the problematics of motherhood in twentieth century women's fiction

184
and images which elevate and at the same trme marglnalise
them This chapter shifts the focus from the thematrc to
aesthetic aspects, indicating how a self-consc~ous feminlst
narrative point of view, structure, genre, imagery and myth
contribute to worklng out the problematlcs of motherhood
5.2.0. wrthln a femlnlst dlscourse itself, texts may be
written elfher from the perspectlve of the mother or the
daughter Femlnlst wrltlng wrltten from a 'daughterly'
perspectlve can be said to ally wlth patrlarchal dlscourse
in the process of 'otherlng' the mother, lt reiterates the
patrlarchal dogma that 'mothers can't wrlte, they are
wrltten' Whxle the storles of women have been ecllpsed In
men's plots, the storles of mothers are belng neglected in
the plots of sons and daughters Psychoanalytic femlnlsm
has added the female chlld to the male, allowing women to
speak as daughters, but 1t has d~fflculty accounting for the
experience and the voice of the adult woman who 1s a mot>.er
5.2.1. The mother's presence, tlll now reduced to a
utllltarlan functlon In llfe acd In fictlon, springs tc
prominence when women reallze that e5Jen when they are
mothers, there is a part of them that 1s not just a mother,
a part that remains a separate and independent '1'. Thrs
enables her to be the subject of her own story lnstead of
being a slave to the reproductive process As Dl Brandt