The voice of the mother

Description:

"In The Voice of the Mother, Jo Malin argues that many twentieth-century autobiographies by women contain an intertext, an embedded narrative, which is a biography of the writer/daughter's mother.". "Analyzing this narrative practice, Malin examines ten texts by women who seem particularly compelled to tell their mothers' stories. Each author is, in fact, able to write her own autobiography only by using a narrative form that contains her mother's story at its core. These texts raise interesting questions about autobiography as a genre and about a feminist writing practice that resists and subverts the dominant literary tradition.". "Malin theorizes a hybrid form of autobiographical narrative containing an embedded narrative of the mother. This alternative narrative practice - in which the daughter attempts to talk both to her mother and about her - is equally an autobiography and a biography rather than one or the other. The technique is marked by a breakdown of subject/object categories as well as auto/biographical dichotomies of genre. Each text contains a "self" that is more plural than singular, yet neither."--BOOK JACKET.

subjects: 20th century,  American prose literature,  Autobiography,  English prose literature,  History,  History and criticism,  Mother and child in literature,  Motherhood in literature,  Mothers and daughters in literature,  Mothers in literature,  Narration (Rhetoric),  Women and literature,  Women authors,  Prose américaine,  Histoire et critique,  Écrits de femmes autobiographiques,  Prose anglaise,  Mères et filles dans la littérature,  Mère et enfant dans la littérature,  Maternité dans la littérature,  Mères dans la littérature,  Narration,  Écrits de femmes américains,  Écrits de femmes anglais,  LITERARY CRITICISM,  American,  General,  Frauenliteratur,  Familie,  Geschichte 1900-2000,  American prose literature, women authors,  Autobiography, women authors,  English prose literature, women authors

Places: English-speaking countries

Times: 20th century