Narratives of Motherhood and Mothering in Fiction and Life Writing (Palgrave Macmillan Studies in Family and Intimate Life)

Contents
Notes on Contributors
Chapter 1: Ambivalent Narratives of Motherhood and Mothering: From Normal and Natural to Not-at-all
	Motherhood, Mothering, and Narrative
	Research on Literary Representations of Motherhood
	The Chapters in this Volume
	References
Untitled
Chapter 2: One Hand Clapping: The Loneliness of Motherhood in Lucia Berlin’s “Tiger Bites”
	At the Clinic
	Distant Mothers
	Places, Bodies and Borders
	Conclusion
	References
Chapter 3: “their mothers, and their fathers, and everyone in between”: Queering Motherhood in Trans Parent Memoirs by Jennifer Finney Boylan and Trystan Reese
	Introduction
	Queering Mothers and Fathers
	Trans Life Writing Traditions
		Stuck in the Middle with You
		How We Do Family
	Conclusion
	References
Chapter 4: Struggling to Become a Mother: Literary Representations of Involuntary Childlessness
	“But I Just Wanted to Be Normal”: Normative Femininity and the Swedish Gender Equality Ideal
	“I Want Children Too, but Together with Him”: Nuclear Families and Heteronormative Temporality
	Conclusion: Challenging the Miracle-Baby-in-the-End Narrative
	References
Chapter 5: Orality/Aurality and Voice of the Voiceless Mother in Abla Farhoud’s Happiness Has a Slippery Tail
	Dounia’s Story
	The Mother’s Book
	The Mother/Daughter Plot and Migrant Women’s Writing
	A Migrant Mother’s Story in More than One Voice
	The Power of the Muse
	Conclusion
	References
Chapter 6: From Survivor to Im/migrant Motherhood and Beyond: Margit Silberstein’s Postmemorial Autobiography, Förintelsens Barn
	Postmemory as a Generational Concern
	Holocaust Mothers and Daughters
	Im/migrant Mothers and Minority Daughters
	Conclusion
	References
Chapter 7: The (M)other’s Voice: Representations of Motherhood in Contemporary Swiss Writing by Women
	Introduction
	Zoë Jenny, The Pollen Room
	Ruth Schweikert, Augen zu
	Conclusion
	References
Chapter 8: Contested Motherhood in Autobiographical Writing: Rachel Cusk and Sheila Heti
	The Social and Biological Question: Women and Motherhood
	Challenging the Script
	The Matrilineal Narrative
	Scrutinizing Motherhood
	References
Chapter 9: A Plea for Motherhood: Mothering and Writing in Contemporary Norwegian Literature
	The Choice of Genre: Novels or Motherhood Memoirs?
	Mothering and Writing as Opening to the World: Skomsvold’s Barnet and Furre’s Dyret
	Mothering and the Acceptance of the Everyday in Isakstuen’s Rase and Bråtveit’s Dette er også vatn
	The Plea for Motherhood in Norway
	References
Index