| Margaret Drabble is a preeminent female novelist, biographer and critic incontemporary Britain. In the west Drabble has got a few titles from the critics: amoralist, a realist, a women's writer, a feminist. Indeed, her identity is absolutelycontroversial. In China, she is seldom introduced. The study of her is just at itsbeginning. Thus in my dissertation, on the basis of the analysis of the criticism fromboth home and abroad and a close study of her works and interview records, I wouldlike to draw an overview of Drabble and her novels.In the introduction part, the author gives a general introduction to MargaretDrabble and the criticism on her and her novels. As in a 1967 interview, Drabble hadever proclaimed that she did not want to write an experimental novel;she wouldrather be at the end of a dying tradition, which she admires, than at the beginning of atradition which she deplores. While two years later, in 1969, Drabble published herexperimental novel, The Waterfall. The openness in the direct description of femalebody and female sexuality, the playfulness in form—the loose and split narrative allappear in Drabble's later novels. Following this clue, the author finds thecontradiction in Margaret Drabble's novel writing. Based on this point, the author putsforward the central argument that there are two tendencies in Margaret Drabble'snovel writings: on the one hand, she follows "The Great Tradition" theory, generated,taught and fervently advocated by F. R. Leavis;on the other hand, she transcends"The Great Tradition" by fusing the modernist and postmodernist elements into herwriting. In a word, Drabble is not only a firm follower but also a practitioner inexceeding Leavis's "The Great Tradition".As Drabble has always said that she was influenced much by F. R. Leavis and his"The Great Tradition", then in Chapter one, the author makes a detailed analysis ofLeavis's "The Great Tradition" theory, including the necessity of "The GreatTradition", the content of "The Great Tradition", the significance and limitation ofthis theory then concludes that, Leavis's "The Great Tradition" discerns a clear "greattradition" of social and moral realism, of fictional "maturity", running from theeighteenth to the twentieth century with its key figures who should become theexamples for twentieth-century novelists;Leavis's limitation lies in his too rigid focuson the moral meaning of the literary works and the ignorance of aesthetic interests tosome extent.In the following chapter, the author further discusses Drabble's appliance ofLeavis's "The Great Tradition" theory in her novel writing. The author first analyzesthe realistic elements in Drabble's novels and which correspond to what Leavis assertsin his "The Great Tradition"—the "openness before life" and the "awareness of thepossibilities of life". Secondly, the author proves that there is a concern for socialhistory and the great community goes in Drabble's novels and which corresponds toLeavis's advocating that writers should present a process of self-recognition, ofself-definition through the recognition of "mutuality in human relations" in novels.Thirdly, the author finds the using of subtle living language in Drabble's novels isquite similar to the language used by some female writers in the Victorian age, such asAusten and Bront?, which was stressed much in Leavis's The Great Tradition.Although "The Great Tradition" taught by Leavis has influenced her deeply,Drabble admits that there is still something in her that rebels against Leavis's controlof the canon, she says she has got a sense of deconstruction and postmodern in herself.Thus, in Chapter Three, the author first introduces the literary background at the endof 1960s when Drabble changed her standpoint to write experimental novel, thengives the definition of the term modernism, postmodernism and deconstructionrespectively and further discusses the relationship among them. Secondly, the authordoes a research on Drabble's feminist identity. The author finds that Drabble's novels,especially her early novels, were detailed with thick growing of female consciousness,the primitive impulse of female sexuality. Moreover, the deconstruction in languageappears in The Waterfall from which the author finds a tendency of postmodernism.What is more, during whose research, the author also finds out there is not only apenetration of female consciousness and feminist sensibility in her female-sexed textwhich is advocated by a French feminist critic Helene Cixous, but also a shift inDrabble's conception of morality towards a female-centered one—a deviation fromthe male-centered morality. Therefore, the feminist identity is proved. Thirdly, theauthor finds a deviation in form in Drabble's novel The Waterfall. By a frequent use ofsplit narrative, in which the story is sometimes told in the first person and sometimesin the third, it creates the sense of a divided self and of fantasy. What is more, an openending was adopted in The Waterfall by Drabble which shows a trend in literarywriting, that is, the transition from the author-orientation to the readers-orientation,and also a falling of the worship towards the unitary and absolute authority and arising of a multi-thought system and a multi-world. Thus, the modernist andpostmodernist features are revealed.Based on the former discussion and analysis, the author concludes an overview ofMargaret Drabble and her novels: throughout all Drabble's fictions, there is always amain note one can perceive: her subtle use of living language, her sticking to narrative,her moral and social realism, all shows the features of Leavis's "The Great Tradition"theory;while at the same time, Drabble also puts her effort in walking out of theshadow of "the father figure (Leavis)" and in exploring new elements in novelwriting—her "feminine writing", her deviation from the male-centered to afemale-centered morality;the deviation in form—the writing of a metafiction (thesplit narrative, the open ending), all of which has reflected a fragmentation ofcontemporary existence and which places Drabble among the premier of thepostmodernists. |
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