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- Title
Clothing in Alice Munro's 'Hateship, Friendship, Courtship, Loveship, Marriage'.
- Authors
Huang, Zhongfeng
- Abstract
Alice Munro devotes great attention to clothing in her short stories, which finds ample evidence in the substantial description and lavish detail accorded to the characters' clothes. In her story 'Hateship, Friendship, Courtship, Loveship, Marriage', the compelling depiction of the major characters' clothing fulfills myriad functions. First, Mrs Willets's coat serves as an 'objective correlative' invested with symbolic values, which endows Johanna with power and strength as well as connecting her to the past. Moreover, McCauley's three-piece suit becomes the external indicator of his financial and social viability as well as of his authoritative power over the disadvantaged. What is more, the changes of Sabitha's dress code are suggestive of her social upgrading, her increasing distance from her bygone friendship with Edith, and her striking detachment from her past. In short, as the specific product of cultural, social and gender contexts, clothing not only plays a significant role in revealing the characters' personality, identity reconstruction and psychology, but also enriches and enlarges readers' understanding of the story as a whole. Ultimately, clothing can be read as a multilayered literary trope that casts light on the complexity of characterisation and the ambiguities in Munro's stories as well as her superb narrative art and vision.
- Subjects
MUNRO, Alice, 1931-2024; COURTSHIP; NARRATIVE art; DRESS codes; CLOTHING &; dress; SOCIAL context; FRIENDSHIP
- Publication
British Journal of Canadian Studies, 2023, Vol 35, Issue 1, p69
- ISSN
0269-9222
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.3828/bjcs.2023.4