“Vanity […] I Was Determined to Sleep It Away” : Exploring Identity in Ottessa Moshfegh’s My Year of Rest and Relaxation

Abstract

In this thesis, I examine Ottessa Moshfegh’s novel My Year of Rest and Relaxation (2018) from the perspective of postfeminism. I assess how pervasive the postfeminist ideology is especially in connection with neoliberalism. Moreover, I discuss how consumerism and adaptation to the neoliberal market logic affects the identities of individuals in neoliberal societies. I examine the ways that Moshfegh directs her criticism at neoliberalism and draws the reader’s attention to its destructive impacts on the characters in her chick lit narrative. To demonstrate the effects of consumerism, neoliberalism, and postfeminism, especially on women, I center my analysis on the protagonist and her friend Reva. I also elucidate the illusion of female empowerment inherent to postfeminism by applying relevant theories, most notably the work of Rosalind Gill and Christina Scharff. In the analysis, I argue that conforming to postfeminism, the normative model of femininity within neoliberalism, is performative and thus it can manifest itself as a loss of identity.