1.
Using the Feminist Criticism, what can you say about the representation of men and women in the
story?
Feminist literary criticism, arising in conjunction with sociopolitical feminism, critiques patriarchal
language and literature by exposing how these reflect masculine ideology. It examines gender politics in
works and traces the subtle construction of masculinity and femininity, and their relative status,
positioning’s, and marginalization’s within works.
In this story Women represents as meek and considers men to be superior. They are faithful and
easy to fall in love while men are rational and uncertain. The story broke the notion of patriarchal
system as the society sees men as rational type or in line with logic while women are the emotional kind.
In connection to my role as the Literary Luminary, I will use paragraph 6 as a reference. It was
stated there, “How can a woman be in a hurry when the man does not hurry her?” Up until
now, for women in general, they talk about timelines - when should they get married and what
age it’s “smart” to start having children. The society puts pressure on them. However, since
timelines never work out as planned, it leads to stress, disappointment, or even unhappiness
and a lack of self-confidence when things don’t happen like you (or others) anticipated.
2. What do you think were the historical and social circumstances of the time when Dead Stars was
written that reflected in the story?
“Dead Stars” is the 1925 short story that gave birth to modern Philippine writing in
English. English was still a young language in the Philippines, and many of the writers using the language
were still struggling with it.
Paz Marquez-Benitez, in her masterpiece Dead Stars, did not only write about a love story. Most
importantly, her writing reflects the time in which the literary work was written along with the language,
the norms and the way people think. It serves as a literary time machine for readers as it enables them
to understand how courtship, marriage and fidelity were viewed through the early 1900 standards. It
renders a sound comparison between the past and the present, the existing modern culture and the
fading, almost obsolete tradition.
3. Describe the setting of the story. What does it imply?
The story uses the third-person voice and is set in the early 1900s. The story is set in Don Julian’s and
Judge Del Valle’s houses located in the Philippines. It foreshadows the social make-up and dominant
views of the place at that time. The society is male-dominated and represent the features of such a
social setup. As the author is a female writer placed in a male-dominated age and World, the story
became a precursor to the growth of Filipino English literature.
In a patriarchal society, man is the ultimate authority in defining norms, moral or otherwise. Women are
secondary and precluded group when it comes to deciding the dominant idea and pervasive issues. But
the woman is not just anti-man or inadequate-man; she is also what man can never be. This necessitates
the balance between the two and if this equilibrium is challenged by revolutionary or reformist zeal than
it is often stifled and silenced. They both cannot exist unilaterally or autonomously and need mutual
reaffirmation by each other. Hence, women often become an afterthought in such male-dominated and
chauvinistic times even though the subtle and inextricable inter-dependence of the male and female
forms is always a function of a cohesive social system.
4.
Good afternoon guys! Here are some of the draft questions that may be asked during our session.
You may start exploring and answering it, especially if it is related to your role. Thank you!
Heart
1. Using the Feminist Criticism, what can you say about the representation of men and women in the
story?
2. What do you think were the historical and social circumstances of the time when Dead Stars was
written that reflected in the story?
3. Describe the setting of the story. What does it imply?
Reader-response criticism is a school of literary theory that focuses on the reader (or "audience") and
their experience of a literary work, in contrast to other schools and theories that focus attention
primarily on the author or the content and form of the work.
In the story dead stars, men are easy to fell out love and easy to fall in love. The protagonist,
Alfredo is uncertain by his decisions in his life. He was engaged to Esperanza, his fiancée of four years.
But for some reasons, apparently on Alfredo’s part, a change of heart has taken place. He has fallen for
Julia Salas, the sister-in-law of the judge whom his father had a meeting with. His confusion, weakness
and unreasonableness are innate flaws of humans. Alfredo sees something different to Julia Salas that
Esperanza don’t have and I find it very egotistical for him that he differentiate the two women. He sees
women as second choice of his dreams when it is fade.
