Living the Best She Could: the Double Boundary Crossing in C. P. Gilman's Autobiography

Abstract

Abstract: This paper aims to shed new lights on the study of women's autobiography by analyzing the double boundary crossing of the autobiography of Charlotte Perkins Gilman, a significant American feminist and social activist at the turn of the 20th century. The first boundary crossing of Gilman in this work is that of the inside/private/woman vs. the outside/public/man division, which she succeeds by integrating the living self that dedicates herself to improving human welfare and the self that lives and endures harsh reality of the outside world. Gilman crosses the generic boundary between autobiographical and diary writing by the gradual transformation of her autobiographical self because she re-reads the past to understand and improve the imperfect world. With the double boundary crossing, Gilman re-visions autobiography to be a non-exclusive gender genre and gives meaning to both women's living and writing.

Key words: C. P. Gilman, life narratives, personal narratives, women's autobiography, women's diary, gender division

Liu Kailing. Living the Best She Could: the Double Boundary Crossing in C. P. Gilman's Autobiography[J]. Foreign Literature Studies, 2017, 39(2): 112-121.

References

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