Epq Rationale

An analysis of the presentation of female characters in American Prose and Drama between 1918 and 1963

Why American Prose and Drama?

As a Literature student, with aspirations to read English literature at university, I find that I turn towards American literature with a greater frequency than I turn to the English Romantic movement or to the Mid-19th Century novels. The wealth of literature that the country has produced, with authors such as Hemingway, Dickinson, Eliot, Faulkner, Fitzgerald, Vonnegut, Walker and Lee allows a reader to gorge on a feast of classic novels, without ever having to leave one's own country. American Drama has a particular interest to me. As a scri pt writer, I find that reading other pieces of work by dramatists helps to inform me of techniques and themes which I may wish to explore through my own writing. Furthermore, as well as having an interest in America and the culture which it, I find that prose and drama are the best ways of considering the presentation of female characters. These forms allow for the reader to consider the social context at which the author sets their piece of work. The idea that literature may mirror the society that an author writes in fascinates me and is what I find most interesting about English Literature.

Why female characters?

In reading American literature, I found that there was a dearth of what I would consider strong female characters. For example, in Twain's "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn", though the novel is a "vastly influential Great American Novel" (Henneberg, 2010 p.125-134), it is blatantly clear that Twain's portrayal of female characters is somewhat unfavourable. For one, Huck's mother is an absent one, thus leaving him in the custody of the Widow Douglas. Whilst she attempts to help Huck in some way, it is pointed out that Twain imposes upon her character the responsibility of being his educator and turning him into a decent human being for society, which leads to her being 4 appropriated with the traits of "piety and propriety" (Henneberg, 2010 p.125-134). Both of these characteristics are what Twain is attempting to "expose and indict" (Henneberg, 2010 p.125-134). Thus Twain has almost made a villain out of a female character who is attempting to help Huck Finn and has imposed upon her the role of acting as an obstacle to the journey which Huck takes through the novel. She is ultimately a powerless character, unable to retain custody of Huck when his father tries to take him back into his own care. Whilst this is only one novel, it suggests that, within American Literature, female characters are given somewhat skewed presentations. Fetterly wrote American Literature is male. To read the canon of what is currently considered classic American literature is perforce to identify as male. Our literature neither leaves women alone nor allows them to participate. (Fetterley, 1971) Considering the example given in Twain's work, I would argue that this is a fair criticism of American Literature to some degree, though by no means a fool proof one. Whilst in my own experience of American literature, female characters are portrayed as restless but confined within their society, such as in Steinbeck's 'Of Mice and Men' through the character of Curley's Wife, I want to explore if, and how, this portrayal of women is developed. My own personal issue with Fetterly's argument is that the canon she was discussing was only read by men, as it was "perforce to identify as male". Whilst I enjoy reading the American canon which she is talking about, I argue that my interests are as much to do with the female experience within these novels and dramas as it is with the male experience. It's part of the reason why I have grown to question why over my academic life at school I have studied texts from Miller and Steinbeck and Fitzgerald, all of which I have enjoyed, but have never 5 been given the chance to study the poetry of Emily Dickinson and the novels of Virginia Wolf. Whilst Dickinson is one of the most eminent poets from the 19th Century produced, she is left off of the syllabuses I have looked at, and Wolf is one of the most important female writers of the early twentieth century for her contributions to both literature and literary theory. In a society where we are continuously striving for gender equality, it is constantly over looked that schools and the syllabus should use their powers to allow boys to consider life from the female perspective as much as girls are made to see life from the male perspective through literature. It is made even stranger when Literature is stereotypically considered to be a subject dominated by female students and yet so little of the syllabus literature is directed towards them. My motivation for doing the EPQ is that by looking at female characters, I will be able to deepen my understanding of feminist theory, both from the point of literary theory, but also when considering what it means to be a woman, particularly in the period that I wish to study.

The Period Logic

The investigation I wish to conduct would be far too vast and broad to do without having some sort of a catchment area for me to focus my efforts. I have therefore chosen to look at American literature between the period of 1918 and up to 1963. 1918 saw the end of the First World War. Whilst America only joined the war on April 2nd 1917, they suffered 116,516 mortalities. Following the end of the war, a movement developed at which Faulkner, Fitzgerald, and Hemmingway and Kerouac were considered the forefront. This was known as the Lost Generation. The Lost Generation writers were something that interested me for a long time. Whilst considering titles for my EPQ, I was tempted to look at how they worked together and affected each other's 6 work, so much so that I went to Paris to visit the spot where Fitzgerald and Hemmingway would have met. However, of more interest to me whilst I was in France was 'Shakespeare & Company' in the Latin Quarter of Paris. The bookshop was set up by Sylvia Beach following the end of the First World War. An American expatriate, the bookstore was the largest English language bookstore in Paris and she helped to nurture young writers, publishing the modernist classic 'Ulysses' by James Joyce. However, when Joyce signed onto a larger set of publishers, she needed the help of a group of writers which included the likes of Ezra Pound, Eliot and Hemmingway to help save the bookstore from closing. Beach2 saw great American writers work but very rarely did she ever see female writers work. Not only was 1918 two years before the 19th Amendment was introduced; the right for women to be given the vote was passed in 1920. By 1961 this was built upon, when Eleanor Roosevelt was appointed as the chairwoman of President Kennedy's Commission on the Status of Women. The report it published in 1963 found that there was substantial discrimination in the workplace against women, and suggested that women were given paid maternity leave, affordable child care and fair hiring practices to improve the conditions. This was then compounded as Betty Friedan published "The Feminine Mystique" in 1963 which became highly influential. It galvanised the women's rights movement, becoming a best seller. Challenging the role of middle-class housewives with the narrow role they had imposed on them, it suggested the dissatisfaction of women towards the hand they were dealt in society. By using these two dates to frame my investigation, I will be able to see how women's rights and how they are portrayed changes as the place of women in American society also evolved.