The representation of the woman artist figure in Australian women writers' fiction

Abstract

This thesis sets out to explore, from a feminist point of view, the ways in which women writers 'author' the literary representation of 'woman' as 'artist', her identity and destiny, within the patriarchal context. Because women writers operate from a marginal position, and despite the fact that they are working within the patriarchal system of language, ideology and discourse, their texts to varying degrees critically evaluate their patriarchal contexts and the attendant notions of both 'woman' and 'artist'. At the same time, in response to previous texts, to changes in ideology (for instance, the emergence of feminist literary theory) and changes in society, the literary construction of the woman artist is also subject to change and development. <br/> For this examination, a combination of the theories of Mikhail Bakhtin together with a feminist perspective and insights from feminist theory have been found to be most appropriate. Bakhtin has delineated the discursive relationships and strategies which marginal groups, such as women, might effect upon a centralist hegemony such as the patriarchy. His concept of carnival as a subversive strategy which may be adopted by marginal groups in relation to the hegemony suggests directions for the feminist analysis of women writers' subversive strategies. He locates the struggle for the meaning and value of particular ideologies in the nature of language itself and in the structure of discourse. His theory suggests that literary texts by women are engaged in an ongoing dialectic of critique and transformation of patriarchal literary and cultural values about 'woman'. <br/> In the course of this dissertation, it has emerged that the women's texts which I am discussing are all, to some extent, radical texts. All challenge to varying degrees the patriarchal centralist assumptions about both 'woman' and 'artist'. These challenges are effected through a series of literary strategies. The literary representation of both 'woman' and 'artist' is developing from a specifically female point of view, and a new image of 'woman' is being inserted into the literary and cultural national tradition.