Feminist theory is an approach that focuses on the way women are represented in literature. This mode of interpretation is important not only to understanding how gender affects characters in a work, but also in understanding the societal values that are reflected by the work.

Since the world of academe has privileged the male sex for most of history, it is not surprising that the traditional literary canon mostly overlooks or ignores works by female authors. Hence, written women often adhere to traditional gender roles determined by patriarchal, or male dominated, society. Women are often depicted as submissive wives, dutiful homemakers, and selfless nurturers, considered virtuous by right of beauty and dominated by emotions. Feminist theory tries to answer the question of whether a character perpetuates traditional female stereotypes, and to what extent the text supports those views. Though much of feminist scholarship focuses on rediscovering and analyzing works by women authors, feminist theory can be applied to any work. Because of this, there are many varieties of feminist theory.

Historical feminist criticism focuses on how a work correlates with women’s position at a certain point in time. By thinking about the work in its historical context, the reader can better analyze how the characters typify or transgress the gender norms of their society. For instance, a historical feminist approach could be effectively used to analyze “The Daughters of the Late Colonel” by Katherine Mansfield because the death of an unmarried woman’s father