When I first saw the title of the book I never really thought about what it meant, and it was until the end of chapter seven that I finally was able to connect the title and its meaning to the novel. At the end of chapter seven, after Sara’s father Reb drives his oldest three daughters away from love and then foolishly loses $400 on an un-stocked food store, his wife has enough of it and yells at him, “If only I were a widow people would pity themselves on me. But with you around, they think I got a bread giver when what I have is a stone giver,” (p 141). A bread giver is literally the person who gives the family bread, the one who puts food on the table and supports the family financially. Traditionally in a Jewish household this is supposed to be the male figure. It is expected for the man, the father, the husband, to go out and make the most money so that he could feed his family. Women are considered inferior to men. They aren’t smart enough to be on their own. They aren’t even good enough to get into heaven unless they are married to a man. However, Reb Smolinsky is quite the opposite of a breadgiver, and his choice in sons in law show to be quite the same.
It is ironic how a man who is so devoted to his religion and his culture, acts the total opposite than what is expected of him. In the public eye he seems to be a loved figure who brings wealth to his family through his public display of preaching and bragging. But in reality it is his daughters and his wife who are the ones bringing the money home. They are the ones who need to take care of him because he doesn’t even work claiming that his brain is worth more than money. And at the same time he expects to be the head of all financial decisions, dumb enough to purchase an empty food store without consulting his wife, the real brain of the household.
Since Reb figuratively has the title of a bread giver he has the ultimate say on who his daughters marry. And so he ends up picking out men that are like him, men who claim they are able to support their wife when in reality all they do is try to support themselves leaving the burden of the household on their wife’s back. When his daughters try to marry the men they love, Reb finds a reason to kick them out, whether they be too poor, unreligious, or too greedy. He finds a flaw in each of them but when his choices turn out to be horrible men, he doesn’t see it and blames the girls. For the beautiful Mashah her breadgiver is a fake, he acts as though he has money spending it all on his looks so that he can look rich, when in reality his family is starving and Mashah has to be the one to get money to pay the bills and even buy milk for her children. For the smart Fania, her bread giver too is a fake, as he gambles away everything leaving her miserable. And for the hardworking Bessie, her bread giver that promised to take away her burden gave her a bigger one instead with a business to help out with and five step children to take care of.
Seeing the way that her mother and sisters are treated by the men they are around shapes Sara into being the young woman that she is. Ever since she was little, Sara knew to never feel the need to be dependent on a man to take care of her. Her goal in life is to be an independent woman, with an education and no need for a man to support her. She is her own bread giver, she provides for herself, and shows everyone that her American dream means that she can finally be someone other than just a wife or a mother. That females here are just as equal as men. Sara breaks through the barrier and defeats the stereotype of who the bread giver really is.
