AustLit

'This article is an attempt to discuss the protagonist Eddie Twyborn’s identity issue in Patrick White’s The Twyborn Affair. By changing gender to live in different identities, Eddie tries to pursue the ideal identity and become a “complete man” who can love both himself and others. Eddie finally gains the ideal identity and presents the strategy to deal with fragmented identity. White deconstructs the binary opposition of male/female via depicting Eddie’s three gender changes, and reveals the fluidity and instability of identity. White shows readers a beyond humanistic, postmodern solution to identity problem in Twyborn: "bricolage". Different from "androgyny" which focuses on mediation between male and female identity, "bricolage" doesn’t aim for equilibrium of gender but manages identity problem in a more flexible way, which is applying different identities in different relations.'

Source: Abstract.