Abstract

Death in the woods is one of the famous short stories of Sherwood Anderson. It tells a story of an old woman's tragic life. The old woman, Mrs. Grimes, has to take on all responsibilities to feed men and livestock without respect from her husband and her son. On a snowy day, she dies in the woods on her way home with food for her family. 

Ecological feminism is the product of feminist movement and ecological movement. It focuses on exploring social, political and economic roots that cause the double oppression of nature and women and aims to change the situation women and nature are reduced to. Inspired by it, the author decides to analyze this short story from the perspective of Ecological Feminism. Carefully designed, this thesis explores the story in terms of the relationships between women and nature, industrial civilization and nature. In the story the old woman and the nature have an affinity in that the woman delivers a son and a daughter and nature feeds lives. And they are both under oppression with nature being plundered and the old woman being marginalized in the patriarchal society. Moreover, the death of Mrs. Grime makes a complaint against the distorted society. To change the poor situation of women and nature, some approaches are put forward at the end of the thesis.

Key Words: Ecological Feminism; Nature; Women; Death in the Woods

Contents

Abstract

中文摘要

1 Introduction-1

1.1 Brief introduction to Sherwood Anderson and Death in the Woods-1

1.2 Purpose and significance of the thesis-2

1.3 Thesis structure-2

2 Literature review-3

2.1 Previous Studies-3

2.2 Introduction of ecological feminism-4

3 Connection between women and nature-5

3.1 Similarities between women and nature-6

3.2 Close relationship between Mrs. Grime and nature-7

4 Imbalance in Death in the woods-8

4.1 Oppression to nature by industrial civilization-8

4.2 Harm to women brought by patriatchy system-9

5 Approaches to avoiding similar tragedy-11

5.1 Respect for women-11

5.2 Partial re-enchantment of nature-11

6 Conclusion-13

References-15