Reconstructing Legitimation on Metanarrative Ruins: Postmodern Paralogical Writings in Atwood’s “Happy Endings”

“Happy Endings”, the masterpiece of Margaret Atwood, is a significant presentation of the anxiety, suspicion and sense of insecure about the soaring development of modernization and its following consequences including the Cold War and the Feminist Movement that pervaded the Western world in the 1980s. Atwood intentionally challenges the deeply ingrained framework of grand narratives and manages to reconstruct a potential for micro-narrative legitimacy and multiple interpretations toward the uncertain future in Western world by disintegrating the conventional romantic storytelling. Drawing on Lyotard’s postmodern condition, the study explores postmodern spiritual crisis and the reconstruction of legitimation revealed in John and Mary’s deconstructed “romances” by analyzing the postmodern paralogical writings Atwood applies and highlighting their external triggers. It promotes a deeper comprehension of the intricate interplays between historical periods, ideological trends, and psychological variables.