A Study of Personal Trauma Writing by Female Taiwanese writers in the 90s

• Main Authors: Lily Siok Hwa Teo, 張淑華
• Other Authors: Chia-ling Mei
• Format: Others
• Language: zh-TW
• Published: 2013
• Online Access: http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/09442645043019850294

碩士 === 國立臺灣大學 === 中國文學研究所 === 101 === Following the lifting of the Martial Law in 1987, the Taiwanese literary scene underwent a flourishing period in the Nineties. Many voices of history once silenced by political suppression found outlets to be heard. Previously ignored or snubbed, women who were deemed the weaker sex, are now able to present their new interpretations of history through the emergence of many prolific female writers and their feministic literature. As compared to the grand historical narrative once considered a strong tradition, petite narrative revolving around the individual has attracted fair attention. “Feminist trauma narrative” is no stranger to Taiwan literature, but the works belonging to this genre in the Nineties emphasized more on aesthetics and feminist awareness, particularly “personal traumatic memories that were difficult to articulate in the past that had nothing to do with national issues”. Wen-in Chung, Yu-hsiang Hao and Hsueh Chen -- three female writers born in the Seventies and who emerged as writers in the Nineties, did not carry burdens of national trauma upon themselves and were thus able to focus on the writing of personal trauma. Having experienced their growing up years in the same era, all three writers had written extensively on their childhoods in their autobiographical novels. The home, traditionally perceived as a warm and safe haven, was depicted as a dark and depressive environment which struck fear in the hearts of the protagonists. Set up as the source of trauma and pain, what dark secrets loomed within? How did the visible and invisible forms of trauma plague the protagonists? Traumatic memories commonly lack system and order, from the perspective of narrative therapy; can writing be an effective treatment strategy? This thesis sets out to investigate how the three aforementioned female writers weave their ways between factual and fictional aspects of their writing while employing sensory and spatial details in the reconstruction of space and writing about leaving/returning, with the aim to fill in the gaps in traumatic memory lapses while the healing of personal trauma.