The Economy of Sex, Gender and Love in Sally Rooney's Novels

This thesis will explore the concept of sex, gender, and love in Sally Rooney’s novels Normal People and Conversations with Friends. Moreover, it will explore the basic characteristics of capitalism and postmodernism outlined by Jameson (1984) and Fisher (2009), and will illustrate how key issues in today’s capitalist society directly and indirectly influence and shape the psyches and choices of Rooney’s characters by examining them through the Lacanian terms: the big Other, the father figure, alienation, and separation. The second part of this thesis breaks down the unconventional relationships in both novels by analysing how the balance of power in them is influenced by the ideologies that stem from the concept of the patriarchal society. In addition to that, this thesis will explore how the novels gesture towards ways of breaking from the social norms imposed by capitalism