المستخلص: |
This study examines Margaret Atwood’s The Robber Bride in order to question the patriarchal view of women. Undertaking to do this, the study depicts female characters that contain myth vestiges of sirens. It shows how these sirens possess characteristics that reflect the current patriarchal society’s preoccupation with classifying women as either ‘good’ or ‘bad’. It also attempts to explain that the persistence of these myth vestiges to the present day is used as a means to formulate the bad woman. The study, then, investigates the validity of the firmly established view of the bad women. While doing this, it explains how the existence of myth vestiges in 20th century western society is an indication of the way in which gender relations are still full of problems despite a surface pretence at equality. The study also explores the underlying causes of the categorisation of women into the duality of good and evil. In The Robber Bride, Atwood attempts to destroy the myths in order to empower feminine status. Her deconstructive strategy has exposed the existence of these myth vestiges and recommended the application of unfixed plurality of meaning in both literature and life. Ultimately, by attempting to undermine the myth vestiges that limit possibilities for women, Atwood offers new models of behaviour for them to adopt.
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