The Awakening Of Women’s Consciousness In This Side Of Paradise

F.Scott Fitzgerald is one of the most prominent novelists in modern American literature. In his lifetime, he had created a great number of excellent works. This Side of Paradise is one of his most important novels and a semi-autobiographical one. Most critics focused on the psychological growth of the male protagonist, regarding his growth as the the process of confusion and maturity of the Lost Generation after the World War I. Others paid attention to the “Oedipus Complex” of this novel, considering the relationship between Amory and his mother Beatrice as abnormal with the approach of psychoanalysis. Though This Side of Paradise had earned fame and wealth for Fitzgerald, this novel has achieved less attention compared with his other works such as The Great Gatsby and Tender Is the Night. Most of feminist critics put emphasis on his other works by presenting the tragic life of the female characters in patriarchy society rather than focusing on their awareness of fighting.In this thesis, the author tries to present the awakening of the consciousness of the female characters in This Side of Paradise by analyzing it in the perspective of their femininity. It intends to research two kinds of femininities of the female characters: one is patriarchal femininity; the other is androgynous femininity. The theory of women’s oppression as expounded by Simone De Beauvoir in The Second Sex and Virginia Woolf’s androgyny in A Room of One’s Own will be used to explore the patriarchal femininity and androgynous femininity respectively. There are two generations of women in the novel. The elder generation is the traditional woman with the patriarchal femininity. In This Side of Paradise, Beatrice is the typical woman with patriarchal femininity of being passive, submissive and dependent on males. The younger generation is known as flappers in the 1920 s. They are women with androgynous femininity. Clara, Rosalind and Eleanor had both femininity of weakness, innocence and submissiveness and masculinity of independence, braveness and ambition. They come from different classes but all suffer from the patriarchal ideology. They have a tragic life in their family, oppressed and dominated by men. But they don’t give up fighting and show their features of the new women at that time.This thesis will be divided into four parts. Firstly, it’s a brief introduction of the novel This Side of Paradise and a literature review of it. Secondly, it’s an elaboration of the theory femininity and androgyny. Thirdly, their awareness and behavior is described to show their fight; finally, the reasons for their awakening of consciousness are analyzed. It includes three reasons: Jazz Age, which provides fertile soil for the female awakening; the decline of masculinity, which is an important factor for women’s fighting; the androgynous femininity of the flappers in This Side of Paradise, which is the source for fictional flapper and their awakening.With the patriarchal femininity and androgynous femininity, the awakening of the four female characters’ consciousness is analyzed in detail. They females are on the way to fight for their own rights and began to show their self-consciousness of independence. Moreover, the cause for their awakening is explored historically and culturally. The flappers in the novel and their braveness, independence and confidence can enlighten the women today.