Original scientific paper

Mela Hartwig’s The Woman is a Nothing: Feminism in the Literary Narrative of the Post-imperial Heritage

Eldi Grubišić Pulišelić ; Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences, University of Split

Abstract

The Austrian writer Mela Hartwig (1893–1967) interprets the reality of women in the post-imperial period and shows the consequences of misogynist theories for the construction of feminine identity. In the short story „Das Verbrechen“ („The Crime“), the author describes the psychopathological relationship between the father and the daughter through a cruel „play“ motivated by Freud's theory of psychoanalysis. In the novel Das Weib ist ein Nichts (The Woman is a Nothing), Hartwig deals with the constellation of institutional and extra-institutional power. The writer chooses a very radical, unusual and provocative form of analysis and criticism to show a dominant masculine culture. In her literary discourse, the "new woman" of the liberal 1920s is cast as a myth since Hartwig does not show optimism about upcoming changes in gender relations.

Keywords

Mela Hartwig; misogynical theories; psychoanalysis; feminine identity; female sexuality; new woman

Hrčak ID:

210858

URI

https://hrcak.srce.hr/210858

Publication date:

4.12.2018.

Article data in other languages: croatian

Visits: 1.351 *