the problematics of motherhood in twentieth century women's fiction

to the earlier generation, as observed in her other works
too such as The Realms of Gold and The Waterfall
cunnzngham observes.
This is a conscious desire of the author's, a
deslre 'to give credit where credrt is due' to the
feminlst tradition, and to counter the faclle
assumption she finds partlcularly among Americans
that the woman's movement is something which
sprang from nowhere in the mid-sixfies (1982 133).
As Gall
The clarity of the femlnlst lssues faced by the women of the
earlrer generatron become blurred for Drabble's contemporary
women who find it dlfflcult to get stralghtforward answers
to then dilemma
2.3.0. A deslre for sons rather than daughters 1s
ingrained in the psyche of the feminine mother Such a
preference is actually a construct of patriarchy, used to
perpetuate its rule While daughters are consldered
unwanted burdens, sons are regarded as power-symcols,
perpetuatcrs of the famlly This 1s partlcularly tr;e in
the case of Indlan soclety where female foet~clde 1s
practised even today A glance at ancient Indlan :exts
reveals that while sons were elevated to helghts, daugsrers
barely exlsted, belng nullifled elther by sllence cr by
lcfantlcide Among Indlan cornunities such as the Ra;puts
ar,d Brahmins, where sons are consldered more desirable,
there is nevertheless a special attachment of mothers to
their daughters. But this kind of female bonding, though