Ambiguities of Counter-Hegemonic Monologism in Margaret Atwood’s Surfacing :: Essays Papers

Ambiguities of Counter-Hegemonic Monologism in Margaret Atwood’s Surfacing In his book Ideologies of Epic, Colin Graham looks at the recognisable tendency of Victorian epic poetry to establish or attempt to establish a monologic discourse in relation to the concept of nation, national literature and empire. Epic as genre and the concept of nation, â€Å" . . . desiring to be ‘centripetal’, turning in upon themselves, denying the existence of the ‘other’† (Graham,1), is a phenomenon relevant to monologic discourse as it may be perceived not only in national epic but also in the novel and it’s concomitant ideologies. Graham points to the evolution in literary history, the move towards the adjectival use of the word ‘epic’, particularly with regard to the work of Wordsworth and George Eliot. He notes, â€Å" . . . [the feminising and privatising of ] the once-public, turning narratives of action into narratives of the drama of selfhood.† (Graham,4) In a post-colonial context and in the geographical context of Canada one can see in Surfacing how Atwood asserts a feminist counter hegemonic discourse with and within a discursive framing of Canadian national identity. Graham draws on the work of M.M.Bakhtin, the Russian critic. Michael Gardiner’s comments on Voloshinov are also seen by Graham as relevant to this discussion of monologism: The dominant class is motivated to ensure fixity of meaning and arrest the flux of the sign, insofar as the establishment of a monolithic or ‘official’ language facilitates the socio-political unification of society. (Gardiner, 16) So, monologism is synonymous with hegemony - be that sexual, social, imperial or any other ideological assertion of dominance and fixity. Thus, the status of the subaltern - where the subaltern has no ‘voice’ - leaves them, as Bakhtin says, as, â€Å" . . . another person [who remains] wholly and merely an object of consciousness, and not another consciousness.† (qtd.in Gardiner, 26) In Surfacing the subaltern role could be filled by both male and female. The narrating I holds the discourse firmly. She alone has her inner consciousness exposed and denies others their consciousness. Unlike, say, Toni Morrison in Jazz, where questions of gender and race are dealt with through a narrative consciousness that moves fluidly from one voice to another. As feminist epic, structurally and adjectivally, the foregrounding and dominance of the ‘I’ forms a moral-ideological hierarchy. Anna walks out of the bedroom, dressed in jeans and shirt again. She combs her hair in front of the mirror, light ends, dark roots, humming to herself.