Comparing the Feminine Quest in Surfacing and Song of...

The Feminine Quest in Surfacing and Song of Solomon Margaret Atwood in her novel Surfacing and Toni Morrison in her novel Song of Solomon require their heroines to pass through a stage of self-interpretation as a prerequisite for re-inventing the self. This stage in the feminine journey manifests a critical act typically absent in the traditional male journey, and one that places Atwood and Morrisons heroines at odds with the patriarchal community. If authors of feminine journeys meet the requirements set out by feminist critics like Dana Heller, then we must also provide a method for interpreting the texts that will be palatable for critics from the patriarchy. Otherwise we perpetuate an hostility between the camps that†¦show more content†¦But as conditions in real life changed, the structure and impact of the old stories failed to keep pace, and we found ourselves with a confusing mismatch of perceived roles and desired roles. The revised male journey became flight from women and from the influence of others - according to Heller - thus creating the literary label of anti-hero (24). He still journeyed, but he kept the boon to himself (it was a lesser one anyway). If for some reason he does pass back through his sponsoring community, he is not received as a prince returning home.. The revised female journey became more fully hers, but like the male anti-hero, the Jane Eyres and Emma Bovarys become social outcasts and outlaws for refusing to remain in their duly assigned roles. For a satisfactory conclusion to these stories, the audience required death or marriage - still generally portrayed as a final submission to patriarchal authority. Dana Heller tells us now that Womens quests must propose strategies for escaping debilitating structures, for discovering authentic selfhood, and for claiming the right to take her journey out into the world (13). Heller expresses here an imperative to current and future writers of the feminine journey to generate stories that accord the heroine