Through Feminist Eyes: Gender Identities and Gender Roles in the Fiction of Fay Weldon

Abstract

In a society of patriarchal hegemony, women have been subordinated and humiliated in such a way that many feminist writers have highlighted the pathetic plight of women. The commodification and humiliation to which the women have been subjected form favourite fictional themes for writers like Fay Weldon. The premise is that man is woman’s protector whose authority she has to acquiesce in whether she wills it or not. Female relationships in all their multiplicity and complexity are what Fay Weldon probes in most of her works. Some of her novels set in the seventies reflect certain features of radical feminism in that they deal with gender difference and its impact on women. This article focuses on Weldon’s concern for the creation of female spaces and the need for the assertion of their identities in a patriarchal society. Weldon does not adopt a tone of confrontation, rather strikes a healthy compromise between conciliation and confrontation.