An Analysis Of Identity In Mudwoman From The Perspective Of Space Theory

As a prominent contemporary American writer,Joyce Carol Oates as well as her works,has attracted much literary attention.Due to her interest in the realistic world,Oates pays close attention to the problems which reflected the social reality.Her novel Mudwoman,published in 2012,focuses on the middle-aged female intellectual M.R.?s identity anxiety,and it severs as an embodiment of her social concern.Influenced by the trend of spatial turn,Joyce Carol Oates directs her attention on space and its literary expression in the text.By analyzing the physical space,social space and psychological space in the novel,this paper attempts to explore the research of protagonist?s identity in Mudwoman.After almost being drowned in the mudflat by her insane mother,the protagonist M.R.has lived a shadowy life.Meanwhile,the accident also severs as the resource of her identity crisis as well as the reason why she has transferred among different physical spaces in the process of growing up.With the transformation of physical space,M.R.has become extremely lack of sense of security and belonging.Exposed to the painful truth that she has been the substitution of her adoptive parents? dead daughter,M.R.has been obsessed with a sense of betrayal and the absence of identity.In adulthood,despite of the high social position she enjoyed as a successful professional woman,M.R.has to suffer from great repression and misery.Due to her excellence,she is appointed as the first female president of Princeton University.In social space,however,as a victim of sex discrimination,her ability is always been questioned just for her female identity.In addition,with the long-existing gender discrimination,she is in a secondary position in the relationship with her lover.Her experiences have brought about physical exhaustion and spiritual frustration;hence M.R.decides to return to the place where she was born and grew up to reexamine herself.Oates believes that women must transcend sexual stereotypes responsibly.By highlighting the self-discovery in one?s life,Oates pleads for relief and improvement which,she believes,will improve the quality of life for all people.