Urban Space And Female Identity In The Summer Before The Dark

Doris Lessing(1919-) is an outstanding female writer in British literature, regarded as thegreatest woman writer after Virginia Woolf. Lessing is a writer who can architect the soul. Eitherin her short stories or novels, cities are always the important setting, particularly London. Urbanproblems are always the focuses in her fictions.The Summer Before the Dark, published in1973, is one of Lessing’s bestsellers. As soon as itwas published, this novel was highly appreciated. It tells a story of a middle-aged woman’sexperiences of departure and return to home during one summer. The protagonist Kate Brown,often just “Mrs Michael Brown,” is a representative of middle-aged women. Loss of her domesticspace awakens her awareness to seek for the real self. The studies on The Summer Before the Darkboth at home and abroad mainly belong to feminism, psycho analysis and narratology, however,the important relation between space and the destiny of the protagonist in the novel has long beenneglected. Kate’s departure from home; accepting a temporary job and traveling with her lover areall inseparably related with her pursuit of space. Besides feminism, this thesis tries to reread TheSummer Before the Dark from the perspective of space study. French philosopher Henry Lefebvreis the forerunner of spatial study. His Production of Space leads to the spatial turn in contemporarycultural studies. By closely dissecting the social confinement of women’s living space, it revealsthe primary causes of middle-aged women’s identical crisis and ways for women to constructself-identity.The thesis is divided into three parts. The first part is an introduction, including the currentresearches on Doris Lessing and her The Summer Before the Dark both home and abroad; the motivation and significance of the research, research methodology and the structure of the thesis.The second part is the body of the thesis, consisting of three chapters. Chapter one willdemonstrate some important and pertinent social-spatial theories, like Lefebvre’s production ofspace, Foucault’s space-power theory and feminist geography. Based on these social-spatialtheories, the author will explain the feasibility to The Summer Before the Dark. Chapter two is toset forth the relationship between femininity and the social spaces in The Summer Before the Darkfrom four spatial aspects: the space of household; the suburbs; consumption space and the publicspace. It uncovers the primary causes of women’s spiritual and identical crisis at macroscopiclevel. Chapter three is a close reading of The Summer Before the Dark. We follow the steps of theprotagonist going through the journey of seeking for the real self in urban spaces. The dreamyspace and memorial space are important private space to approach real self. This part analyzesrelevant problems at the microcosmic level. The third part comes to conclusion, pointing out thatspace plays a vital important role in cultivating and constructing modern female identity. Mendominate women by confining women’s social space in patriarchal society. Women need to haveawareness to expand their social space to construct self-identity.