The Portrayal of Women in American Literature

The Portrayal of Women in American Literature

Throughout American Literature, women have been depicted in many different ways. The portrayal of women in American Literature is often influenced by an author's personal experience or a frequent societal stereotype of women and their position. Often times, male authors interpret society’s views of women in a completely different nature than a female author would. While F. Scott Fitzgerald may represent his main female character as a victim in the 1920’s, Zora Neale Hurston portrays hers as a strong, free-spirited, and independent woman only a decade later in the 1930’s.

In F. Scott Fitzgerald's, The Great Gatsby, the main female character, Daisy Buchanan, is portrayed by, Nick, the narrator, only by her superficial qualities. “Guided only by Nick’s limited view of her, readers often judge Daisy solely on the basis of her superficial qualities” (Fryer 43). What the reader sees through the eyes of Nick only appears as a woman whose impatience and desire for wealth and luxury cost her the love of her life, Gatsby. Nick’s narrow perception does not allow one to see that “…[Daisy’s] silly manner conceals a woman of feeling or that her final ‘irresponsibility’ towards Gatsby stems from an acute sense of responsibility towards herself” and that Nick “…clearly does not understand what motivates her” (Fryer 43). One can easily view Daisy as a victim. Fitzgerald distinctly exposes Daisy’s need for stability, which, according to Fitzgerald or perhaps the mentality of the time period, can only be found in a man. “Her need for stability was immediate, and she attempted to satisfy that need through something tangible, something close at hand” (Fryer 51). This “need” that Fitzg...

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Bibliography:

Works Cited

Fryer, Sarah Beebe. Fitzgerald’s New Women: Harbingers of Change. Eds. Jackson R.

Bryer, A. Walton Litz, and Linda Wagner. Studies in Modern Literature, No. 86. Ann Arbor, Michigan: U-M-I Research Press, 1988. 43, 51, 54-55.

Gladstein, Mimi Reisel. The Indestructible Women in Faulker, Hemingway, and

Steinbeck. Eds. A. Walton Litz, Thomas C. Moser, and Linda Wagner. Studies

In Modern Literature, No. 45. Ann Arbor, Michigan: U-M-I Research Press,

1986. 57-58, 86-89.

Goodman, Susan. Edith Wharton’s Women: Friends & Rivals. Hanover: University

Press of New England, 1990. 72-75.

Peters, Pearlie Mae Fisher. The Assertive Women in Zora Neale Hurston’s Fiction,

Folklore, and Drama. Ed. Graham Russell Hodges. New York, New York:

Garland Publishing Inc., 1998. 132, 139, 141, 143.