The Feminist Writing In Woolf’s To The Lighthouse From The Perspective Of Lacanian Theory Of Subject Construction

Virginia Woolf is an eminent and acclaimed writer,literary critic and feminist of world fame,who left affluent and valuable literary works for world literature with her original writing techniques of stream-of-consciousness,ingenious writing conception and profound themes in her works.As a pioneer of modernism,Woolf conveyed various feminist thoughts in her works,and courageously questioned the political,economic and cultural systems under the patriarchal order.This thesis takes her novel To the Lighthouse as the object of analysis and Lacanian theory of subject construction as the theoretical framework,attempting to explore Woolf’s characteristic feminist writing in the novel and her deconstruction of the patriarchal discourse system.The thesis mainly contains three parts:Chapter One to Chapter Three are the introduction of the thesis.The first chapter presents a detailed introduction to Woolf and To the Lighthouse,as well as the significance and purpose of the research.The second chapter is the literature review,which respectively introduces the current researches on the novel both at home and abroad.The third chapter is the theoretical framework,which illustrates Lacanian theory of subject construction from two aspects: the theory of three orders,Lacanian theory and feminism.Chapter Four to Chapter Six are the main body of the thesis.The fourth chapter studies the manifestation and consequences of the alienation of female subject in Symbolic order based on the analysis of Mrs Ramsay’s subjectivity.It is mainly reflected in the fact that women are forced to accept and recognize the Symbolic rules,the representation of patriarchy,and gradually lose their self-independence and female consciousness.The “angel in the house” represented by Mrs Ramsay is a typical alienated female subject in a patriarchal society which is actually constructed to fulfill men’s desires.The fifth chapter explores Mr Ramsay’s subjectivity.In the author’s description,Mr Ramsay,as a representative of the paternal authority,encounters a predicament in the Symbolic order.And Mr Ramsay’s desire for feminine comfort also implies his need for primitive femininity in the Imaginary world.The crisis of Mr Ramsay’s subjectivity actually indicates Woolf’s question and deconstruction to male authority in the Symbolic order.The sixth chapter presents an analysis of Lily’s subjectivity.After constantly confronting the illusory mirror image in the Imaginary order and the threat of patriarchal ideology in the Symbolic order,Lily rejects the alienated female subject and gradually constructs a subject with female independent consciousness in the process of self-pursuit.It symbolizes Woolf’s reflection on how women should insist self-conscious subjectivity in the patriarchal society.The last part is the conclusion,which summarizes the discussion of this thesis.Based on the analysis of the subjectivities of the three characters in the novel,this thesis draws the conclusion that Woolf embodies her unique feminist writing in To the Lighthouse: the criticism of the oppression of women under the patriarchy,the deconstruction of the authority of male discourse,and the emphasis on the construction of self-conscious female subjects.Woolf generates a fictional autobiography which offers a feminist indictment of men-centered world and domestic tyranny,while simultaneously composing a poem of healing the wounds of the patriarchal order by describing the realization of Lily’s self-worth.