Shuxin Jin
Fujian Normal University, Fuzhou 350007, Fujian, China.
*Corresponding author: Shuxin Jin
Abstract
The Blind Assassin is the masterpiece of Margret Atwood, one of the most influential writers in English literature. The novel tells the life stories of the protagonist Iris and her sister Laura. Based on existential feminism rooted in Simone de Beauvoir’s theory of “the Other”, this thesis analyzes the formative factors and the situational factors that lead Iris to fall into the otherized predicament, and how Iris secures existential transcendence by achieving economic independence and establishing a sense of subjectivity. She asserts subjectivity by publishing The Blind Assassin under Laura’s name, a narrative act that exposes patriarchal violence and reclaims her voice. Finally, it comes to the conclusion that Atwood emphasizes the importance of gaining economic independence and developing subjectivity for women to get rid of their subordinate status and realize their existential meaning through the realistic portrayal of the protagonist Iris’s plight and her struggle against being otherized in The Blind Assassin.
References
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How to cite this paper
An Interpretation of The Blind Assassin from the Perspective of Existentialist Feminism
How to cite this paper: Shuxin Jin. (2025) An Interpretation of The Blind Assassin from the Perspective of Existentialist Feminism. Journal of Humanities, Arts and Social Science, 9(6), 1082-1086.
DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.26855/jhass.2025.06.005