Subversion And Capitulation

This thesis aims to analyze the relationship between writers and their works as embodied in Jane Eyre and The Golden Notebook from the perspective of ecofeminism. Charlene Spretnak, an American ecofeminist and philosopher, raises the notion of―the complex sense of place‖, arguing that human beings are influenced subtly by their environment, which includes both the natural environment and the social and cultural one. In this sense novels are more or less a fictional realization of the writers'living environment. Charlotte Bront? and Doris Lessing were born in different times, which resemble each other in their authorization of male superiority and female subordination. Under such circumstance Bront? and Lessing successfully delineate two female protagonists who boldly acknowledge their wishes and desires despite the oppressive environment. In this process, they not only defy male dominance but also disrupt the patriarchal dualisms, which constitute the subversive power of the novels in question. Nevertheless, as the general social and cultural contexts of the writers are marked with patriarchal ideology, the writers cannot shake off its influence completely, in that the novels exhibit assimilation to traditional values to a certain degree. Therefore, from the perspective of―the complex sense of place‖the two novels are simultaneously subversion of and capitulation to conventions. In the patriarchal society, female writers express their dissent from women's subjugation to men via novels. Yet in the mean time they are subject to the prevalent ideology that sanctions male superiority. In this sense the subversion of traditional values in female writers'novels is inevitably mingled with capitulation.