The notion, which has persisted over many years, of Mary Shelley as the conservative daughter of a radical, proto-feminist mother can be traced to the views of Edward Trelawney, a contemporary and fair-weather friend of Shelley. This study, by exploring female identity, largely in terms of modern feminist psychoanalytic theory, in several of Shelley's lesser-known novels, attempts to contribute to the efforts of those who have challenged such notions and who have strived to render a more accurate portrait of Mary Shelley. / Anne Mellor's discussion of female identity in Shelley's sentimental novels, Mathilda, Lodore and Falkner, (in her book Mary Shelley: Her Life, Her Fiction, Her Monsters) does much to dispel the notion of Shelley's apathy with regard to gender politics. Mellor convincingly argues that these novels celebrate what she terms the "relational" identity of their heroines, and thus "support a feminist position which argues that female culture is morally superior to male culture." She further maintains, however, that these novels simultaneously reveal the damage that such an identity can do to a woman's personal development. / My paper challenges Mellor's assertion that Lodore and Falkner Shelley's last novels, portray relational identity with ambivalence. (Abstract shortened by UMI.)
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:LACETR/oai:collectionscanada.gc.ca:QMM.21276 |
| Date | January 1998 |
| Creators | Walker, Tara. |
| Contributors | Kilgour, Maggie (advisor) |
| Publisher | McGill University |
| Source Sets | Library and Archives Canada ETDs Repository / Centre d'archives des thèses électroniques de Bibliothèque et Archives Canada |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Electronic Thesis or Dissertation |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Coverage | Master of Arts (Department of English.) |
| Rights | All items in eScholarship@McGill are protected by copyright with all rights reserved unless otherwise indicated. |
| Relation | alephsysno: 001658063, proquestno: MQ50584, Theses scanned by UMI/ProQuest. |
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