A Feminist Reading Of The Revolutionary Road

Richard Yates (1926-1992) was considered as one of the greatest writers at the"Age of Anxiety". He published seven novels and two collections of short stories in his short life. In all these stories,Yates'first story The Revolutionary Road was highly valued when it was published in 1961 and nominated for the U.S. National Book Award the same year and also was awarded as one of the great classics of English fiction in 2005. The film The Revolutionary Road which was adapted from the well-known novel of the same title got the Golden Globe Best Actress Award in 2009 and also brought the actress an Oscar nomination.At that time, when the novel The Revolutionary Road was published in 1961, American economy was just beginning to regain economic vitality after World War II, the life condition and the mental outlook of the people was brand new and at the same time people has a strong desire for freedom. From the early 20th century to 1960s, the world war broke out for two times and at that turbulent period the colonialism fell apart, the feminism also underwent rapid development with the feminist awareness was simmer on all of which has great influences on the writing of Richard Yates. This thesis tries to interpret the connotation of the theme and female consciousness of the novel The Revolutionary Road in light of feminist critical point of view under the background of feminism campaign at that time.In the early stages of the development of the feminism, the dominant ideology of the feminist contains the emancipation of the role of women as well as of the real human and they fight for a common goal—to clear away all the obstacles that hinder the development of the woman as a real human being. Generally, all of the feminists work on the premise that the women, as a whole, suffer the oppression and discrimination in all ages, just the concept"the other"which Simone de Beauvoir put forward in her representative work The Second Sex. In her masterpiece The Second Sex, Simon de Beauvoir discusses women's situation and the destiny as being"the other"objectively and then put forward some practical recommendations for the emancipation of women. She believes that the ideal goal of the women's total liberation is that the women and men should work together to create the prefect fusion of social gender based on the gender differences. At this point Woolf totally agrees with Beauvoir and her concept of"Androgyny"is also brought forward on this basis. Woolf hopes to create a better society in which the two genders live in harmony through the ideal way of"Androgyny".This thesis analyzes the life experiences especially April's marriage in the patriarchal society in detail and from the feminist visual the author shows her different emotional changes throughout the course which marks her strong desire for self-independence and yearning for a better life. April is tired of the dull and monotonous family life and hopes to get rid of the shackles imposed on women by the whole society, but she only died in depression. Therefore, from a feminist point of view, The Revolutionary Road can be seen as a novel which is focused on the growth of the woman, including the loss of the self-consciousness, the finding and discovery about her new way out, and then starting to rebel against the traditional male chauvinism. April lifetime is full of frustrations and depression as she lives as"the other"in the patriarchal society and this is the major cause of her failure on her revolutionary way. Thus it indicates that there is a long way to go for the women's liberation and the outlet of the happy family life lies that the men and women should live together in harmony with selfless love. By seeing through the appearance to get at the essence, Yates put forward its own distinctive point of view on the status quo and made a plea for the contemporary American happy housewives who was satisfied with the existing state of affairs and suffered a lot from the unfair treatment, which in large stirred the awakening of the American women.