Deconstruction Of Gender Binary Opposition In Middlemarch

Ever since George Eliot began her career as a writer, there has been an incessant argument about the woman writer, her thinking of creation and the thematic implication in her works. Her attitude towards feminism conveyed in Middlemarch is one of the most controversial issues in the study of Eliot. By studying the masterpiece Middlemarch, the author explores the artistic features related to the effective proposals for deconstructing the traditional gender pattern of binary opposition with the male being the center and the female being the marginal.Chapter One discusses the historical background and theoretical sources of the gender binary opposition in terms of deconstructive insights, and by expounding some certain feminist concepts, aims to provide illustrative evidences that George Eliot has actually made very conspicuous contributions to the deconstruction of gender binary opposition in Middlemarch. Chapter Two analyzes male characters in the novel, whose frustrations in all fields, including politics, economics and education, completely reflect Eliot's artistic efforts to construct an ideal personality by subverting western traditional masculine values and her approval of a new pattern of masculinity integrated with some feminine attributes. Chapter Three analyzes female characters and their influences upon the men with whom they interact. Eliot's portrayal of these vivid female characters with charming personality suggests her unremitting artistic pursuit of breaking through gender binary opposition and seeking for a new pattern of femininity integrated with some masculine attributes. Chapter Four explores the thematic implication in Middlemarch. This novel is significant not only for the deconstruction of traditional male-centred binary opposition, but also for the construction of a harmonious personality transcending such an opposition. The author of the present thesis, after a thorough study of Middlemarch, believes that androgyny - the one in which masculine and feminine elements commingle and attain a perfect balance - can be realized via both men's rejection of elitism in traditional ideology and women's self-independence by overall education.The brand-new masculinity and femininity as well as the thematic implication in Middlemarch broadly hint that the traditional thinking stereotype has enormously hindered humanity and personality from their natural and healthy development. A true artist with strong social responsibility is quite able, by means of his/her artistic creation, to construct an equal and independent personality harmonized by a communion of both yin and yang gender elements.