For The Spiritual Freedom

Through a contemporary feminist and gender studies, this thesis aims to analyze the oppression of heterosexism on the three leading female characters in The Hours and how each of them emancipate spirit in the homosexual way and finally obtain the freedom of finding herself. Virginia Woolf (1923), Laura Brown (1949) and Clarissa Vaughan (1999) seem to share similar repression and melancholy. Michae Cunningham not only presents the hegemony of the heterosexism, but also provides his solutions to the three women and conveys his authorial intention. To analyze why and how the three women are oppressed, how they subvert patriarchy and heterosexism and find a way out, I divide my thesis into three chapters: sufferance of heterosexuality, performance of homosexuality, and result of both sexual orientations.Chapter One discusses the heterosexism the three women are encountering and facing in their life. Virginia Woolf endures her burden of Victorian times, Laura Brown suffers her inextricable confinement in the family, while Clarissa Vaughan, who is nicknamed"Mrs. Dalloway"by her former boyfriend reminds of her past with him.Chapter Two analyses how the three leading characters perform in the homosexual way in order to struggle against the heterosexism. Virginia Woolf and her sister, Laura Brown and her female neighbor, and Clarissa Vaughan and her same-sex lover, each of them shows their lesbian affairs in various extents.Chapter Three indicates the result of the three women's both sexual orientations. Virginia Woolf through committing suicide, Laura Brown through leaving her family behind and Clarissa Vaughan through losing her former boyfriend obtain their spiritual freedom.The conclusion offers a brief summary of all the major aspects and ideas mentioned in the previous chapters. Cunningham's The Hours vividly portrays the issues of female dilemmas and struggles in their lives and he tries to tell the readers that sexual orientation is no longer important; what matters is how to obtain one's own spiritual freedom—to truly choose the lives they want by their free wills.