A Spatial Study Of Identity-building In Margaret Atwood’s Surfacing

As her first novel with strong ecological concern and carrying some of her typical themes,Surfacing signifies an important point in Margaret Atwood’s career.Many domestic scholars have done related interpretation and research from perspectives of ecofeminism,feminism,narrative techniques,etc.However,limited attention has been paid to the spatiality contained within Surfacing.This spatial critical interpretation of Surfacing aims to analyze the spaces of different dimensions within the novel to illustrate that the lingual,psychological and physical problems the narrator undergoes are syndromes of her unclear identity and dislocation of mind.By relocating herself in the third space,the narrator breaks free from the shackles of various binary oppositions,such as center/margin,self/other,victim/victimizer and male/female,then eventually reconstructs her national imagination and her identity as both a Canadian and a woman and further accomplishes a parallel narration of individual and nation.In The Production of Space,Henri Lefebvre categorizes space into three aspects:the perceived,the conceived and the lived.He also elevates the position of the spatial body at the center of his metaphilosophy.The thesis corresponds to the three components of spaces.As a small Francophone company town,the place is under strong influences of capitalism and American popular culture,appearing as a cultural wasteland missing its indigenousness.In confronting the former two layers of spaces,as a victim,the narrator finds herself caught in a predicament and is unable to map herself,which is further reflected by her lingual problems,her psychological inability to build intimacy and her written body.Unable to recover from her former relationship,being mentally dislocated,the narrator is caught in a state of anesthesia and has been avoiding her past and her cultural root.The process of retrieving her parents’ legacies is also the process of denying to be a victim,of building her own identity.The searching for her missing father is also the narrator’s searching for her past and her mental location.The narrator first adopts the religion of the local god and reconstructs her identity as a Canadian,then by retrieving her mother’s legacy reconstructs her identity as a woman.Situating herself in the third space,the narrator eventually refuses to be a victim and regains the ability to face the actual world as an independent natural woman.