Material Things in the Struggle of the Female Writer/Artist in the Stories of A. S. Byatt
In all her fiction, A. S. Byatt creates female protagonists who struggle to make their way as writers or artists in what is often still a patriarchal society. Author, to date, of five volumes of short stories, Byatt has often used the short form to condense and concentrate on particular struggles. T...
Enregistré dans:
| Dans: | URI:https://journals.openedition.org/jsse, |
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| Auteur principal: | |
| Format: | Article ou chapitre numérique |
| Langue: | Anglais |
| Publié: |
Journal of the Short Story in English
2022
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| Accès en ligne: | Accès Université d'Orléans et IFPM |
| Résumé: | In all her fiction, A. S. Byatt creates female protagonists who struggle to make their way as writers or artists in what is often still a patriarchal society. Author, to date, of five volumes of short stories, Byatt has often used the short form to condense and concentrate on particular struggles. This study examines Byatt’s development in her stories of females making an effort, harnessing their skills and determination, to overcome obstacles in their goals to create verbally or visually. Examined in chronological order of publication of the collections, Byatt’s strategies are analysed as she explores the possibilities and problems of English women in society, from childhood through maturity to old age. Frequently, the efforts of a character focus upon specific things, for Byatt admits to being an admirer of Henry James’s “solidity of specification” and the ability to create fascination, magic or fear from “the thinginess of things.” As she applies this strategy, she selects material things, quite often related to the sphere of women, and also delights in describing processes of artistic creation, both verbal and visual, self-consciously attracting attention to the skills involved, in order to question the age-old gender-biased dichotomy of mind versus body. |
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