An Analysis Of Female Self-growth In Alice Munro’s Works

In 2013, Alice Munro became the first winner of Nobel Prize for literature by short stories and became the 13 th female winner of this Prize. Many European and American medias give her the title of “master of the contemporary short story”, and the American Jewish writer Cynthia Ozick even put it, “our Chekhov”. As a female writer, Munro especially pays attention to the women’s fates and growth. “Boys and Girls”, “Runaway”, “The Beggar Maid”, “The Office” and“My Mother’s Dream” are five autobiographical short stories with Munro’s growth track running through in those stories. The reason for the author to choose the above five short stories at different periods of time is to find out the changes of Munro’s viewpoints on women’s self-growth. The author hopes to give some enlightenment to modern women based on Munro’s viewpoints on women’s self-growth.In the west, Munro’s works have already got the attention of scholars since 1980s; and in recent years, Munro’s works have drawn domestic scholars’ attention especially after she got the Nobel Prize for literature in 2013. However, previous studies from home and abroad mainly focused on the narrative skill, theme, feminism and so on. From a new perspective, the author of this thesis is committed to study the self-growth of women in ordinary life. Through comprehensive analysis, the author of this thesis analyzes dilemmas suffered by the women in patriarchal society and women’s solutions toward the dilemmas with the aim to explore some enlightenment for the self-growth of modern women.Firstly, through close reading and text analysis, the author of this thesis finds out that women suffered some dilemmas that the men do not in self-growth, such as patriarchal constraints on women’s gender role, career predicament, ethical dilemma as well as their economic and spiritual dependence on their husbands. The main root of the above dilemmas is women’s “the Other” status in patriarchal society. Secondly, the author of the thesis figures out women’s solutions toward above dilemmas those are rebellion and compromise. Lastly, the author of the thesis finds out that women in dilemmas never gave up self-growth and still continued to find self-identity and pursue economic and spiritual independence, marital happiness and career development.Based on the above analysis, the author of this thesis find out the changes of Munro’s viewpoints on women’s self-growth. In the early works, Munro thinks that women should adhere to self. Then Munro thinks that while adhering to self, women should also accept the female nature. In recent works, Munro pays more attention to women’s real life. Although the real life is not perfect, that is the real life and women should try to face the real life rather than runaway from that.Based on Munro’s viewpoints on women’s self-growth, the author of this thesis has drawn such enlightenment for modern women: if women want to get a better growth, they firstly should get spiritual and economic independence. Secondly, harmonious development has become the main development trend of today’s world. Therefore, while pursuing self-growth, the modern women should devote themselves to destruct the patriarchal culture that oppresses women’s self-growth and construct an harmonious society with gender equality. Only in the harmonious society with gender equality can women shed off “the Other” status and get better development.