Elaine Showalter--- A Literature of Their Own

 Elaine Showalter—A Literature of Their Own

Elaine Showalter’s Feminist Literary Theory: The Feminine, Feminist, and Female Stages

Elaine Showalter, a pioneering feminist critic, introduced a ground-breaking model for understanding women’s literary history in her book A Literature of Their Own (1977). She argues that women writers have progressed through three distinct phases—Feminine, Feminist, and Female—each reflecting their historical and cultural struggles under patriarchy. The Feminine phase (1840–1880) represents women’s early attempts to write within a male-dominated literary tradition, often adopting male pseudonyms or conforming to gendered expectations. The Feminist phase (1880–1920) marks a period of overt rebellion, where women writers challenged patriarchal norms and advocated for suffrage, education, and autonomy. The Female phase (1920–present) focuses on self-discovery, where women writers moved beyond protest to create a uniquely female aesthetic, exploring female subjectivity and bodily experiences. Showalter’s model not only historicizes women’s writing but also legitimises it as a distinct literary tradition, countering the marginalisation of female voices in canonical literature.

The Feminine Phase: Imitation and Internalised Oppression

During the Feminine phase (1840–1880), women writers were constrained by societal expectations that deemed literature a masculine domain. Many female authors, such as the Brontë sisters and George Eliot, published under male pseudonyms to gain credibility and avoid the prejudice that often accompanied their work. Their works usually conformed to patriarchal norms, featuring domestic themes and morally virtuous female characters to avoid backlash. However, even within these constraints, subtle subversions occurred—for example, Jane Eyre’s defiance in Jane Eyre (1847) or Dorothea Brooke’s intellectual ambitions in Middlemarch (1871). Showalter highlights how these writers negotiated between societal expectations and their creative impulses, laying the groundwork for later feminist resistance. This phase illustrates the tension between women’s artistic expression and the oppressive structures that sought to silence them.

The Feminist Phase: Rebellion and Protest Literature

The Feminist phase (1880–1920) emerged alongside first-wave feminism, marked by women’s demands for political rights, education, and professional opportunities. Writers like Virginia Woolf, Olive Schreiner, and Charlotte Perkins Gilman openly critiqued patriarchy, using literature as a tool for social change. Works such as The Yellow Wallpaper (1892) and A Room of One’s Own (1929) exposed the psychological and economic oppression of women, rejecting passive femininity. This phase was characterised by anger, polemical writing, and a deliberate rejection of male literary standards, as women sought to define their narratives. However, Showalter notes that some feminist texts risked reducing female characters to mere symbols of victimhood rather than fully developed individuals. Despite this, the phase was crucial in establishing women’s literature as a legitimate field of resistance and intellectual discourse.

The Female Phase: Self-Discovery and Gynocriticism

In the Female phase (1920–present), women writers shifted from protest to introspection, developing a literature centered on female identity, sexuality, and lived experience. Showalter terms this approach gynocriticism, which focuses on analysing women’s texts as an autonomous tradition rather than male literature. Authors like Doris Lessing, Margaret Atwood, and Toni Morrison explored themes of motherhood, female desire, and intersectional oppression, creating complex, authentic female protagonists. This phase also saw the rise of experimental narratives that rejected linear, male-centric storytelling in favour of fragmented, cyclical, or non-linear forms. Showalter argues that the Female phase represents the maturation of women’s writing, where it no longer seeks male validation but asserts its own aesthetic and thematic authority. By centering female subjectivity, this phase redefines literary value and expands the canon to include marginalised voices.

Critiques and Legacy of Showalter’s Model

While Showalter’s tripartite model revolutionized feminist literary criticism, it has faced critiques for its Eurocentric and heteronormative assumptions. Scholars argue that it overlooks the contributions of Black, postcolonial, and queer women writers, whose experiences don’t neatly fit into her linear progression. For instance, African American writers like Zora Neale Hurston or Indian feminists like Ismat Chughtai navigated both gender and racial/colonial oppression, complicating Showalter’s framework. Additionally, some critics question whether the phases are universally applicable, as women from different cultures may not follow the same literary trajectory. Despite these limitations, Showalter’s work remains foundational in legitimising women’s literature as a field of study. Her emphasis on gynocriticism paved the way for intersectional and transnational feminist critiques that continue to evolve today.

Elaine Showalter’s model of the Feminine, Feminist, and Female stages provides a crucial framework for understanding the evolution of women’s writing in response to patriarchal constraints. By historicizing women’s literary production, she demonstrates how female authors transitioned from imitation to rebellion and finally to self-defined artistic expression. Her concept of gynocriticism remains influential, encouraging scholars to analyse women’s texts on their terms rather than through a male lens. While later feminist theorists have expanded her work to include diverse voices, Showalter’s contributions remain essential for studying gender and literature. Teaching these phases allows students to see how literature reflects and shapes women’s struggles for autonomy and creativity. Ultimately, A Literature of Their Own affirms that women’s writing is not a marginal subcategory but a vital, dynamic tradition within world literature.