Skip to Main Content
 

Global Search Box

 
 
 

ETD Abstract Container

Abstract Header

“Beyond the Gilded Cage:” Staged Performances and the Reconstruction of Gender Identity in Mrs. Dalloway and The Great Gatsby

Pinzone, Anthony F
http://orcid.org/0000-0001-6632-3521
http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=csu1559659966276508

Abstract Details

2019, Master of Arts in English, Cleveland State University, College of Liberal Arts and Social Sciences.
Although scholars have examined Mrs. Dalloway extensively in terms of gender performance, few critics of The Great Gatsby have explored Gatsby’s masculinity through gender studies. Using Judith Butler’s theory of gender performativity, I argue that Mrs. Dalloway and Gatsby represent both actors and directors rehearsing a new gendered identity of the twentieth century. Through their roles as staged performers, I emphasize how seemingly minute tasks connect to larger social and political stakes of memory, celebrity status, and reappraisals of gender identity. I further assert that while both Mrs. Dalloway and Nick Carraway experience revelations and heightened imagination through death, neither achieve non- heteronormative gender identities. Still, Virginia Woolf and F. Scott Fitzgerald draw upon their own image of the artist to playfully tease a new hybrid-femininity and masculinity of self-invention beyond the gilded cage.
Frederick Karem, Ph.D (Committee Chair)
Rachel Carnell, Ph.D (Committee Member)
Adam Sonstegard, Ph.D (Committee Member)
57 p.
American Literature; Comparative; Comparative Literature; Gender Studies; Literature
gender identity; gender performance; gender studies; Judith Butler; gender performativity; nonheteronormative gender identity; Mrs Dalloway; The Great Gatsby; Virginia Woolf; F Scott Fitzgerald

Recommended Citations

Citations

  • Pinzone, A. F. (2019). “Beyond the Gilded Cage:” Staged Performances and the Reconstruction of Gender Identity in Mrs. Dalloway and The Great Gatsby [Master's thesis, Cleveland State University]. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=csu1559659966276508

    APA Style (7th edition)

  • Pinzone, Anthony. “Beyond the Gilded Cage:” Staged Performances and the Reconstruction of Gender Identity in Mrs. Dalloway and The Great Gatsby. 2019. Cleveland State University, Master's thesis. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center, http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=csu1559659966276508.

    MLA Style (8th edition)

  • Pinzone, Anthony. "“Beyond the Gilded Cage:” Staged Performances and the Reconstruction of Gender Identity in Mrs. Dalloway and The Great Gatsby." Master's thesis, Cleveland State University, 2019. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=csu1559659966276508

    Chicago Manual of Style (17th edition)

csu1559659966276508
1,030
© 2019, all rights reserved.
This open access ETD is published by Cleveland State University and OhioLINK.