A Realism Perspective towards Woman’s Image in Thérèse Desqueyroux and The Superfluous Woman

Comparative literature examines literary unions, relationships and their influence. Francois Mauriac and Jalal Ale-Ahmad indicate the difficult situation of women. The two authors describe their ideal society by criticizing the society’s problems and restrictive rules which make women submissive and dependent. The reader gradually becomes informed about the past and present of the hero of story and predicts a vague future full of anxiety and worry for them. The present article, through a descriptive, analytic and comparative method, compares Thérèse Desqueyroux of Mauriac and The Superfluous Woman of Al-Ahmad based on the school of social realism approach. The results of this research indicate that the main characters in these two oeuvres are the oppressed women in patriarch societies which have a humiliating viewpoint on women’s freedom, wishes, interests and desires; and trample on their rights. Both authors describe the griefs, unjust situation of women’s life, the oppression and tyranny of women by men and society in order to attract the society’s attention for women’s problems and difficulties, the critique of the society’s unconventional values and society to revise everything related to women.