of the house to point out how physicians like John are oppressing women by denying them their right to a postpartum experience with their baby, a thing of “romantic felicity,” and instead, turning it into an ordeal as nightmarish as a “haunted house.”

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Introduction The American Revolution was a very long and extensive war that lasted from 1775 until 1783, and as a result America gained its independence. It is very imperative to highlight the significant role that women played during the American Revolution. During this era a woman was often portrayed as illiterate, child-bearing mother, and a homemaker.

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Gilman intentionally tried to make Jane a typical woman of the time period. She is economically dependent on her husband, as she does not work out of the house. She is not allowed to make her own decisions, John will not let her out of bed, even though she wishes to do so; and she is often treated like a child, John gives her a dirty look when she expresses that she is still not well when he believes that she is getting

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In colonial North America, the lives of women were distinct and described in the roles exhibited in their inscriptions. In this book, Good Wives the roles of woman were neither simple nor insignificant. Ulrich proves in her writing that these women did it all. They were considered housewives, deputy husbands, mistresses, consorts, mothers, friendly neighbors, and last but not least, heroines. These characteristics played an important role in defining what the reality of women’s lives consisted of.

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That is, not only does her mother arrive in town, putting a stop to her schemes, but also the protagonist’s natural biological body disrupts her plans through pregnancy. Indeed, John Richetti argues that: “The early eighteenth-century amatory novella…out one part of the antithesis I am working with: …the heroines are visited by overwhelming and ineffable…passion, obsessions that preclude self-examination and make a mockery of agency and self-consciousness” (336-337) in his essay “Ideas and Voices: The New Novel in Eighteenth-Century England.” The “Shock of Nature” (69), of labour, starts while she is still in town and under her mother’s dominion. The protagonist’s mother is a “severely virtuous” (68) lady, and upon finding her daughter ill, feels “Pity and Tenderness” (69), which is then “succeeded by an adequate Shame and Indignation” (69). Her mother hears Beauplaisir’s story after finding out the truth of her daughter’s schemes.

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Jane Eyre: A Quest for True Happiness Charlotte Bronte’s classic heartfelt novel entitled “Jane Eyre” depicts how an unloved orphan constantly wishes for affection and acceptance throughout her life. Even at an early age in life, she never truly understood what it meant to be “loved” and what it means to “love” others. With this, maturing into a young lady definitely opened her eyes to the realities of life. Moreover, the novel also depicts a patriarchal society where women aren’t respected with dignity and equality. In this coming of age novel, discover how a young woman courageously faced her fears and triumphed with love in the end.

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Charlotte Perkins Gilman addresses the infantilism of Victorian womanhood via “The Yellow Wallpaper” through Jane’s childish actions, John’s patronizing personality, and the nursery’s

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Midwives often were called to court to testify as a medical expert on matters of pregnancy and gynecology. Similar to the instance mentioned above, although medical doctors had more theoretical knowledge about gynecology, Medieval culture generally left all gynecology and oncology to midwives, despite their technical non-expertise. Court records also support this; doctors were called to court to testify for everything but gynecology. Midwives were known to prove impotence, or the inability of a husband or wife to produce children. Impotence was both legal and moral grounds for divorce, and so midwives testified in the courts as a medical “expert”.

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