A Study Of The Heroine In Willa Cather's My Antonia From The Perspective Of Psychological Androgyny

My Antonia has generally been acknowledged as the best novel by Willa Cather, who is one of the most established women writers in the first half of the twentieth century in American literary history. The moment it was published, My Antonia received great attention from the critics and the readers. So far, since its publication in 1918, it has been studied from various perspectives, like new criticism, feminism, new historicism, cultural approach, eco-criticism and so on. Some critics have also paid attention to the research into androgyny in My Antonia. However, there is still shortage of systematic and deep investigation specially aimed at My Antonia employing the conception of psychological androgyny, which is the very reason for my study in the thesis, in the hope of helping readers to get a clearer understanding of the novel.This thesis falls into five chapters, including the introduction and the conclusion, each of which deals with one particular aspect. The first chapter focuses on a biographical introduction to the author, Willa Cather, and a literary review of My Antonia both at home and abroad. At the end of this part, the reason why psychological androgyny is employed to study My Antonia is explained to give explicitly a direction to the next chapter. The second chapter proceeds to discuss androgyny, firstly, presenting an evolvement and a general review of androgyny in different fields, and, then, concentrating on the theory of psychological androgyny on which to base the interpretation of the next chapter. The third chapter elaborates on independence of masculinity, the indispensible masculine trait, and nurturance of femininity, the most essential feminine characteristic in Antonia, which are both closely associated with psychological androgyny. The fourth chapter places an emphasis on the harmony with the actual world gained by psychological androgyny, consisting of the harmony between the old culture and the new culture, and the harmony between family members owing to the major character, Antonia, who practices her psychological androgynous qualities. Chapter Five reemphasizes the theme of this thesis and explains the significance of the study.