But, just to prove I have been writing, I've decided to provide examples of the tortures they inflict on unsuspecting English majors in college. I promise I will write more this summer and next semester (when I'm having marvelous adventures in London instead of being chained to my desk chair).
"In particular, I want to address how the romance novel has affected women writers. During the early days of the novel, what we would now consider romance novels were outlets for female writers to explore on what terms marriage should occur and the role of choice within those terms. Helene Cixous commissions women in her essay "Laugh of the Medusa”, telling them, "Write, let no one hold you back, let nothing stop you...Smug-faced readers, managing editors, and big bosses don't like the true texts of women--female-sexed texts. That kind scares them" (Cixous 2041). Writing within the romance genre allows for female-sexed to reign supreme and explore different facets of the readers’ psyche. As a part of this, I also want to discuss the idea of androgyny and gender identity within the romance novels. Romance writer Linda Barlow asserts in her essay "The Androgyny of the Writer" that, “The various elements contained in [romance novels] function as internal archetypes within the feminine psyche. This includes the hero, whom I see not as the masculine object of feminine consciousness but as a significant aspect of feminine consciousness itself” (Barlow). The inner gender dichotomy happening within the mind of the reader allows for conflict and personal resolution in the outer gender dichotomy of the marriage plot that is happening in the novel. From this discussion, I want to move on and explore the male-female relationships that are modeled and matured within the lexicon of the romance novel, both in the novels themselves and in the discussion surrounding them." ~ an excerpt from my Literary Theory and Criticism paper over Feminist Criticism and the Romance Novel
"As a woman, there is not much Volumnia can control since; socially and politically she is subject to the will of men. But as a mother, she has a surrogate that she has taught to listen to and put into action her own personal agenda This sentence and the below highlighted one are essentially the same point, maybe make them neighbors or cut one to avoid repetition without growth. When she sees her son for the first time upon his return after the war, she tells him, “I have lived/
To see inherited my very wishes/
And the buildings of my fancy: only/
There's one thing wanting, which I doubt not but/
Our Rome will cast upon thee” (II.I.197-202). She speaks of his accomplishments as if they were hers . She has spent most of her life raising this man;him andnow he has fulfilled what she sees as his duty to her: he has brought glory to himself and to Rome. As a woman, her worth isn’t measured in the same way as a man’s. Her one job in society is to raise her child. Raising a child without a father makes his success or failure even more her responsibility than other mothers. Martius’s return to Rome isn’t just his triumph- it’s hers as well. All of his achievements are partially hers because she made him the man that he is." ~ an excerpt from my Capstone paper about the role of women in Coriolanus and King Lear by Shakespeare.
My life is soooo exciting, isn't it?
Count down to summer and getting to see my wonderful friends and family? 4 days.
Nice!
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