Literature and Politics

Post colonial diasporic literature can use the canon to make political  statements about women’s lives and about the society around them. Woolf’s Orlando is seen as a landmark text for feminist English literature exploring the restraints of gender and Englishness Currently I am writing a novel “The Lady of the Realm” which is a Vietnamese diasporic take on “Orlando”. I wish to interrogate my own position as a Vietnamese diasporic writer whom is Western educated using “Orlando” as a reference point for my own work. Similar intertextual referencing techniques have been used by Vietnamese Francophone writers using the “Tale of Kieu” the epic poem of the nineteenth century to make commentary on women’s social position in Vietnam.  In this paper I will explore this intertextuality and the commentary possible about gender relations, power, politics  and colonialism  when using canonical texts in this way.

Hoa Pham is an author and psychologist. She is also studying a Doctorate of Creative Arts at the University of Western Sydney. In her spare time she edits "Peril" an asian australian arts and culture magazine. Her work can be found at www.hoapham.net