Melancholy, the Absent Mother and the Fragmented Self: Identity Crisis in Helen Walsh’s Brass
Mustonen, Viivi (2018-06-06)
Melancholy, the Absent Mother and the Fragmented Self: Identity Crisis in Helen Walsh’s Brass
Mustonen, Viivi
(06.06.2018)
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Turun yliopisto
Tiivistelmä
In this thesis I study the identity crisis of the protagonist Millie O’Reilley in Helen Walsh’s novel Brass (2005). I analyse how the absence of Millie’s mother, Andrea, has affected Millie’s mental well-being and results in melancholy and intrusive thoughts, such as smelling her mother in the wind. I concentrate on the mother–daughter relationship more than on Millie’s obsession with sex workers and illegal substances.
I study how the mother–daughter relationship and Millie’s obsession with sex workers and illegal substances affect the narrative features of the novel, such as spatiality, familiarization and stream-of-consciousness narration. The identity crisis is studied with ideas of postmodernism, focusing on the concepts of self and the constituting components of identity such as gender, sexuality and socio-economic background. The familial relationships are studied with psychoanalytic literary criticism, with focus on the mother–daughter relationship.
My analysis shows that Millie craves power over women and prefers to identify with men. She begins to regret purchasing sex, and displays preference towards her mother as a source of refuge over her father when the novel ends.
Identity crises should be studied intersectionally, so that different features can be studied subjectively, depending on their importance for the topic. Studying mother–daughter relationships displayed the importance of familial relationships, and by choosing to study Millie’s survival from her identity crisis instead of only narrative bildungsroman structures displays the innate preference Millie has for her mother.
I study how the mother–daughter relationship and Millie’s obsession with sex workers and illegal substances affect the narrative features of the novel, such as spatiality, familiarization and stream-of-consciousness narration. The identity crisis is studied with ideas of postmodernism, focusing on the concepts of self and the constituting components of identity such as gender, sexuality and socio-economic background. The familial relationships are studied with psychoanalytic literary criticism, with focus on the mother–daughter relationship.
My analysis shows that Millie craves power over women and prefers to identify with men. She begins to regret purchasing sex, and displays preference towards her mother as a source of refuge over her father when the novel ends.
Identity crises should be studied intersectionally, so that different features can be studied subjectively, depending on their importance for the topic. Studying mother–daughter relationships displayed the importance of familial relationships, and by choosing to study Millie’s survival from her identity crisis instead of only narrative bildungsroman structures displays the innate preference Millie has for her mother.