Jesse Emerich 03/20/14Ragtime Essay Lit & Pol Bl. 4BDFE. L. Doctorow's novel, Ragtime, offers a tale that mixes historical and fictional characters in America at the turn of the century. Halfway between fiction and history, the novel leads the reader to question what is real and what is false. Through interlocking stories and relationships, each character develops their own story and personality. Set in a time of great change, the characters experience and undergo great transformations, for better or for worse. Two important movements occurred during this time: the women's rights movement and the African American civil rights movement. Mother and Coalhouse represent these movements throughout the novel and the time period changes, respectively. The beginning of the novel portrays Mother as what would have been considered the normal housewife. She cooked, cleaned, took care of her child and pleased her husband. But during her husband's absence, she gained some independence by taking charge of his professional duties. When the father returns, it is evident that the woman he has returned to is a changed woman and the relationship between the mother and father changes drastically. He notices on their bedside table, pamphlets by Emma Goldman, an anarchist revolutionary advocating equality between men and women. This shows Mother's interest in women's rights and her independence of thought. The mother seems to become more open intellectually and sexually, which irritates the father as she moves away from the middle of the paper. He suffered great discrimination from white Americans. His fight for justice was admirable as he fought for equal treatment, but his means turned violent and his fight became one in which he became a villain. The mother seems to succeed in achieving her goals of becoming her own person and finding happiness, while Coalhouse receives his Model T, repaired, his love died in the process and so he welcomes death in the end, accepting that his struggle is finished. . But with the end of the novel came a great historical triumph, Mother fully displayed the new age by accepting Tateh, a Jewish socialist, as her husband, without caring where he came from or his political positions, but simply enjoying his character, and Coalhouse had revealed to many people the prejudice he had suffered and thus raised awareness of African-American discrimination..