Charlotte Perkins Gilman does NOT want to be a man, actually...

Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s short narrative “If I Were a Man…” is a perfect example of a few of James Phelan’s rules in “The Concept of Voice”, in that Phelan’s narrative gives structure to the voice of Mollie Mathews through Gerald. Basically, Gilman may offer the audience a beautifully wrapped treat but, when unwrapped, it gives a sharp bite. I would like to look at this narrative’s peculiar voice with only Phelan’s first two rules.

Phelan’s 4 Rules:

1) Voice is as much a social phenomenon as it is an individual one.

2) Voice is the fusion of style, tone, and values.

3) The presence of the author’s voice need not be signaled by any direct statements on his or her part but through some device in the narrator’s language – or indeed through such nonlinguistic clues as the structure of the action – for conveying a discrepancy in values or judgments between author and narrator.

4) Voice exists in the space between style and character.

Rule number 1 states that Voice is prevalent throughout a piece of literature and isn’t always tacked to one phenomenon within the script. Phelan states that “wherever there is discourse there is voice”(44), so what he means is that in any form of communication, whether its between characters or the audience and author, there is always the style and utterance of the author’s influence. In Gilman’s narrative, her voice’s style is acutely charming sarcasm. At first the audience is swayed with the sweetness of it, but as lines reveal themselves, it is harder and harder to consider these statements as valid and innocent. For example, Mollie’s character description, “Little, of course—no true woman may be big. Pretty, of course—no true woman could possibly be plain” (170). What seem like compliments are merely demoralizing degradations of women as a whole. ‘Little’ can mean anything from inferior, weak, and vulnerable, to no-intelligence, powerless, and cowardly. ‘Pretty’ may seem like a legitimate compliment until one sees the pressure and stress presented with the word; you are not a woman unless you are beautiful in the eyes of a man. Her words are manipulative in a half-conscious way, writing in a smooth delightful style but throwing in these contrasting comparisons. In fact, Gilman’s voice likes to curl slyly about her word choices and careful syntax, subtly creating a conflict in ideals. Men are “erect and square-shouldered” with always the “last word” in their ears, and “the right size” with good feet that were “firm and solid on the ground” (170-171) while women are presented in the light above as little, foolish, and silly. This flaunting of masculinity as a form of superiority illustrates the chasm between the ideal man and the ideal woman, where the man is powerful and reasoned and the woman is weak and whimsical. This contrast offers the conflict within the narrative some principle, and through her voice Gilman reveals this depth of interaction.

Rule 2 is closely hand-in-hand with Rule 1, as in the description of voice. Rule 1 focuses on prevalence of the voice, while Rule 2 focuses on the character of the voice. The voice is a fusion of the author’s intent, what does he/she setting out to show or prove? How will he/she pursue that goal? “Style will reveal the register of a voice” (45) and through Gilman’s personal style she charms as well as educates her audience. Tone will sway the audience to her angle, she sets the voice to a specific influx and the audience responds to that stimulus. When Mollie as Gerald begins speaking about the hats of the people on the train, Gilman gets us to see the men’s hats as “sensible” and “dignified”, while the women’s hats are “foolish” and “tipped, twisted, [and] tortured into every crooked shape” (172). What we perhaps would previously have perceived as a ‘boring man hat’ or an ‘extravagant woman hat’ has now been flipped and shaped into a whole new perception due to Gilman’s purpose of literary code switching. The voice persuades our views as the story continues when Gerald is talking to the other men on the train. Each offers their belittling understandings of women, such as “They haven’t much mind to make up, you know”, “The real danger is that they’ll overstep the limits of their God appointed sphere”, “Their natural limits ought to hold ‘em… you can’t get around physiology”, and my personal favorite “[they] brought evil into the world” (174-175). Each of these comments is presented to show the values of men who are blind in superiority, and Mollie/Gerald’s next statements cut them back down to size. Here is where Gilman gives her voice a clear ringing, no longer hiding in the cloud of charming sarcasm. Mollie/Gerald’s statements are Gilman’s entire purpose of writing the narrative, flashing about her feminism and oppression through the mouth of a perceived man. She touches on the smarts of a woman as well as athletic endurance, saying how both have the ability to surpass any man. But here is the overall point she makes, “women are pretty much people,” (175) and she explains that women are trapped in a system that men make and how any form of trying to be sensible has them tabooed and alienated, for as she says, “if a woman is courageous enough to wear common-sense clothes… [what man] wants to dance with her?” (175). In the society presented where all these men have enlarged egotistical superiority complexes, I would imagine none. This inference shows that in order for a woman to be loved, she must become that whimsical, charming fool, and nothing more ambitious. Gilman also retorts to the (not-so-holy-ever-loving) clergyman that even if women brought evil into the world, men are the ones who “keep it going” (175) and therefore are capable of much evil themselves.

This strong presentation of voice through style, values, tone, and discourse, encompass “If I Were a Man…” quite passionately. Here is where I find the most emotional connection between the audience and the narrative, which just happen to also be Phelan’s first two rules. This glue that holds the story to perception and meaning is critical to Gilman’s (and countless other women’s) purpose between 1900 and 1930, which was women’s suffrage and other equal rights. Emotion triggers a reaction that can lead to a response in the form of action, Phelan helped define these triggers while Gilman pushed for the right reaction.