A Reversal of Perspective

The Mother's Voice in Edith Wharton's “The Mother's Recompense”

Abstract

Over the past decade, feminist scholars have shown how the mother-daughter bond falls outside of the accepted social context of men-women relationship and, for this reason, remains unsaid. Wharton's novel can be read as a text that suspends the cultural muteness of the mother, showing instead how disruptive a mother's voice can be when she speaks, like Kate Clephane, as a subject who shapes "her story."