Instigating Women” and Initiation in Postmodern Male Identity
Women Mentoring Men in Michael Dorris's Short Fiction
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 12412546 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Terry Lee (0000-0003-2582-2337, Christopher Newport University, corresponding author) |
| Year | 1998 |
| Volume | 6 |
| Issue | 2 |
| Pages | 209-225 |
| Publication date | 1998-03-01 |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | The Journal of Men s Studies (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 1060-8265 • E-ISSN: 1933-0251 |
| Publisher | SAGE Publishing (PUBLISHER • US) |
| DOI | 10.1177/106082659800600206 |
| OpenAlex | W2382523533 |
| Language | EN |
| References cited | 6 |
Two short stories from Working Men by the American fiction writer Michael Dorris enact romantic heterosexual relationships in which a woman becomes the mentor who helps carry a man stuck in delayed adolescence into initiated manhood. Dorris's stories update and make accessible the mythical and magical elements that Robert Bly has described in his Iron John as being able to renew a man stuck in his boyhood woundedness. Where Bly discusses the female mentor for men in terms of “meeting the god woman” and the wild woman guarding a sacred pond, Dorris fleshes out his female guides in the form of what Bly calls “instigating wom[en],” contemporary women who possess a certain wisdom. These women play a life-transforming role in establishing a more mature, differentiated identity in men
Aesthetics · Art · Identity (music · Literature · Postmodernism · Psychoanalysis · Romance · Sociology · Contemporary Literature and Criticism · Gender Studies · Psychology · Themes in Literature Analysis · Utopian, Dystopian, and Speculative Fiction
| Highly cited | No |
|---|