Rossum Gender Roles

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Karl Capek’s Rossum’s Universal Robots (R.U.R) follows an unexpected theme of gender. Even though the main aspect of the book is robots, who have no real gender, the book explores society’s ideas of masculinity but more prominently femininity. While this work was published in 1921 it’s sexist ideas and language cannot be overlooked. In a satirical way R.U.R explores women's sometimes empty role, lack of choices and self-determination, and their value as reproducers.
Notably, the only real female character in the book is Helena Glory, daughter of an influential businessman. At first, her value comes only from who her father is and then once she takes of her veil it comes only from her beauty. This is clear throughout the entire play in the …show more content…
She herself asserts that her question might be a stupid thing to ask, in this way she is diminishing herself before the men even get the chance (33). The way they disregard her solely because she is a woman is further evident when they are discussing what they should do concerning the manuscript. “Helena: Harry, please… Domin: Wait, Helena. We’re talking about a serious matter here. What do you think, lads, to sell it or destroy it? Fabry?” (83). Here, not only does he tell Helena to stop talking as this is a serious matter they are discussing, but he then defers to his male colleagues to see what they think. Helena should not be considered just because she is his wife, but also as someone who is directly affected by the problem at hand. This denial to let her speak and claim that it is because it is a serious matter shows how they do not see her as having any real value or voice of her own. Anything that she could say in a serious matter is completely disregarded as the foolish musings of a woman. She is even told to be overly emotional by Domin when they see Busman die. Domin simply says "Cry, Helena."(92). Insinuating that is a typical female response and what she should be doing on her own
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