Vilt växande Fula Flickor. Om kvinnoblivande hos Mare Kandre - an analys av "Bübins unge" och "Aliide, Aliide"

Abstract

The purpose of this master’s thesis is to examine from a psychoanalytic point of view how Mare Kandre narrate the complex process when girl becomes woman. Earlier theoretical work concerning Mare Kandre is sparse and limited to narrow cut-outs of her authorship. There are two dissertations, but none with Kandre and her unique fictional works alone in focus. Most frequently she is presented as part of different groups of authors. The material constitutes of Kandre’s early novels Bübins unge (1987) and Aliide, Aliide (1991). The theoretical premises is mainly based on psychoanalytic theory. A subordinate purpose therefore is to investigate how psychoanalytic way of thinking can be useful in literary studies. Influential is Julia Kristeva’s theory on the abjection and moreover her idea of the female writer as a dissident. Other important concepts are semiotic and symbolic language and girlhood. The method used includes both a stylistic and a thematic approach. The first part of the analysis aims to explore the narrative method Kandre uses when describing the birth of an identity as a woman. The second part concerns the difficult progress when the young girl is trying to find herself an identity as a woman. To enable a systematic examination four aspects of the process were selected: the relation between mother and daughter, the experience of being a girl, physical changes and the capture of a language.The conclusion of this study is that Mare Kandre describes the complex process when girl becomes woman in a groundbreaking way. Stilistically she uses an innovative language that can be said to broaden the limits for the capacity of the language, where the imagery is the hallmark. Thematically she enter a new kind of girl in our common literary consciousness when she describes the agonizing process of becoming a woman. With substantial support in psychoanalytic theory Bübins unge and Aliide, Aliide has been interpreted. This particular way of reading has opened the literary texts in a most purposive way and generated rewarding angles of approach.