On Women's Suffering In The Grass Is Singing From The Perspective Of Eco-feminism

Doris Lessing is one of the widely recognized female writers at present. In 2007, she was rewarded the greatest award of literature—Nobel Prize for Literature. The Grass is Singing is her first novel which takes South Africa in 1940 s as the background. The author tells us a sad story of the protagonist, Mary's tragic life. It can be seen in this novel, besides Mary, the other female characters also suffer from all kinds of pains. Their fate is closely connected with the fate of nature and they all suffer from the exploitation and oppression of the patriarchal society in the same way.This thesis aims to analyze the suffering of women and nature from the perspective of eco-feminism. Eco-feminism is based on care ethics as its theoretical foundation, with an aim to establish a new model of relationship between human beings and nature, men and women which should be unified and harmonious. This thesis is trying to analyze Mary's survival predicament from three dimensions of eco-feminism, which are natural ecology, social ecology and spiritual ecology. Furthermore, it is also trying to innovatively extend the analysis from the tragedy of the heroine to the tragedy of the whole female group.Main body of the thesis consists of five chapters. The first chapter is the beginning, with an introduction to Lessing and her The Grass is Singing, and a brief analysis of the academic research situation about this novel and the theory of eco-feminism. Then it puts forward the task of exploring the implied fundamental ideas of eco-feminism. The second chapter analyzes Mary's suffering from disharmony of natural ecology. It is shown by dissecting the relationship between Mary and nature as well as the relationship between major male characters and nature in the novel that the harmonious natural ecology is the premise for women to get rid of painful life. Chapter three analyzes Mary's suffering from disharmony of social ecology. By dissecting the attitudes of the major male characters towards Mary, it is shown that women could get rid of pain only with the equality between men and women. The fourth chapter gives an analysis of Mary's suffering from disharmony of spiritual ecology. Through dissecting Mary's deep-rooted colonialism, underdeveloped subject consciousness and distorted sexual consciousness, the paper shows that happiness can only be obtained by women with correct recognition of themselves and proper understanding of their relationship with others. The fifth chapter analyzes the sufferings of other female characters in this novel. It reveals the inevitability of women's suffering as a whole in the patriarchal system.Chapter six is the conclusion. It is summed up that Lessing does show deep eco-feminism thoughts in this novel and paying close attention to the suffering of Mary and other female characters in the novel is significant to solve current social problems and promote the sustainable development of human beings. Only when nature, women and other disadvantaged groups are no longer regarded as "the other" in the patriarchal system, but to establish a relationship of interdependence and coexistence of all life, can harmony be achieved ultimately.