Blog one- Mrs. Joe

Mrs. Joe has been established as a stern and hostile woman through her abuse who often resorts to hitting others. Mrs. Joe, the wife of a blacksmith named Joe and and the sister to Pip runs a strict household. In this scene, Joe, Mrs. Joe and Pip are sitting down to their meal of bread and butter. Joe and Pip usually have a fun little contest when they eat their bread and look at their bite marks, however, Pip is not eating his bread. Pip's bread disappears while Joe isn't looking and Joe questions what happens, thinking that Pip ate it in one bite, causing a problem for Mrs. Joe. She wants to know what is going on and Joe apparently doesn't give her a proper answer, which she demands. “By this time my sister was quite desperate, so she pounced on Joe, and, taking him by the two whiskers, knocked his head for a little while against the wall behind him: while I sat in the corner, looking guiltily on”(p.11). As you can see, Mrs. Joe resorts to abuse when she demands something she wants. This quote shows how she runs her house: intimidating and hitting others others. She wants to know the answer and knocks Joe's head against the wall until he tells her. She is clearly the head of the house, taking control of Joe and Pip. She treats them both like children even though Joe is the male in the house. Both Joe and Pip are inferior to her. But the weird thing is that Joe allows her to abuse and hit them, instead of telling her to stop. This shows how Mrs. Joe is superior to him, proving how she uses abuse to run her household. Therefore, this shows that Mrs. Joe is violent and abusive because of the way she treats others, especially Joe and Pip.