M.ドラブルの『7人姉妹』に関する一考察 : キャンディダの人生と語りの技法

概要

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The heroine of The Seven Sisters, Candida Wilton, is a late middle-aged woman. She got married to an English man, Andrew, right after graduating from a university. She has not engaged herself in a job for a long time and she has spent her life just as a housewife. She is both a wife and a mother but she prefers to keep distance from her husband and daughters. Andrew feels lonely and seeks for her love. However, she is not affectionate towards him. Finally, he falls into the arms of another woman and Candida is forced to divorce him. This novel depicts how Candida lives her new life after the divorce, seeking her own happiness. Judging from this point, it ostensibly seems to deal with the same theme as Drabble's earlier novels. However, it is not so simple a novel. We notice that the narrative in The Seven Sisters is so artificial at our first reading: that is, computer journal, first or third person narrative shifting, false narrator's change and so on. In her earlier years of writing, Drabble said, "I hate books which are deliberately confusing. I aim to be lucid." She detested complicated novels like experimental ones so she has written many comparatively simple ones, having found themes in daily lives. Considering her words, Drabble seems to have some reason for having adopted several narrative techniques in The Seven Sisters. In this paper, I have studied how the development of Candida's new life and the narrative techniques are related.
2008-03-31