A quest for feminine identity in Timberlake Wertenbaker's plays: New Anatomies and The Grace of Mary Traverse

Women have been in the centre of many discussions especially since the seventeenth century as they start to search for ways to get rid of the oppression and restriction which they have been exposed to because of the socially constructed female roles in the patriarchal societies. While the first part of this thesis is conducted with the historical development of the feminist movement that has had different targets and discussions at different periods, in the second part the playwright and her two plays are analyzed in the framework of feminist debates and identity question. This study aims to scrutinize the main female characters in Timberlake Wertenbaker's New Anatomies and the Grace of Mary Traverse who traverse the boundaries of their stereotypical female identities and embark on quest of identity which is free from the restrictions. As this study shows, unless the patriarchal social construction changes, it is not possible to change the stereotypical female identity. Keywords: Feminism, Theatre, Timberlake Wertenbaker, Identity, Woman, Stereotype