Aspects of Chick-Lit: A Comparison between Western Chick-Lit and the Israeli Chick-Lit The Song of the Siren

ABSTRACT

In the 1990s, a new literary genre appeared – the chick lit – dealing with the stories of women in their 20s and 30s in the big city, including accessible and humoristic poetics. This article maps the characteristics of the genre as well as its origins: diary, journalistic writing, romance, glamor novel and Bildungsroman. Comparison between the Anglo-Saxon chick lit and the Israeli chick lit novel The Song of the Siren reveals that the genre is less successful in conservative societies than in liberal Western ones. However, its subversiveness is deeper and it promotes anti-stereotype themes regarding women’s singlehood (which becomes legitimate), in choosing a partner who enables the female character to be dominant and find her place and career in the public sphere.

摘要

20世纪90年代, 出现了一种新的文学体裁——鸡仔文学——讲述大城市二三十岁女性的故事, 包括通俗易懂的幽默诗学。这篇文章描述了这一类型的特征及其起源:日记, 新闻写作, 浪漫, 魅力小说和成长小说。比较盎格鲁-撒克逊鸡仔文学和以色列鸡仔文学小说《塞壬之歌》, 可以发现, 这种文学类型在保守社会不如在自由西方社会成功。然而, 它的颠覆性更为深刻, 在选择一个能够让女性角色占据主导地位并在公共领域找到自己的位置和职业的伴侣时, 它促进了关于女性单身 (这是合法的) 的反刻板印象主题。

KEYWORDS:

• Chick Lit
• Women’s literature
• Diary
• Romance
• Bildungsroman
• Feminist Thinking

关键词:

• 鸡仔文学; 女性文学
• 日记; 浪漫
• 成长小说
• 女性主义思想

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Shai Rudin

Shai Rudin (Senior Lecturer, Department of Literature, Gordon College of Education, Haifa, Israel) investigates Women’s Writing, Popular Literature, and Children’s Literature. He writes about gender in Israeli Literature and the influences of radical feminist discourse on women’s writing (in adult literature as well as in children’s literature); the acceptance of women writers in North America, Europe and Israel, the representations of women and children in Holocaust Literature and the appearance of violence as a super-theme in women’s writing. His book Violences (2012) deals with violence against women, girls, and minorities and its poetic representations in literature (spatial violence, textual violence, and sexual violence). His book To Herself: Reading in Galila Ron-Feder-Amit’s Work was published in 2018 and deals with the Israeli writer, Galila Ron-Feder-Amit.