A Comparative Ecofeminist Reading of Margaret Atwood’s Surfacing and Forūğ Farroḵzād’s “I Pity the Garden”

It took a rather long time for ecocriticism to emerge as a concerted interdisciplinary approach in literary studies, and later on in humanities. Glotfelty (۱۹۹۶), a distinguished pioneer of ecocriticism, defined it to mainly concern the study of the asymmetrical relationship between nature and human beings. An Ecocriticism question human’s violation of the environment. As the study of a similar relationship between man and woman has been a pivotal concern in feminism, ecocriticism and feminism found a common ground for a merger. Ecofeminism investigates the woman-nature relationship towards which its various proponents take different stances. The violation of nature by human beings is on a par with the suppression of women in patriarchy partly because they are both determined by what Karen J. Warren (۲۰۰۰) calls the “logic of domination”. The logic of domination is the most prominent feature in an oppressive conceptual framework that sanctions and justifies the subordination of women as well as nature. This paper aims at comparatively investigate the interrelatedness of sexism and naturism in Margaret Atwood’s Surfacing (۱۹۷۲) as well as Forūğ Farroḵzād’s “I Pity the Garden” through an ecofeminist perspective to illustrate their simultaneous literary, social and political involvement with femininity and nature. Both female poets relate the inferiority of women to the subordination of nature as the binary logic that perpetuates patriarchy which also establishes and reinforces anthropocentrism and inevitably leads to the subordination of nature. It will be contended that the liberation attempts of Atwood’s protagonist and Farroḵzād’s persona prove to be successful as they accomplish to subvert patriarchy.

Keywords:

Ecofeminism , Margaret Atwood , Forūğ Farroḵzād , Logic of domination , Surfacing