In Search of the Split Subject

Margaret Atwood is one of Canada's foremost contemporary writers. This study focuses upon her novels with the intent of examining a striking and recurrent aspect of her work; the divided self. It establishes a critical method for reading Atwood's work, borrowing freely from various psychoanalytic and phenomenological theorists in a close and detailed reading of six of the novels, including Atwood's most recent, The Robber Bride. An appendix serves to show how the remaining two could be best accounted for by other approaches, making the book a complete account of Atwood's novels to date.