The Quest For Identity In Alice Munro’s Daily Life Writing

Alice Munro has won quite a few awards including the Governor General’s Awards,Man Booker National Prize and Nobel Prize in Literature with her exquisite quality that embraced by women writers,sensitivity to many social and cultural issues and superb grasp of the works of the short story.From taking the Canadian National Award to the International Literary Award,the public’s attention to Munro has gradually increased,and the research on Munro among academic community has become increasingly hot.Feminist studies and regional studies have long been hot spots.Nonetheless,there are two general deficiencies:Munro’s daily-life writing itself,that is,Munro’s thinking about many issues,is not paid enough attention from the perspective of the daily life,and the relationship between Munro’s life experience and her work is not deeply explored.In view of this,this paper analyzes Munro’s multiple marginal situations from the perspective of the relationship between Munro’s life and her creations and explains Munro’s thoughts about women’s identity and national identity in marginal situations in her daily-life writing.The whole text is divided into three parts: introduction,main body and conclusion.The first part is an introduction which contains the introduction of Alice Munro,the research situation at home and abroad,and the purpose and value of this research.The second part includes three chapters.The first chapter focuses on the origins of Munro’s quest for identity in her writings about her daily life.The Canadian literary tradition,Munro’s life experience and creation concepts make daily writing become an inevitable path for her novel creation.At the right time,world literature shifted from grand writing to daily writing which gives prominence to the expression of women’s identity and national identity,providing the possibility for her to shine on the world literary stage.Besides,the feminist movement,family traditions,social traditions,and personal experiences contribute to the expression of the female identity,while the geographically marginal location of the town and the feeling of“being marginal” brought about by the division of her family propel the exploration of the national identity.To some extent,female identity and national identity,share survival in the cracks and establish their own identity appeals to the center.Chapter 2 focuses on Munro’s quest for female identity in her daily writing.This chapter analyzes Boys and Girls,The Office and Too Much Happiness in terms of symbols,habits and areas of the daily life,revealing the hidden issue of violence and power in daily life.Then,the third chapter investigates the pursuit of national identity in Munro’s daily-life writing,and excavates Munro’s thinking about the national identity of the country in different times by means of considering the text content of The View from Castle Rock,A Wilderness Station and Chandeleys and Flemings.It turns out that immigrant groups have encountered various anxieties of the ethnic identity in different periods,and due to the physical distance,early immigrants faced the fear of losing their culture and national identity.Rather,after arriving in the New World,the pioneers facing the difficulties of wilderness which made it hard to find the cultural roots,were in a state of madness,causing it hard to establish their ethnic status.At present,seeing that Canada is in a triple attack of Irish,Scottish and American cultures,diversity with none-center has become the best annotation of national identity.In the end,the third part as the conclusion illustrates the common orientation of value of Munro’s pursuit of female identity and national identity,and affirms the value of Munro’s daily-life writing to explore female identity and ethnic identity.