Feminist Perspectives and Post Feminist Possibilities: A Reading of Selected Texts of Shakespeare (original) (raw)

2015, Shakespeare Next: A Reappraisal, Vol. 1, Eds. Sunita Sinha & Carole Rozzonelli, published by Atlantic Publishers and Distributors: New Delhi, India, 2015. ISBN: 978-81-269-1962-8. P. 208-220

Abstract: Contemporary readings of Shakespeare’s writings have opened up critical apertures that enable multidimensional approaches to his canonical texts. One such approach has been the post-colonial feminist approach, which not only addresses the issue of women as colonized subjects or objectified “other” in his plays and poems, but also interrogates the political positioning of the much celebrated heroines of his tragedies and comedies, which seem to represent distinctly diverse strands of his aesthetic consciousness of the feminine. His sonnets on the other hand represent a complex aesthetic vision which subvert traditional concepts of feminine beauty, masculinity and hetero-normative love. The present study posits that Shakespeare possessed a rare and unique bi-gender vision/consciousness, which could, by virtue of its double lens and gender fluidity, lend keen insights into human psyche and bring the verve and texture of life to his writings. This paper would attempt to look at selected texts of Shakespeare from a feminist literary critical perspective but further, look beyond a feminist deconstruction to a post-feminist reconstruction of these texts as enduring literary masterpieces.

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