Needlework and Narration: The Case of Margaret Atwood's "Alias Grace"

Abstract

This article explores the main character in Margaret Atwood’s novel Alias Grace (1996) in terms of the semiotics of the textile and its corresponding feminine implications. The main hypotheses enunciated concern, on the one hand, the possibilities of narrativity that this symbol brings about (particularly for dissident discourses) and, on the other hand, the dissipation of the conceptual and representational boundaries of the textual and the textile. Furthermore, this study suggests a revision of the imaginary traditionally associated with the feminine spheres and an approach to these spaces as places of resistance that have arisen in the midst of silencing, captivity, or marginalisation.