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    A Feminist Approach To Ernest Hemingway

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    aschiutacriss
    The document provides a feminist analysis of Ernest Hemingway's short story "The Snows of Kilimanjaro". It summarizes that the story reflects the marginalization of women in Hemingway's works, with the female character Helen portrayed as submissive to the dominant male character Harry. A feminist critic could observe hints of patriarchal conceptions in the distinct perspectives afforded to each character. However, elements also present Helen in a more emancipated light, and the ending focuses on her, suggesting Hemingway's perspective may have changed to a more modern view of women's status.

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    A Feminist Approach To Ernest Hemingway

    Uploaded by

    aschiutacriss
    631 views4 pages
    The document provides a feminist analysis of Ernest Hemingway's short story "The Snows of Kilimanjaro". It summarizes that the story reflects the marginalization of women in Hemingway's works, with the female character Helen portrayed as submissive to the dominant male character Harry. A feminist critic could observe hints of patriarchal conceptions in the distinct perspectives afforded to each character. However, elements also present Helen in a more emancipated light, and the ending focuses on her, suggesting Hemingway's perspective may have changed to a more modern view of women's status.

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    a critical essay on Hemingway's so called "mysoginistic" attitude toward his female characters...

    Original Title

    A Feminist Approach to Ernest Hemingway

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    The document provides a feminist analysis of Ernest Hemingway's short story "The Snows of Kilimanjaro". It summarizes that the story reflects the marginalization of women in Hemingway's works, with the female character Helen portrayed as submissive to the dominant male character Harry. A feminist critic could observe hints of patriarchal conceptions in the distinct perspectives afforded to each character. However, elements also present Helen in a more emancipated light, and the ending focuses on her, suggesting Hemingway's perspective may have changed to a more modern view of women's status.

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as DOC, PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as doc, pdf, or txt
    631 views4 pages

    A Feminist Approach To Ernest Hemingway

    Uploaded by

    aschiutacriss
    The document provides a feminist analysis of Ernest Hemingway's short story "The Snows of Kilimanjaro". It summarizes that the story reflects the marginalization of women in Hemingway's works, with the female character Helen portrayed as submissive to the dominant male character Harry. A feminist critic could observe hints of patriarchal conceptions in the distinct perspectives afforded to each character. However, elements also present Helen in a more emancipated light, and the ending focuses on her, suggesting Hemingway's perspective may have changed to a more modern view of women's status.

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as DOC, PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as doc, pdf, or txt
    of 4

    A Special Course in American Literature

    Prof. Dr. LIGIA DOINA CONSTANTINESCU


    A Feminist Approach to Ernest Hemingways The
    Snows of Kilimanjaro
    Student: TUDOR CRISTINA
    French- English, 4th year ! study, "#4$
    $%&'(&$''(
    A Feminist Approach to Ernest Hemingways
    The Snows of Kilimanjaro
    When referring to what we call literature norms, the famous
    feminist critic, Elaine Showalter remarks, and with good reason too, that
    in most of what we call good literature: too many literary abstractions
    which claim to be universal have in fact described only male perceptions,
    experiences, and options... (Toward A Feminist Poetics, p.124), the result
    being the unfair treatment of woman as the Marginal, the secondary sex
    not allowed to speak and express its own perceptions and personality.
    Ernest Hemingways well-known short-story The Snows of
    Kilimanjaro is one literary product which refects best the womans
    marginal position in a great American writers work. A representative
    work for its creator, The Snows of Kilimanjaro has a rather simple plot:
    Harry, a journalist aspiring to be a writer, and his wife, Helen,
    participate in safari hunting on Kilimanjaro Mountains, where Harry gets
    a gangrened leg. The story is focused on Harry last hours of life and on
    his discussions with Helen.
    When talking about this short-story, it is quite impossible to
    overlook the distinctive roles detained by the two characters, and the
    continuous confict between them. Seen from a Feminist perspective,
    these characters are clearly, if not dangerously, representing an
    patriarchal way of conceiving sexes roles: the man - a typically
    dominant, aggressive male, frustrated by the wasting of his talent, always
    $
    not only disregarding but also insulting his wife: You bitch, you rich
    bitch!; the woman - a not named, totally submissive character,
    emotionally dependent on her husband.
    A Feminist critic could not help observing the fact that this short-
    story shows many hints of a patriarchal conception and of a marginal
    position of the female character. From the very beginning, there are two
    distinct perspectives of her: Harrys and the narrators, all converging to
    an inferior position comparing to her man. Harrys subjective perception
    shows her as the kindly caretaker and destroyer of his talent- ftting
    perfectly Hlne Cisouxs considerations on the woman inferior status in
    a phallocentric society which blames her for being frigid, for being too
    hot, for being both at once; for being too motherly and not enough... (The
    Laugh of the Medusa, p.312). Furthermore, Helens rare, short answers
    also construct an image of the woman as an obedient being, not allowed
    to criticize her man but only to take care of him.
    Nevertheless, there are some elements presenting this character in
    a diferent view as a rich emancipated woman, having few love-afairs,
    etc., as the provider for food, as the only active character in the story.
    Willingly or not, Hemingway gives also an objective perspective of this
    character, letting his reader guess that there is something more behind
    the mask imposed by the patriarchal perception of women. This
    correlated with the last scene of the story showing the woman fnding
    Harrys body and her incapacity to hear the hyenas noise for the beat of
    her heart - thus indicating the authors focus on the character at the end
    - leads to a probable change in Hemingways perspective of the female
    status, from a phallocentric one to a modern one.
    #
    To sum up, a Feminist critic always fnds something to reproach to
    Hemingway when analysing his female characters, as they are
    undoubtedly marginalized, somehow associated with the death of man, of
    virility, of lucid control against emotions- all favourite themes of the
    phallocentric society and culture. And, still, this disregard of the other
    sex can possibly determine a critic to neglect a great writers literary
    value?! Obviously, it cannot.
    Bibliography:
    Showalter, Elaine Toward a Feminist Poetics,
    1979
    Cisoux, Hlne The Laugh of the Medusa,1975
    Hemingway, Ernest The Snows of Kilimanjaro
    4

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