A Study On The Mother-Daughter Relationship In Margaret Drabble’s Jerusalem The Golden

Margaret Drabble (1939-) is one of the most influential contemporary British femalewriters. Jerusalem the Golden, published in1967, is her fourth novel. As a typical Drabblework, it reflects how women search for identity and realize their values through whichDrabble shows the intellectual women’s common sights during the1960s. Ever since thenovel is published, scholars’ researches mainly focus on the themes of women fate and pursuitof self identity. Though the theme of mother and daughter relationship has also beenmentioned, no further excavation has been carried out. This thesis mainly adopts LuceIrigaray’s mother-daughter relationship theory, studying the change of the mother-daughterrelationship in the novel, and probes into Drabble’s views on woman.In the view of Irigaray, the bond of mother and daughter has been cut off early in theancient times. Mother and daughter are in lack of communication for a long time.Furthermore, mother is only confined to family and marriage in the male discourse, and isdeficient of female subjectivity which impedes the daughter to identify with her mother. Sothe daughter turns to the “father”, who represents the symbolic order, for identity. But in thepatriarchal society, the daughter can neither be satisfied with the construction of identity.Therefore, Irigaray advocates that mother and daughter should return back to the pre-oedipusphase when they remain a harmonious and intimate relationship. Irigaray’s theoreticaldiscourse provides new angle of views for the studying of the mother-daughter relationship inJerusalem the golden.This thesis is divided into three chapters. Chapter one analyzes the aggressivemother-daughter relationship. Having lived in the backward and patriarchy-prevailing townfor a long time, Mrs. Maugham turns into an unorthodox and eccentric person, which hindersnormal intimate association between mother and daughter and results in physical alienationwith her daughter. The daughter resents the mother’s oddity and rejects communication withher mother, which facilitates the psychological estrangement between them. Chapter twodiscusses the diversion of mother-daughter relationship. As the daughter fails to tolerate hermother any more, she arrives in London for self-fulfillment. She attaches herself to maleauthorities, expecting that through this way she could build her identity. Interacting with celebrities engenders her sensation that she can never fit into their living environment.Furthermore her mother’s thoughts have haunted her all the time. In the balance of returningto mother and remaining attached with males, she loses herself. Chapter three is about therestoration of the mother-daughter relationship. The daughter discovers that her mother isonce also imbued with vitality and passion. Realizing that her mother’s disintegration is justone example of women’s inevitable tragedy, the daughter starts to identify with her mother.Mother and daughter relationship eventually recovers. The daughter’s recognition of hermother precipitates her subversion against the male authority. Her resistance is on the basis ofestablishing independent self instead of completely separation from men or dependence onthem. Through analyzing the development of mother-daughter relationship, it can beconcluded that Drabble is convinced that if women wishes to obtain real freedom, they mustfirst establish the close relationship with their mothers. Only by doing so can women expectto subvert the patriarchal order, breaking women’s inferior status as object and the Other andrealizing the equality between male and female.