DOCSLIB.ORG

The Daughter As Escape Artist

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
The Daughter As Escape Artist Atlantis Vol. 9 No. 2 Spring/Printemps 1984 10-22 The Daughter as Escape Artist Sue Ann Johnston University of British Columbia We shall not cease from exploration Yet novels by comtemporary women writers And the end of all our exploring show that walking out the door is no guarantee Will be to arrive where we started of freedom. Like Martha Quest, fictional daugh• And know the place for the first time. ters seek escape from the mother and the con• stricting life she represents. They rebel against T.S. Eliot, Four Quartets, V the mother's way of life, often violating her taboos through sexual activity or leaving home We have long been accustomed to reading physically "in hope that emotional separation about male protagonists who long to escape the will follow."3 They do not go far, however, constraints of civilization and "light out for the before they realize not that they cannot go home Territory,"1 but increasingly in twentieth cen• again, but that they have never left. In novels by tury women's novels, we see heroines who leave Margaret Drabble, Margaret Atwood, and Anne home, hoping to create themselves anew. In a Tyler, the heroines' escape from the mother discussion of Margaret Atwood's Lady Oracle, becomes a search for her that is also a search for Clara Thomas reports that "Women students the self. In Jerusalem the Golden (1967), Lady recognize themselves in Joan with the compre• Oracle (1977), and Earthly Possessions (1977), hension that to 'escape,' to leave home, is a basic journeys symbolize flight from the mother— impulse for women, mirrored in countless her• into the arms of a man with whom separation oines' stories, just as for men the complementary and attachment conflicts are re-experienced. impulse is signified in Odysseus' dogged voyage Before they can become individuals with capac• towards home. "2 The distinction, I would argue, ity for mature dependence,4 these heroines face is hardly this clear: even Odysseus takes the most the awesome task of emerging from an overly roundabout route imaginable back to Ithaca, close identification with their mothers. never missing any booty or amorous adventures which thrust themselves on his attention. For In all three novels, daughters struggle with both male and female writers, the journey away self-hatred, craving the love denied them by from home can easily merge with the journey mothers who appear cold and withholding. toward home. The emphasis, however, may be They continually seek self-affirmation, yet fear different; for the sons of Telemakhos, urged to exposing inner selves they do not feel, at bottom, leave home sometimes before they are ready, the to be lovable. Clara Maugham relies on men to impulse in ascendancy may be a homeward one; give her value in other peoples' eyes; Joan Foster for women, traditionally encouraged to stay at fears that her husband will discover her "true home, the driving impulse may be toward self" embodied in her past; Charlotte longs to freedom—physical, spiritual, psychological. escape a husband's "judging gaze... that widened at learning who I really was."5 These heroines hunger for love, but their sense of self is so nebu• twentieth-century daughter's desire for "libera• lous and unsure they cannot trust the love that tion," all three authors point toward possible comes. avenues of feminine growth, self-knowledge, and integration. They can, however, learn a measure of self- love through surrogate mothers upon whom I. Jerusalem the Golden they model themselves. They are attracted to qualities they find lacking in their own mothers— In her study of Margaret Drabble's fiction, personal autonomy, tolerance, warmth. Even Ellen Cronan Rose shows how Drabble, like when they are primarily fantasy figures, as in Arnold Bennett, dramatizes the claims of the Earthly Possessions, these surrogate mothers can past. In her biography of Bennett, Drabble suggest a range of possibilities. writes: With an ideal mother, it is also easier to be an The girl in Jerusalem the Golden like Ben• ideal daughter. Just as these daughters see their nett's first hero [Richard Larch, in A Man mothers as inadequate, they also perceive an From the North], is obsessed with escape, absurd distance between what is expected of and she too is enraptured by trains and them as daughters and how they experience hotels and travelling: she feels she has "a themselves. Humor, a legitmate response to rightful place upon the departure plat• absurdity, seems a survival tactic for all three form" of her home town.6 heroines, helping them to separate the creative, perceiving self from her role enactments. Their Yet the strength of this impulse to escape testifies rueful humor may be an antidote for the kind of to the strength of internal constraints. Freedom, madness other fictional daughters experience Drabble shows us, may be less an escape from the when they step outside themselves for a long, past than a clear-eyed confrontation of it. In a hard look—recall Martha Quest in Four-Gated discussion of Jerusalem the Golden, Lee Edwards City or Esther Greenwood in The Bell Jar. If points out what Drabble adds to traditional sto• Joan Foster can laugh at the picture of herself as ries outlining women's quest for independence: unloved mothball daughter on a stage full of butterflies, perhaps she can gain the love (from ...the vital perception that any attempt by the audience, from us) which she forfeits by not such a character to shape a future into living up to her mother's expectations. Humor, which she can then move must be accom• then, may be a reply to absurdity, the mis-match panied by an equal motion back into the between expectations and reality. character's own past. This past, this net• work of parental expectations and social Clara Maugham, Joan Foster, and Charlotte customs, cannot simply be annihilated, but Emory all attempt to deal with ambivalence must instead be re-perceived in order that, through violent rejection of their mothers and through understanding, it may lose its their past. Yet in their journeys—to London and power to strangle.7 Paris, to Europe, to the American South—these heroines discover that they cannot escape the Growing up in the grimy industrial town of mother who is so deeply internalized. They must Northam, England, Clara Maugham bends her eventually trace their way back home, not to the will upon escape. Yet, even after she manages to omnipotent mother of infancy, but to a figure of leave Northam on a scholarship, she feels con• pathos and vulnerability—in other words, a strained by duty to return home on vacations; daughter, a self. While exploring the roots of the because she is still unseparated from her mother, she lives in terror that she will not summon the Paris, land of sweet, forbidden fruit, loses energy to leave again. Her hatred of Northam is a much of its symbolic importance with Mrs. mask for her fear. Maugham's surprising concession. If Paris is permissible, Clara must find other testing ground ...She hated her home town with such vio• for her independence. Montmartre, because for• lence that when she returned each vacation bidden, becomes her Paris to which she deter• from university, she would shake and trem• mines to escape alone at night. The adolescent ble with an ashamed and feverish fear. She sexual experimentation she experiences there hated it, and she was afraid of it, because serves to fix this adventure as a gesture of rebel• she doubted her power to escape; even after lion. Unconsciously, she expects punishment two years in London, she still thought that and is exhilarated to realize that "she had dared, her brain might go or that her nerve might and she had not been struck dead for it" (p. 83). snap, and that she would be compelled to The successful violation of taboo helps her to return, feebly, defeated, to her mother's feel separate. house.8 Even as a young women in London, she con• She fears the power of her mother, whose tinually needs to reaffirm her separateness. The judgements can deflate her sense of worth, large Denham family attracts her because it deflecting her from her struggle for autonomy. represents the antithesis of her own—open, affectionate, tolerant, rather than closed, cold, At home, Clara so much expects a blank, stony and rigid. Repeatedly, she contrasts this surro• indifference from her mother that she is deeply gate family with her own, speculating on what shaken when it shows "hidden chinks and her mother would think. faults" (p. 66). When Mrs. Maugham unexpect• edly grants Clara permission to go on a school Clara often found herself wondering trip to Paris, Clara is dismayed. If she can see her what her mother would think. Such wonder mother as uniformly cold, she can better brace never prevented her from any course of herself against the current of her mother's will. action—on the contrary, she sometimes feared it impelled her—but nevertheless, Because the truth was that this evidence of when drunk or naked, thoughts of her care and tenderness was harder to bear than mother would fill her mind. And with the any neglect, for it threw into question the Denhams, these thoughts pressed upon her whole basis of their lives together. Perhaps intolerably, (p. 145). there was hope, perhaps all was not harsh antipathy, perhaps a better daughter might The qualities she admires in the Denhams are have found a way to soften such a mother. those which draw her farther from her mother And if all were not lost, what effort, what and her lower middle class background; thus strain, what retraced miles, what recrimi• there is a sense in which the Denhams represent nations, what intolerable forgivenesses were both a betrayal of her origins and an idealized not to be undergone? (p.
Load more

Recommended publications
  • Linköping University Department of Language and Literature English A
    Linköping University Department of Language and Literature English A Blueprint for Women’s Fulfilment A Reading of Three Novels in the Early Fiction of Margaret Drabble Lena Knutsson D Course. Literary Specialisation Spring Term, 2008 Supervisor: Margaret Omberg Table of Contents Introduction .................................................................................................. 1 Single Motherhood in The Millstone ........................................................... 3 Sexual Love as Salvation in The Waterfall................................................ 11 Family, Friends, and Fulfilment in The Realms of Gold............................ 19 Conclusion.................................................................................................. 28 Works Cited................................................................................................ 30 Introduction In the modern literary tradition, starting in the 1950s, there is a clear break with earlier traditions to hush up certain aspects of women’s lives and experiences. In modern literature however, and especially after the Women’s Movement got under way in the 1960s, it was, and is, permissible to write about every aspect of a woman’s life. Experiences of childbearing and the rearing of children as well as career and relationships are explored by women writers – the experiences and dilemmas that many women face today. We wallow, and are allowed to, in all the gory details of pregnancy, birth, nursing, and sex. Margaret Drabble started writing in this
    [Show full text]
  • Identity, Culture, Class and Gender in the Novels of Margaret Drabble
    The Question Of "Englishnessff. Identity, culture, Class and Gender in the Novels of Margaret Drabble Elizabeth Eastman Somerton Submitted in partial fuifiilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Dalhousie University Halifax, Nova Scotia September 1998 Q Copyright by Elizabeth Easmian Somerton, 1998 Acquisitions and Acquisitions et Bibliographie SeMces seNices bibliographiques The author has granted a non- L'auteur a accordé une licence non exclusive licence allowbg the exclusive permettant à la National Library of Canada to Bibliothèque nationale du Canada de reproduce, loan, distriiute or seli reproduire, prêter, distribuer ou copies of this thesis in microform, vendre des copies de cette thèse sous paper or electronic fonnats. la forme de rnicrofiche/film, de reproduction sur papier ou sur format électronique. The author retains owership of the L'auteur consewe la propriété du copyright in this thesis. Neither the droit d'auteur qui protège cette îhèse. thesis nor substantial extracts fkom it Ni la thèse ni des extraits substantiels may be printed or othemise de celle-ci ne doivent être imprimés reproduced without the author's ou autrement reproduits sans son permission. autorisation. Acknowledgements 1want to thank Dr. Victor Li, my supervisor, without whose help and encouragement this thesis would not have been writîen. I also want to thank Dr. Roberta Rubenstein of American University, Wa~hhgtonD.C. for taking the from a busy schedule to be the external examiner of my thesis and for making her report available to me. 1 also want to thank the intemal readers-Drs. Stephen Brooke. Anthony Stewart and Rohan Maitzen-for their constructive criticisrn of my work.
    [Show full text]
  • British Society from the 1960S to the 1990S in Four Novels by Margaret
    Masaryk University Faculty of Arts Department of English and American Studies English Language and Literature Lucie Hartigová British Society from the 1960s to the 1990s in Four Novels by Margaret Drabble Master’s Diploma Thesis Supervisor: prof. Mgr. Milada Franková, CSc., M.A. 2009 IdeclarethatIhave workedonthisthesis independently,usingonlytheprimary and secondarysourceslisted inthebibliography. ………………………………………….. I wouldliketothankmy supervisor,prof.Mgr. MiladaFranková,CSc.,M.A., forherkindhelpandvaluableassistance withmy diplomathesis. Table of Contents 1. Introduction 1 1.1. TheLifeof MargaretDrabble 2 1.2. SocialBackgroundofGreatBritainfromthe1960stothe1990s 5 1.3. TheCharactersontheStage 8 2. The Importance of the Gender of the Main Characters 13 2.1. DifferentRolesofFemaleCharacters 13 2.2. AspectsoftheMale World 17 2.3. TheRestrictiveConditionsofGender 21 3. Social Consciousness in the Second Half of the 20th Century 25 3.1. SocialClassBelonging 26 3.2. Socio-economic Aspects intheNovels 29 3.3. NegativeBritishness 33 4. Success and Failure 38 4.1. CareerasaCauseandReason 39 4.2. BlameandInnocence 42 4.3. ImprisonmentoftheCharacters 45 5. Interdependence of Fate and Setting 50 5.1. FateandDeterminism 51 5.2. HousingandLiving, TownandCityLife 54 5.3. North-SouthClash 58 6. Conclusion 63 Bibliography 66 1. Introduction Mentioningthenameof MargaretDrabbleintheliterary worldgenerallyevokes associations ofoneofthemostaccomplishedBritishauthorsbecausethisnovelisthas won respectsincehersuccessfullystartedcareerinthe1960s.Hernovels,traditionalinstyle,
    [Show full text]
  • The Functions of Journey and Ascent in Selected Short Stories in Margaret Drabble’S a Day in the Life of a Smiling Woman
    1 Linköping University Department of Culture and Communication Master’s Programme Language and Culture in Europe ISRN: LIU-IKK/MPLCE- A--13/07--SE The Functions of Journey and Ascent in Selected Short Stories in Margaret Drabble’s A Day in the Life of a Smiling Woman Daria Zheltukhina Language and Culture in Europe Spring term, 2013 Supervisor: Françoise Monnoyeur-Broitman 2 Table of Contents Introduction ……………………………………………………………………………..……..…3 Chapter 1 Overview of the Short Stories …………….………………………………..….7 1.2 Setting …………………………………………………………………………….…………7 1.3 Depiction of protagonists …………………………………………………………………….9 1.4 Plot development …………………………………………………..……………………......10 Chapter 2 Functions of Journey and Ascent in the Selected Short Stories ……..……...12 Theme I Journey as a Means of Regaining Independence: “A Merry Widow” and “Stepping Westward: A Topological Tale” ………………………………...12 Theme II Journey as an Evasion from Marital Hardships and Family Obligations: “The Gifts of War” and “Crossing the Alps” …………..………….17 Theme III Journey and Ascent as Achievements of Victory: “A Day in the Life of a Smiling Woman” and “A Pyrrhic Victory” ……….….. 22 Theme IV Journey as an Escape from Loneliness and Routine: “A Voyage to Cythera” .... 28 Chapter 3 Psychological Insights into the Journeys ….………………………………….32 3.2 “Abyss”, “plateau” and “ascent” as stages in the psychological journeys .…...…..….……..32 3.2.1 The 1960s ………………………………………………………………………….33 3.2.2 The 1970s ……………………………………………………..…………………...34 3.2.3 The 1990s ………………………………………………………………………….35 3.3
    [Show full text]
  • Englishness in the Novels of Angus Wilson Bachelor’S Diploma Thesis
    Masaryk University Faculty of Arts Department of English and American Studies English Language and Literature Mgr. Tereza Výtisková Englishness in the Novels of Angus Wilson Bachelor’s Diploma Thesis Supervisor: Stephen Paul Hardy, Ph.D. 2016 I declare that I have worked on this thesis independently, using only the primary and secondary sources listed in the bibliography. ……………………………. Tereza Výtisková ii Acknowledgement I would like to thank my supervisor, Stephen Paul Hardy, Ph.D., for his advice and encouragement. iii Table of Contents Table of Contents .......................................................................................................... iv 1. Introduction.............................................................................................................. 1 2. Angus Wilson and ‘Condition of England Novel’ ................................................. 5 2.1. Angus Wilson .................................................................................................... 5 2.2. The Victorian ‘Condition of England Novel’ ................................................ 10 2.3. The Post-War ‘Condition of England Novel’ ............................................... 13 3. Anglo-Saxon Attitudes .......................................................................................... 22 4. The Old Men at the Zoo ....................................................................................... 37 5. Conclusion .............................................................................................................
    [Show full text]
  • Strode Theatre
    September - December 2018 LIVE ON STAGE FILM EXHIBITION LIVE ON SCREEN Church Road • Street • Theatre Somerset • BA16 0AB & Cinema Box Office 01458 442846 www.strodetheatre.org.uk Public booking opens Saturday 18 Aug Welcome to our new IN CASE YOU MISSED IT... HITCHCOCK ANNIVERSARIES Autumn 2018 brochure. FILM TRIPTYCHS Book a tryptich together and save £3.60! 31 Oct FAMILY PLOT: 40 years ago p. 24 WELCOME Over the last months I have FILM Curated series of three films based on a theme, 3 Nov THE BIRDS: 55 year anniversary p. 27 received many generous genre, director or actor. comments of enthusiasm and 14 Nov VERTIGO: 60 year anniversary p. 30 gratitude for the programme we have managed to pull-together FOCUS ON PAUL SCHRADER Hitchcock’s distinctive films remain as here at Strode Theatre. I’m very pleasurable and impactful to watch as ever. appreciative of everyone’s positive 15 & 20 Sep First Reformed p. 8 So, with the 60th anniversary re-release of support and encouragement - his masterpiece Vertigo, we thought we thank you. 25 Sep The Walker p. 11 would bring you a couple of other Hitchcock anniversaries worth celebrating. Rolling forward One of the things that was most apparent to me when I joined Strode MAMMA MIA! HERE WE GO 2 Oc t Taxi Driver p. 14 to 55 years ago, we find the release of the Theatre early last year was its sheer potential, both to host a wide range AGAIN (12A) chilling The Birds, ... the same year that Strode of shows and to reach broad audiences.
    [Show full text]
  • Margaret Drabble's Writing Emerged from The
    argaret Drabble’s writing emerged right after the Nobel Winner’s death, in 2013, is of extraordi- from the turbulences of the second nary emotional power and political wisdom while seeming a wave feminist movement and the rad- simple recollection of Lessing as a visitor and as a host. ical demands and changes it brought I spoke with Margaret Drabble in Toronto, during her to contemporary fiction. She married brief stay at a writers’ festival, where she came to talk about Myoung, had children, and started work on what would become her most recent novel, The Pure Gold Baby. She is a gener- her first published novel at the age of twenty-one, soon after ous interlocutor, and after the first quarter-hour it felt like a graduating from the University of Cambridge, in 1960. In a basic understanding was tacitly established, many of the for- BBC documentary about the young Drabble, recorded around malities left aside. —Lydia Perović the time of her first literary successes—mid-to-late sixties, the time of her award-winning novels The Millstone and Jeru- I. THE PRESSURE salem the Golden—she appears the embodiment of cool: the FOR THINGS TO BE SAID young Glenda Jackson style, the mini-skirt, the knee-high boots, the effortless, understated 1960s glamour. THE BELIEVER: The big Feminist Fiction wave that you Her first novel,A Summer Bird-Cage, is a joyful bundle were part of, together with Doris Lessing, Margaret Atwood, of contradictions, in which the chatty musings about clothes, Angela Carter, Toni Morrison, A.S. Byatt, Octavia Butler— popularity, and men do not distract from the historical ques- how did it take shape? That kind of critical mass of fiction tion at hand: what can a young woman do with her life in the and criticism that focused on gender philosophy and poli- latter half of the twentieth century? All her young novels have tics can’t be matched with anything happening today.
    [Show full text]
  • Rebelling Against the Regency: Jane Austen and Margaret Drabble
    Rebelling Against the RegencY: Jane Austen and Margaret Drabble NORA FOSTER STOVEL AB T6G 2E5 Department of English, University of Alberta' E'dmonton' an ambivalent Contemporary British writer Margaret Drabble has expressed and condemnation in attitude to Jane Austen, vacillatin[between admiration an f,.. commentaries. As i novelist, Drabble has also enjoyed "rl,i.uf relationship with her literary predecessor' fluctuating between writer' "-Uigr"rtimitation of her rectory precursor and reiellion against the Regency Bennett sisters con- Her first novel, A Summer Bird-Cag,e (1963), is about (1964')' is i"-piu,i"g marriage, and her novel, The Gqrrick Year '"tond In The uUoi u sEtf-deceived heroine named Emma considering adultery' i,'iiirion of Women's Fiction (1982), Drabble acknowledges: after Jane Austen When I began writing, in my innocence I called my characters Bennett which is characters. In a Summer ni.d-cage the characters are called unconsciously' the Bennet from Pride and PreJudice. I did this completely (93) im*a in The Garrick lear is aiso a Jane Austen character' ,.The Dower House at Austen frames Drabble's Career' for her latest fiction, for the 1993 6iitr.t," an original short story that she composed especially iesie it Late Louise, is a sequel to Austen's novel Persuasion.ln -"",ing "All my irr" qr"trl", pltoa following her reiding, she acknowledged' nor"it are a dialogue with Jane Austen"' Austen in enthusias- As a critic, Drablle has expressed her admiration for edition of tic introductions to Austen's works, beginning with the Penguin laneAusten:LailySusan,TheWatsons-,Sanditioninlg74'andconcluding of Austen's most recently witir her introductions to the new virago editions no,el,.oraruteopensherlgT4introductionbyassertingthat..Therewould by Jane ;;;";" genuine rejoicing at the discovery of-a complete new novel A;;, tiun uny &h".
    [Show full text]
  • The Quest for a Female Identity in Historical Novels by British Women Writers
    „My sense of my own identity is bound up with the past“ - The Quest for a Female Identity in Historical Novels by British Women Writers: Penelope Lively, Margaret Drabble, A.S. Byatt, Esther Freud Dissertation zur Erlangung des philosophischen Doktorgrades an der Philosophischen Fakultät der Georg-August-Universität Göttingen vorgelegt von Jessica Koch aus Roth Göttingen 2012 Danksagung Von den Anfängen dieser Arbeit bis hin zu ihrer Veröffentlichung war es ein langer Weg. Bei all den Personen, die mich hierbei tatkräftig unterstützt und über die Jahre hinweg stets begleitet haben, möchte ich mich herzlich bedanken. Besonderer Dank gilt dabei meinen Eltern Heidi und Hans-Dieter Koch, die immer an mich geglaubt haben. Ohne sie und ihre Unterstützung wäre diese Arbeit gar nicht erst möglich gewesen. Bedanken möchte ich mich auch bei Frau Prof. Dr. Brigitte Glaser, die meine Dissertation nicht nur betreut hat, sondern mir auch zahlreiche hilfreiche und zugleich inspirierende Denkanstöße gegeben hat. Ferner möchte ich auch Frau Prof. Dr. Barbara Schaff für ihre freundliche Übernahme der Zweitkorrektur meinen Dank aussprechen. Gewidmet ist diese Schrift schließlich meinen Großeltern, die die Fertigstellung leider nicht mehr erleben konnten. Roth, im Februar 2014 Jessica Koch “Only connect.” In loving memory of my grandparents. 1 Table of Contents List of Abbreviations ............................................................................................................................... 3 1. “My sense of my own identity is bound up
    [Show full text]
  • Margaret Drabble the GATES of IVORY Toronto: Mcclelland and Stewart, 1991
    Margaret Drabble THE GATES OF IVORY Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 1991. Pp. 464. $27.95 Reviewed by Nora Foster Stovel Margaret Drabble's latest novel, The Gates of Ivory, completes the trilogy that began with The Radiant Way (1987), followed by A Natural Curiosity (1989). Interestingly, Drabble's elder sister, novelist A.S. Byatt, launched a tril­ ogy that was to capture three decades of English social history, from 1950 to 1980, beginning with The Virgin in the Garden (1978), a novel involving two sis­ ters, and Still Life (1985). Byatt's masterpiece, Possession (1990; see IFR 18.1 [1991]: 66-67), which won the Booker Prize last year, is not part of this unfinished trilogy. Coincidentally, the central character of Drabble's new novel, Stephen Cox, is a writer who has recently won the Booker Prize—an honor that has not yet been accorded to Margaret Drabble. Drabble's new novel invites further comparison with Byatt's Possession. The Gates of Ivory opens with Liz Headleand, a psychiatrist, receiving in the mail a package posted in Kampuchea containing fragments of manuscripts and diaries apparently written by Stephen Cox himself and, startlingly, two fin­ ger bones. This parcel, known as "The package" or "The Text," must be decoded and interpreted in the interests of saving Stephen (if he is still alive) or (if he is dead) discovering his cause of death. Whereas Byatt's drama of literary detection in Possession aims at multilayered depth, Drabble's aims at many- sided breadth. Her novels have developed from a claustrophobic domestic sphere to range wider over contemporary British society.
    [Show full text]
  • Margaret Drabble and the State of the Nation 249
    Eight: Margaret Drabble and the State of the Nation No, not a political novel. More a pathological novel. A psychotic novel. Sorry about that. It won't happen again. Sorry. A Natural Curiosity (194) As it is a rural route, avoiding the great industrial conurbations that straddle the middle of upper England, she is not here provoked into much political thought about the nature ofthe north andHow Britain Votes, andyou may be spared her occasional reflections on these themes, for this is not a political novel, and anyway her reflections are repetitive and do not seem to be getting her anywhere very fast. A Natural Curiosity (193) From the middle 'seventies onwards, Margaret Drabble became increasingly occupied as a novelist with representing and explaining the state of an increasingly-troubled nation. The novels that resulted are "pathological" in the sense that they might be said to belong to "the science or study of disease; that department of medical science, or of physiology, which treats of the causes and nature of diseases, or abnormal bodily affections or conditions" (OED). In this case the body is the body politic, and the novels are attempts to understand the pathology ("the sum of pathological processes or conditions" - OED) that afflicts late twentieth-century Britain. They also constitute a rigorous test ofthe traditional novel's adequacy to the task ofportraying and understanding the state of the nation. Beginning with The lee Age in 1977, Drabble questioned the ability of the past (i.e. history conceived of as a linear chain of cause-and-effect) to explain the present, and she therefore went on in subsequent novels to reject a traditionally linear, plotted narrative as a satisfactory means of representation.
    [Show full text]
  • Chronicler, Moralist, Artist
    CHANGES IN IDEOLOGY IN MARGARET DRABBLE’S FICTION CELIA M. WALLHEAD Universidad de Granada I have chosen to contribute to this homage to Dr. María Luisa Dañobeitia with an essay on English writer Margaret Drabble for three reasons. Drabble was born just a few months before María Luisa, so they are of an age. Secondly, Drabble came to the University of Granada and visited us at the Department of English and German in 1994. Thirdly, and most pertinently, María Luisa has always been interested in women’s writing or writing about women, which is one of the focuses of Drabble’s fiction and critical writing. Author of seventeen novels to date, also short fiction and journalistic writing, Drabble was successful with her very first novel, A Summer Bird Cage (1963), written at the tender age of twenty-three. Her more mature focus was brought to bear on English Literature in 2000, when, to great acclaim, she made the first major revision of the Cambridge Companion to English Literature. We hope that her creative and critical corpus is far from closed. MARGARET DRABBLE: CHRONICLER, MORALIST, ARTIST The title of this section is that of Mary Rose Sullivan’s chapter on Drabble in British Women Writing Fiction (Sullivan 2000:191–212). From the first novel, which made her name: […] each successive novel has been eagerly greeted, both by women who felt they had found a spokeswoman for their concerns and expectations and by a wider audience who found in her a chronicler of modern consciousness, a George Eliot of contemporary Britain (ibid.:191).
    [Show full text]