Proto-feminism in the utopian works of Christine de Pizan and Margaret Cavendish

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Atıf İçin Kopyala

Aktarer S.

AGATHOS-AN INTERNATIONAL REVIEW OF THE HUMANITIES AND SOCIAL SCIENCES, cilt.16, sa.1 (30), ss.161-171, 2025 (ESCI)

• Yayın Türü: Makale / Tam Makale
• Cilt numarası: 16 Sayı: 1 (30)
• Basım Tarihi: 2025
• Doi Numarası: 10.5281/zenodo.15162987
• Dergi Adı: AGATHOS-AN INTERNATIONAL REVIEW OF THE HUMANITIES AND SOCIAL SCIENCES
• Derginin Tarandığı İndeksler: Emerging Sources Citation Index (ESCI)
• Sayfa Sayıları: ss.161-171
• Recep Tayyip Erdoğan Üniversitesi Adresli: Evet

Özet

The feminist movement, particularly in the French school of the

1980s and 1990s, has emphasised the necessity for women writers to establish an

assertive feminine identity and authority that are not constrained by the

masculine hegemonies observed thus far. However, a retrospective examination

of literary history reveals that women had already produced remarkable works

prior to the emergence of the movement. This study examines two women

writers from different historical periods who predated the emergence of

feminism as a literary and intellectual movement: Christine de Pizan who wrote

during the Middle Ages, and Margaret Cavendish who wrote during the 17 th

century. The paper suggests that in Christine de Pizan’s The Book of the City of

Ladies (1405) and Margaret Cavendish’s The Description of a New World,

Called The Blazing World (1666), both women have produced proto-feminist

properties that explicitly address the reconstruction of women’s roles in society

and assert their authorial autonomy as female writers, by employing utopian

approach.