Political Violence in Northern Ireland: The Violent Loss of Male Figures in Deirdre Madden’s Hidden Symptoms and One by One in the Darkness

Abstract

In this work I intend to examine Deirdre Madden’s Hidden Symptoms (1986) and One by One in the Darkness (1996) taking into consideration the historical, material and ideological contexts in which these novels were produced. I will specifically focus upon the male characters, paying particular attention to the way in which their deaths are naturalized through a feminization process. Likewise, I will scrutinize their relation with concepts such as hegemonic, alternative/subaltern masculinities and patriarchal order, seminal to this article. These two works have been widely analyzed by criticism and the conclusions reached range from considering them as deeply conservative novels to regarding them as typically
female products or clearly postmodern texts. My approach comes closer to the earlier analysis although adding meaningful nuances.