A COLLECTION of SHORT STORIES and ACCOMPANYING CRITICAL COMMENTARY ZOE LAMBERT Thesis Submitted in Partial Fulf
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WHEN I GET HOME: A COLLECTION OF SHORT STORIES AND ACCOMPANYING CRITICAL COMMENTARY ZOE LAMBERT Thesis submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements of the Manchester Metropolitan University for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Department of English Manchester Metropolitan University .. 2010 ," ý. ýaý TABLE OF CONTENTS Abstract p.3 .............................................................................................................................. Acknowledgements p.4 ............................................................................................................. Introduction p. 5 ......................................................................................................................... Part 1: When I Get Home `To Basra' p.7 ............................................................................................................................ `The New Girl p. 14 ................................................................................................................... `The Bunker' p. 18 ..................................................................................................................... In My Grandmother's Life' 24 `Significant Objects ..............................................................p. `What He Doesn't Tell Her' p.27 .............................................................................................. `The War Tour' p.32 ................................................................................................................. `Fishfinger' p.42 ...................................................................................................................... `Lad Lazarus' p.46 .................................................................................................................... `Down Duchy Road' p.54 ......................................................................................................... `Lebensborn' p.60 .................................................................................................................... Last Holiday' p.78 `Their ......................................................................................................... `Thermal Vest' p. 85 .................................................................................................................. Mrs Charlotte Manning' 89 `A Biography of ....................................................................... p. `33 Bullets' p.97 ....................................................................................................................... Part 2: Critical Commentary Section 1: Short Story Theory: The Quest for Definition 107 ............................................... p. Section 2: Short Story Theory WhenI Get Home 127 and .................................................... p. Section 3: Ethics Voice Appropriation 136 and .................................................................... p. Section 3: The Home Women's Writing 152 and ................................................................. p. Section 5: The Home in War Fiction 164 ..............................................................................p. Section 6: Writing Self: Childhood Home 189 the and .......................................................... p. Section 7: Collections Stories: Form Connections in WhenI Get Home 204 of and ............p. Conclusion:Form Politics in WhenI Get Home 209 and ......................................................p. Bibliography 213 .................................................................................................................... p. 2 ABSTRACT The collection of stories WhenI Get Home explores the loss of home and the effects of war for and persecution on migrants and refugees, as well as children's capacity cruelty and lyric one's own potential for violence. The short stories blend elements of the modem forms. story, horror, metafiction, travel narrative and more fragmented postmodern In the critical commentary I situate the collection within contemporary short fiction and by Eileen short story theory, drawing on the theory of the modem lyrical story Baldeshwiler as well as theories of postmodern short fiction. While critical theory tends to form is prefer the experimental story over the traditional, I argue that the postmodern not necessarily more progressive than traditional forms. Instead, I contend that each story produces its own politics in the act of writing. I broach the ethics of voice appropriation when writing about characters from different ethnic backgrounds and ask how an ethical practice might be possible. I relate my representation of the home to the cultural and literary debates around women's writing and the domestic, and defend the domestic as an important literary starting point. I contest the ongoing separation of the private and public spheres in the cultural evaluation of women's writing by demonstrating how I have placed the home at the centre of my stories about war and persecution. I situate my approach within war literature and analyse how the home is represented in war fiction by men and women writers. I consider how memory and imagination have played a complex role in my stories about childhood. I analyse the gap between the speaking, narrating self and the seeing, narrated childhood self in the story and argue that this gap is used by short story writers to interrogate the practice of writing the self. Finally, I take into consideration the form of the short story collection and contend that stories should be read in relation to other stories in a collection and not as single texts. Throughout the commentary I emphasisethe process of writing and drafting of the stories rather than focusing on the finished text, and in so doing, I demonstrate that when writing there is no preconceived ideology between form and content; politics is written anew with each story. 3 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS First and foremost I would like to thank the Department of English for funding this PhD and allowing me to changethe direction of my studies. I would like to thank my supervisory team: Vicki Bertram for making this creative PhD possible, Sue Zlosnik for her attention to detail, and Nicholas Royle for his feedback and editorial eye. I would like to thank Margaret Beetham for the workshops, feedback and encouragement; Mark Hallihan, Helen Pleasance,Maria Roberts, Ana Miller and Jennifer Makumbi for reading drafts, feedback and support. For many reasons,I would also like to thank Sara D' Orazio, Anthony Dawson, Merlyn Taylor, Ra Page, Jon Glover and most of all, my family. 4 INTRODUCTION The first part of this thesis is my collection of stories When I Get Home. The stories explore the loss of home and the effects of war and persecution on migrants and refugees in different historical and cultural circumstances, from the effects of the Lebensborn program on a Norwegian woman to the oppression of a Kurdish academic. One's own capacity for cruelty and violence is explored in stories about childhood and alternative reality. These stories blend elements of the modern lyric story, horror, metafiction, travel narrative and more fragmented postmodern forms. In the second part of this thesis I will situate my short fiction within contemporary writing and short story theory. In particular, I will look at Baldeshwiler's notion of the `epical' and `lyrical' short story, and go on to analyse the fragmentation and self-reflexivity of more recent writing. I will counter the essentialising definitions of some short story theories, and attempt a more open approach by drawing on the views of Frank O'Connor and Nadine Gordimer. While literary theory generally sees the postmodern short story as being more progressive than traditional forms, I will propose that no writing technique is in itself progressive and political. Rather the specifics of the text's narrative strategies and the cultural circumstances of the production of the text determine its politics. I will then broach the ethics of voice appropriation when writing about characters from different cultural backgrounds, and attempt to find an ethical practice. I will relate my representation of the home to the cultural and literary debates around women's writing and the domestic and defend the domestic as an important literary starting point. I will contest the ongoing separation of the private and public spheres in cultural evaluation of women's writing, which Virginia Woolf highlighted in her comment that `this is an important book, the critics assume because it deals with war. This is an insignificant book becauseit deals with the feelings of a woman in a drawing room'. To do this I will demonstratehow I have placed the home at the centre of my stories about war and persecution. I will situate my approachwithin war literature and analyse how the home is representedin war fiction by men and women writers. I will subsequently discuss issues of writing the self and short stories about childhood, and consider how memory and imagination have played a complex role in my stories about childhood. I will analyse the 5 gap between the speaking,narrating self in the story and the seeing, narrated childhood self and argue that this gap is used by short story writers to interrogate the practice of writing the self. Finally, I will discuss the interrelationships and links between the stories in When I Get Home and contend that analysing a short story without taking its relationship to the other stories in a collection or anthology