“He’s wearing pink dish gloves.” An analysis of the love theme in the chick lit genre from the perspective of sociology of literature, Mossvikenfruar : Chansen by Emma Hamberg as an example.

Libraries are often associated with positive values such as democracy and equal rights. The contents of the literature on offer should therefore be of great interest to the librarian, the supplier of said literature. The topic of this Master’s thesis is the popular literary genre known as chick lit. The purpose is to investigate the love theme in Swedish chick lit, and how it relates to Anthony Giddens’ theory on love in late modernity. The genre in this instance is represented by Mossvikenfruar: Chansen by Emma Hamberg. The theoretical anchor of the Master’s thesis is sociology of literature, which focuses on the relationship between literature and society. The starting point for the analysis of the love theme is Anthony Giddens’ theory on love and late modernity. A modified version of Shlomit Rimmon-Kenans thematical method is used as an analytical tool. The reality of love is considerably bleaker (albeit humourously described) in Mossvikenfruar: Chansen than in the writings of Giddens. The similarities, however, are great. The novel contains manifestations of ‘plastic sexuality’, set apart from reproduction, and the relationship between the novel’s protagonists can be seen as an example of Giddens’ description of couple-relationship in late modernity. Although the novel ends on a heteronormative, couple-centrered note which can be considered conservative and repressive, it is argued in this Master’s thesis that it must be valued in the light of the following question: “What constitutes an equal society?” a discussion which therefore concludes the study.Uppsatsnivå: