The Detective and the Rose - Jack Robinson and Rosie

Jack and Rosie, Murder most scandalous

I mentioned Rosie Sanderson in my post about Jack Robinson, but never talked about her so much and I know you all prefer Phryne Fisher as Jack's companion (the whole Phrack thing) and I do too, but I think it is important to talk about Rosie as well.

We do not really get to know much about Jack's first marriage more than the fact that the First World War drove he and his wife apart. Rosie is vaguely mentioned already in Murder on the Ballarat Train and we get small glimpses into their estranged marriage, until we hear they get a divorce in Murder in the Dark at the end of season 1.

We (and Phryne) get to meet Rosie for the first time in Murder most Scandalous, the first episode of season 2 and she is part of the overarching plotline in that season. She is the daughter of the Deputy Commisioner, George Sanderson and we and Jack find out that she is now engaged to her father's godson Sidney Fletcher.

Rosie, Marked for Murder

I do not hate Rosie! In fact I feel sorry for her. She does not really do anything wrong. She seems to come from a privileged household and she was probably raised into a traditional female role. I discussed the thought of "the ideal woman" in my entry about Phryne and the Astrid Lindgren girls. It originated among the bourgeois in late 18th century Europe. The bourgeois woman was considered more or less too fragile to do anything.The man was the one out in society. He created it and did so to fit himself. The woman, on the other hand, was confined to the home where her main task was to please the bourgeois man who's guidance she needed to move through life. She was her husband's subordinate in everything and she was supposed to love him submissively. During the late 19th century, these gender roles spread to other social classes, which is quite strange since experiences from basically every other social class proved that women were just as capable as men.

These gender roles are interesting in relation to Rosie, Phryne and Jack and explains their characters and actions pretty well. We do not know if Rosie belonged to a working class family before her father gained power and titles in the police force. The fact that she married a working class man (Jack) seems to indicate this. She could have married "down" of course, the system provided women with far more opportunities to move in the class system of that time than men, but we can assume she was born rather privileged. This would also mean that she was raised to fit into the category of the ideal woman at the time, described above. This means that she was raised to not have anything to do with society outside the home and to marry and support someone like her father.

Phryne meeting Rosie for the first time, Murder Most Scandalous

Compare this to Phryne who was not raised among the bourgeois. Instead, she was raised very poor and in the lower societal classes, the women had to be out and about to provide for their families just as the men did. In theory, the women were subordinated the men, but in practice they were more or less equal. This meant that she is much more used to defy the norm of the woman (and the man) that is considered a static trait among the bourgeois. Instead of idolising her father like Rosie does hers. She more or less loathes him.

Jack and Rosie, Murder most scandalous

This background explains how they both deal with men, including Jack. Rosie idolises her father and wants Jack to have a career like his. The series has not given us any facts about Jack's character prior to the war. Therefore it remains my own speculation to think that he was probably not too content or happy with the prospect of imitating his father-in-law's career even then. For short, Rosie is not used to bend societal norms. She treats Jack like her father, because that is the only type of man she knows of. I also think this is why her marriage to Jack collapsed after the war. Again, we are not told or shown what actually happened, but due to Jack's sensitive nature, one might guess he was depressed and/or shell shocked which was the term used for PTSD at the time. This was probably something entirely new to Rosie and the fact that she was raised to more or less "obey" the norms to whatever cost probably did not help.

Jack and Rosie, Murder Most Scandalous

Similar to Rosie, Phryne also treats Jack like she would her father. Actually Concetta Fabrizzi  is the only one of the three women in Jack's life that we are aware of, that does not seem to do that (I am saving Concetta for a future Phrack post.). Phryne also tend to seek male bed partners that is similar to her father. However, Jack is nothing like Henry Fisher and while Rosie does not really seem to realise she hurts Jack, Phryne does. Even though Phryne is unfamiliar with men like Jack, she does not follow the norms as strictly as Rosie does and therefore is not unfamiliar with people who fall out of them... like Jack.

Jack, Murder most Scandalous

I have compared Jack to the Astrid Lindgren boys before and the comparison works even in this case. He is neither like George Sanderson nor Henry Fisher. He is sensitive, introvered and rather emotional. I find it interesting to compare him to the hero of the book Mio min Mio (Mio my Mio). When he lives in Stockholm and is called Bo Vilhelm Olsson, he learns that boys need to be tough and brave and should never show emotions. He is never happy with this and really blooms out only when he gets to Landet i fjärran (The land of far away) and becomes prince Mio. There he can really let go of the boy norms and show how scared he is, be emotional and even hug his best friend Jum-Jum. This is also when he becomes a super hero, saving all the children from the evil Riddar Kato with a heart of stone. Jack is pretty much the same. He becomes happy when he can break free of the male norm and be his own fantastic self.

Jack: "I went to war a newlywed"
Phryne: "But you came home."
Jack: "Not the man my wife married... 16 years ago"

 ~ Raisins and Almonds

Like I said in the beginning of this (too) long post, I do not hate Rosie and I do not think the series wants us to either. In fact, Rosie's plotline is a rather tragic one. Rosie does everything right according to the book, but still comes out on the losing end of things and I do not think she ever understands what went wrong. It is obvious that she still trusts and cares for Jack (not least because of the fact that she is openly jealous of Phryne), but she does not know how to love him. The same goes for Jack I think. He still cares for Rosie (He comforts her at the end of Unnatural habits.), but he knows he cannot be the man she needs and he does not love her (He goes to Phryne instead.).

Jack and Rosie, Unnatural Habits