Identity and Memory in Winterson’s Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit

Abstract

This thesis explores how Winterson forms her lesbian Identity through Memory. Autobiography of Winterson’sOranges Are Not the Only Fruithas given original name for the protagonist ‘Jeanette’ and through Jeanette, Winterson retells her story. Jeanette is an adopted daughter in fundamentalist Christian family. Jeanette’s mother wants to make her servant of God. She has faced many problems regarding her lesbian identity at home, at church as well as in society too. Here, by the help of her memory, Winterson reconstructs her identity. Thus, the purpose of this study is to understand the relation between memory and identity.In order to justify the claim of the researcher, this research movilizes the theoretical insight of Sidonie and Smith and Julia Watson’sReading Autobiography.