Exploratory Theatrics: Muriel Spark's Treatment Of A Woman's Absurd In The Driver's Seat, Memento Mori, And

Abstract

Muriel Spark is sharp in her wit and delivery. She has been known to ‘hold her own’ among male writers of the contemporaneous period -- no small feat. for a woman who came of age in the 1930s. She writes dark -- veering towards sinister -- novels, novellas, and short stories, but what is striking about each of them is her uncanny ability to portray the absurd, a field rarely penetrated by women at all. In the chosen texts, Spark creates at once a sense of agency for the women characters, and an overarching lack of control over the universe in which they exist. Using select feminist theory alongside critical analyses of the absurd, this thesis aims to illuminate the ways Spark’s unique storytelling creates space for women in male-dominated terrain. This includes both the arena in which she chose to write, and in the circumstances she sets up for her characters.