Emancipation Through Education: The Importance of Literature in 'Why Be Happy When You Could Be Normal?' Anonymous College

This essay will address the power of language and literature in relation to some of the contemporary issues that Jeanette Winterson discusses in her memoir, Why Be Happy When You Could Be Normal? In it she reflects on her tragic and traumatic childhood, acknowledging its negative effects on her and how it established the foundations for her love of language and literature. The issues of religion, sexuality and motherhood as revealed in the memoir will be discussed by mainly focussing on the oppressive and conservative roles that her mother and religion played in her early life; how her mother and the bible fostered her talent for reading and writing and finally how her education and writing led to her emancipation.

From the beginning of the text one is assaulted with the overpowering and repressive figure of Mrs Winterson, Jeanette’s adoptive mother. Mrs Winterson is a god-fearing, cold woman, incapable of showing warmth, love or affection to either her child or her husband. She uses the ideology of the church and religion as a means of retaining control over Jeanette and her father. Her bible wielding and apocalyptic citations create a form of tyranny and dictatorship within the household. Jeanette describes this in the...