Abstract:
Naguib Mahfouz’s Place Walk and Bankimchandra’s Rajmohan’s Wife are unique literary works that highlight subjugation of women in African fiction. In view of the foregoing, this research, in distancing itself from previous studies, comparatively examines the representations of patriarchal oppression of women in both texts. The study has two specific objectives which are geared towards exploring the experiences of women in patriarchal societies. Furthermore, this study equally examines how the characters react towards oppression as well as various points of similarities and differences as regards women’s condition in both novels. This study adopts feminism as its theoretical framework. Based on the findings of this study, it is evident that patriarchal oppression strongly manifests irrespective societies with diverse means of activism against such menace against the female characters in both texts. It is worthy of note that the two authors emanating from different socio- cultural backgrounds, succeeded in using both texts as channels of exposing patriarchy and its resultant oppression, thereby showing the way forward for the emancipation of women.
