UDC

808.1+821.131.1

Authors

Yuliya N. Galatenko
National Research University Higher School of Economics; ul. Bolshaya Ordynka 46, str. 2, Moscow, 119017, Russian Federation;
e-mail: ugalat@yandex.ru

Abstract

This article aims to analyse the role of women in twentieth-century literature (mainly focusing on Italian women’s literature). This study is relevant due to the fact that feminism has been studied very widely from the point of view of history and sociology, but rather insufficiently from the literary standpoint. The paper analyses the background and the process of formation of “creative feminism” in Europe, as well as its various forms in literature and art. Particular attention is given to Italian women’s prose, which formed later compared to both French and English prose and is therefore least studied. Further, the paper considers key themes and genres of Italian women’s prose, which have derived much from the “creative feminism” of other European countries. The works by G. Deledda, S. Aleramo, A. Guglieminetti, and others are studied here. Female writers fought for the recognition of their identity using the act of creativity itself. It is in culture (and not in politics or the social sphere) that women found it hardest to defend their rights, because “female” in many ways was perceived as second-rate. Among the first “creative feminists” we can name V. Woolf and S. de Beauvoir; in Russian culture, M. Tsvetaeva and A. Akhmatova as well as female literary futurists. To a greater extent this type of feminism manifested itself in Europe in the 1960s–1970s, when creative freedom turned out to be unattainable. It should be noted that at present the objectives of “creative feminism” have not yet been fully achieved.

Keywords

feminism, “creative feminism”, Italian literature, Italian women’s prose, S. Aleramo, A. Guglielminetti, A. de Céspedes

References

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