Absence &Presence Of Male Characters--Feminist Interpretation Of Little Women

Since social division of labor began in civilized society, women’s rights and values, requirements and aspirations have been influenced by different levels of contempt, neglect, or even conscious repression. Female literature began as the awakening of female self-consciousness, which was also the powerful weapon of women against the patriarchal culture. And the definition of female identity in the patriarchal culture and the construction of independent female identity have always been the core subject of female literature. Little Women was written by Louisa May Alcott, who was one of the most outstanding American female writers in 19 th century. The author expresses her feminist ideas which cause the society to rethink the presence and the status of women. This novel can be said to be the classic one in female literature, which is worthy of studying.My paper aims at the male characters of the work, and analyzes the significance of their existence and absence based on the feminist theory. It is the weakening of male characters that enhances the female consciousness of the female characters. In Little Women, the male characters are absent or appear less, so females in March family have the opportunity to resist the cultural hegemony of the dominant class as the spokeswomen of the marginal culture, sending out the voice of marginal culture. The most distinguishing feature of Little Women is to highlight feminist characteristics of female characters under the background of the absence of male characters. And the limited presence of male characters serves to promote the development of the plot of the story and, together with female characters, to shoulder the responsibility of representing the theme. The female characters in Little Women take all kinds of responsibility for the material and spiritual life of the family just because of the gender imbalance, thus they clearly express the desire for equality and freedom, independence and the pursuit of true love.From this point of view, Little Women not only has the new literature value, but also has social significance beyond the era of development. This novel gives readers a kind of new and equal experience, and strives to realize emotional communication and interaction between males and females. As is known to all, emotional harmony is the scarcest part of that time. Today, to really eliminate gender bias and gender discrimination, males, as the main force in the development of the times, should abandon self pride and the domination of women, and finally achieve interdependence and mutual encouragement of males and females to realize harmony.My thesis is divided into five chapters. The first chapter introduces the author and her works, the literature review of the novel, and the starting point of the topic. The second chapter briefly introduces the Western feminist thoughts, and the analysis of male characters in the works of the female writers. The third chapter of my paper discusses the absence of the father image and the influence on the awakening of women’s consciousness. The absence of father image reflected in the March family is the lack of father, husband and the backbone of the family. Therefore only then mother and four sisters have more opportunities to take responsibilities from life and society, and thus also the girls’ independent consciousness and the exemplary role of the mother are reinforced. The fourth chapter illustrates the significance of the existence of other single male characters. It mainly talks about the males and March sisters’ emotional communication and interaction in love and marriage life, so as to highlight the women’ s feminist point of view that they pursue true love and equality in marriage life between men and women. Finally, they realize the harmony and equality between men and women.