사라 스콧의『밀레니엄 홀』 —유토피아적 여성 공동체의 전복성과 한계
The Subversive Aspects and the Limits of a Utopian Female Community in Sarah Scott’s Millenium Hall
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This paper examines the subversive power and the limits of a utopian female community named “Millenium Hall” by the narrator in Sarah Scott’s Millenium Hall. Millenium Hall is constituted on the understanding of society as “a state of mutual confidence, reciprocal services and correspondent affections.” Exchanges of gifts or services in Millenium Hall are performed as unconditional and disinterested acts of benevolence. It is female friendship between the five ladies of Millenium Hall that renders possible this kind of genuine reciprocity. What characterizes their female friendship is that it extends beyond dyadic relationships and serves as the model for social relationships of Millenium Hall. Moreover, it is based on maternal affection,which is well exemplified in Miss Melvyn’s relationship with Miss Mancel and in Miss Selvyn’s with Lady Emilia. But it is problematic that female friendship combined with maternal affection contributes to the reproduction of women embodying traditional female virtues such as patience, resignation,and piety. More problematically, the ladies of Millenium Hall not only think that their duty is to suffer but also accept all their sufferings as trials and all their blessings as rewards from God who mercifully brings good out of bad. In addition, they have contradictory opinions regarding matrimony. While having chosen unmarried life to live with female friends, they encourage young women to marry. These aspects undermine the subversive power of Millenium Hall as a utopian female community.
Abstract
This paper examines the subversive power and the limits of a utopian female community named “Millenium Hall” by the narrator in Sarah Scott’s Millenium Hall. Millenium Hall is constituted on the understanding of society as “a state of mutual confidence, reciprocal services and correspondent affections.” Exchanges of gifts or services in Millenium Hall are performed as unconditional and disinterested acts of benevolence. It is female friendship between the five ladies of Millenium Hall that renders possible this kind of genuine reciprocity. What characterizes their female friendship is that it extends beyond dyadic relationships and serves as the model for social relationships of Millenium Hall. Moreover, it is based on maternal affection,which is well exemplified in Miss Melvyn’s relationship with Miss Mancel and in Miss Selvyn’s with Lady Emilia. But it is problematic that female friendship combined with maternal affection contributes to the reproduction of women embodying traditional female virtues such as patience, resignation,and piety. More problematically, the ladies of Millenium Hall not only think that their duty is to suffer but also accept all their sufferings as trials and all their blessings as rewards from God who mercifully brings good out of bad. In addition, they have contradictory opinions regarding matrimony. While having chosen unmarried life to live with female friends, they encourage young women to marry. These aspects undermine the subversive power of Millenium Hall as a utopian female community.
참고문헌 (15)
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