Experience and Confession in Women’s Writing

Abstract

The literary transformation of women’s experience originates in the controversial and ambivalent attitudes towards artistic tradition and artistic practice, since the mediation of women’s experience calls for the reconstruction of those epistemological and interpretative norms and practices that are closely related to the making of a literary work. Fearing that her unique experience might be transformed into a cliché, a female author always wonders about the relevance of her self-expression – is the experience of a woman growing up and her coming-of-age story important enough to be fictionalised? The subject matter of women’s experience turns into a stumbling block due to the awareness that literary tradition lacks a bold and resolute reconsideration of plots dealing with the lives, education and opinions of women. This paper sets out to explore several recent novels and short story collections by women authors, discussing issues of growth and maturity along with topics of diversity and identity crises within a frame of a fluid text bearing resemblance to a fragmentary novel, autobiography and a short story cycle.