| The Red Queen by Margaret Drabble,published in 2004,has drawn attention from both readers and critics at home and abroad.The Red Queen sets a mode of parallel,consisting of three parts “Ancient times” “Modern times” and “Postmodern times”.The novel centers on crown princess Lady Hyegyong and modern intellectual woman Barbara Halliwell.It describes the court life of the eighteenth-century Korea and social conditions of modern England respectively.Despite different times,nations and cultural backgrounds,experiences of the crown princess and Barbara show a lot in common.In textual analysis,this thesis will employ Kate Millet and Simon De Beauvoir’s feminist ideas and theory of masculinity,trying to analyze females’ identity predicament,males’ predicament and their breakthroughs in the novel.This thesis will be divided into five parts: introduction,three body chapters and conclusion.The first chapter explores females’ identity predicament.Although living in different times and cultural backgrounds,three female characters in the novel—the crown princess,Barbara Halliwell and Viveca Van Jost are representatives of female group in the male-dominated society.They are both greatly influenced by patriarchy.In the novel,they are confronted with predicament as deprivation of identity,uncertainty of identity and loss of identity respectively.The second chapter focuses on males’ predicament faced by prince Sado,Peter Halliwell and Jan Van Jost.This chapter intends to illustrate their decline of masculinity by illustrating male characters’ physical defects,psychological oppressions as well as their incompetence in family relationships.The third chapter discusses possible ways of breakthroughs.First of all,Drabble employs the female first-person narration in first part of the novel.By deconstructing the sagacious image of king Yongjo and revealing the truth of Imo Incident,the crown princess’ s narration subverts historical discourse of patriarchy.She regains the right of discourse and female subjective identity by retelling the historical truth.In addition,adoption of the Chinese girl Chen Jianyi enables Barbara and Viveca to regain the identity as a mother.This chapter also centers on the breakthroughs of males’ predicament by way of reconstructing love and understanding in next generation.The conclusion points out that similar experiences of female and male characters in different cultural contexts indicate their common predicaments.Margaret Drabble intends to show concern for the predicaments faced by human beings in general and to reveal transcultural universal human characteristics.She also expresses her hope for breaking the barriers of space,time,nation and culture and achieving mutual understanding between people in order to get rid of common predicaments confronted by human beings. |
