Abstract:
This paper aims to explore how the dead body is employed as a structural device in Katherine Manseld's “The Garden Party” and David Herbert Lawrence's “Odour of Chrysanthemums” in order to create a climactic revelation whereby the female characters gain awareness and a new understanding into the realities and illusions of their life, their social positions and the essence of human nature. This paper also argues that the dead body functions to unveil that the female protagonists are oppressed within the connes of feminine roles prescribed by the patriarchal and class-based society and thus, stripped of their essence.
