Proceedings of the Global Conference on Gender Studies
Year: 2023
DOI:
[PDF]
Revision of Faustian Myth: Aspects of Gender Difference in Latvian Playwright Māra Zālīte’s “Margarēta”
Sandra Meškova
ABSTRACT:
Rewriting patriarchal stories from the feminine/feminist viewpoint is a broadly used strategy in women’s writing, especially since the 1970-80s coloured by the general postmodernist impetus of unmasking various ideologies through pastiche, parody, and intertextuality. Focusing on the cultural codes and stereotypes of the feminine and masculine, women writers, e.g., Canadian writers Margaret Atwood, Margaret Lawrence, British authors Angela Carter, Jeanette Winterson, German writer Christa Wolf and others, tend to bring them into light and thus sensitize the reader to the patriarchal ideology underneath. In Latvian literature, an interesting example appears in Māra Zālīte’s drama “Margarēta” (1998) that provides a revised version of Faust and Gretchen’s love story highlighting the gender biases in the classical version by Goethe and Charles Gounod and tracing their possible transformations in the present-day Latvian and European cultural context. Zālīte’s play presents a version of Margarete’s story after 25 years in prison as she meets young Advocate who turns out to be her and Faust’s son and goes through the major episodes of her case. Advocate’s comments on the evidence presented by Margarete and her insight into what actually happened between her and Faust open a dialogue between the feminine and masculine perspectives on such issues as love, sense of human life, spiritual and moral values. This is developed as an intertextual dialogue between Goethe’s and Zālīte’s texts, Enlightenment and postmodernist discourses, global/European and local/Latvian cultural positions.
keywords: feminist, gender dichotomy, intertextuality, motherhood, patriarchy