Representation Of Patriarchy Through Intertextuality And Satire In Carol Ann Duffy's World's Wife
Abstract
Feminism as a movement stands for women struggling equality of freedom, social and political rights emphasizing the fact of all the time lacking them in response to patriarchal societies. The World� s Wife reflects a zenith in Duffy�s feminist point of view as she artistically subverts different legendary characters from Greek mythology and gives a voice of narration to their spouses. Duffy�s style of writing is unique and this is linked with her personal background, mixing the historical figures with those who had no voice. In this way, she creates a parallel between social issues of the past and contemporary feminist thoughts. By giving voice to the spouses of different famous figures in history, art and science, she reflects another position of society that have forever been absent, that of female. The reason Duffy empowers the wives voice of these mythological great men by using humor and satire is just to subvert what the history hides in contemporary literature, as now the female writers can use their imagination and intellect to tell the truths fearlessly. This paper focuses on the underrepresentation of women in well-known histories and mythologies, which Duffy reverses in The World's Wife, using modern contexts to illustrate the feminist interpretation of the stories in the poems mentioned. It also examines Duffy's struggle against patriarchy and hegemonic masculinity, in reference to how women react to their male companions in the poems included considering feminist and psychoanalytic perspectives in The World� s Wife as a reason to represent better the new epoch from (his)story to (her)story.
Keywords
The World�s Wife, Carol Ann Duffy, intertextuality, satire, subversion of roles, Greek mythology, dramatic monologues
Authors
MSc Haxhire Xhihani
Kings Education
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