A MODERN EXILE: HOME AND BELONGING IN FOR LOVE ALONE

Abstract

This study examines the transforming notions of home, belongingand exile in For Love Alone by Christina Stead and suggests that the heroineTeresa represents a modern exile who searches for love, knowledge and freedom in the imperial context of the early twentieth century. Teresa's experiences are both shaped and constrained by her family relations, gender, colonial and imperial status, and her cultural and geographical bonds with GreatBritain. Her voyage from Sydney to London, in this sense, symbolises a continuous struggle against all kinds of social, cultural and historical pressures atthe intersection of modernity and imperialism in the 1920s and 1930s. Teresa, as an Australian white woman, cannot develop a sense of belonging byoscillating between exploited and colonial lands. In time, she gets rid of herties to objects, people and places, and for her the real home becomes a worldof love, knowledge and independence.