Komporaly, Jozefina (2001) Configurations of mothering in post-war British women's playwriting. PhD thesis, University of Warwick.

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Abstract

While examining a selection of plays centred on the phenomenon of mothering, my
thesis also investigates the interaction between theatre and feminism in post-war
Britain, aiming to highlight mutual correspondences between women's theatre
making and feminist agendas. I focus mainly on the period of second-wave
feminism, but I also discuss the decade preceding the appearance of the Women's
Liberation Movement, as well as its aftermath up to the mid-nineties. Scrutinising
proto-feminist, feminist and post-feminist stances, I argue that several fifties women
dramatists anticipated key concerns of the late sixties and seventies; and equally, that
many playwrights active after the heyday of second-wave feminism revisited the
climate of the seventies in an attempt to evaluate the transformations that have since
occurred in women's lives. In this manner, I not only contextualise some of the
major achievements and shortcomings of successive feminist interventions, but also
elaborate on key changes that have taken place in the negotiation of dramatic form
and content.
Rather than privileging one dominant theoretical position and adopting its
perspective for the purposes of my analysis, I connect the work of playwrights
informed by different artistic positions and political convictions, in order to pinpoint
the principle of co-existence and multiplicity. This aesthetic and ideological diversity
in women's writing for the stage, characteristic of the past five decades, has been
confirmed not only by the primary and secondary sources that I drew upon but also
by the playwrights themselves, whom I interviewed. For most present-day female
dramatists, as this thesis argues, contemporary British women's theatre is a space of
experimentation and of confluence - in which the broad range of individual voices
can situate themselves next to one another, without the urge to replicate an ultimate
direction imposed by hegemonic political constraints or artistic platforms.

Item Type:	Thesis (PhD)
Subjects:	H Social Sciences > HQ The family. Marriage. Woman P Language and Literature > PN Literature (General) > PN2000 Dramatic representation. The Theater P Language and Literature > PR English literature
Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH):	Motherhood in literature, Feminism and theater -- Great Britain -- History -- 20th century, Women dramatists, English, English drama -- 20th century
Official Date:	April 2001
Dates:	Date Event April 2001 Submitted
Institution:	University of Warwick
Theses Department:	Department of English and Comparative Literary Studies
Thesis Type:	PhD
Publication Status:	Unpublished
Supervisor(s)/Advisor:	Howard, Tony, 1947- ; Cousin, Geraldine
Sponsors:	Soros Foundation
Extent:	xix, 311 leaves
Language:	eng

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