Aestheitic literature or penny dreadful serial fiction? : Notes on narrative in Marija Jurić Zagorka literary novels
Abstract
The paper is focused on literary works of Marie Juricová Zagorka (1873-1957) in the context of Croatian novel. Her serial works were immensely popular, yet often considered to be of lesser literary value.
Although her narration draws from canonized model of realistic historical fiction her works are branded by institutional critique as popular trash mostly for uneducated (female) readers. My attention is paid to the gender norms in the context of literary fiction, problem of exclusionary apparatus of cultural gender within patriarchy and gendered power relation of binary system.
From that point of view Zagorka's multifaceted unstereotypical concept of feminized experience and femininity, is considered "threatening". In the aim for a different, more balanced, view on her literary work we are posing a question if negative assessment of her works, can be perceived as gendered disciplination of female that crossed the gender boundaries.