Hayat Alghamadi

Research Details

Subject Area: English Literature

Supervisor: Dr. Rachel Farebrother and Dr. Richard Robinson

Research Degree: PhD

Thesis Title: Ideas of Landscape in the Fiction of Marilynne Robinson, Toni Morrison, and Louise Erdrich

Research Synopsis

In contemporary American literature since the mid-eighties, there has been an increasing interest in portraying landscape and nature, especially in the light of their relation to human perception.

This study explores spatial dynamics and their connection with ideas of landscape and nature in the works of three American women writers: Toni Morrison, Marilynne Robinson, and Louise Erdrich. All these authors are American residents who have been influenced by feminism. The interactions of their female characters with nature and landscape challenge the American nature/culture dichotomy and eventually allow for the emergence of a gender-based perception of nature.

The project examines to what extent, and in what ways, these authors draw upon a longer tradition of American nature writing, focusing on their engagement with American visual culture and the Transcendentalists (as well as addressing the specific cultural traditions from which the three writers emerge).

An open book