The Right to Howl: Embodiment and Language in ‘Clavícula’ (Sanz, 2017)

This article proposes an analysis of the discourse of Clavícula, Marta Sanz’s autobiographical novel published in 2017. In it, the writer reflects on pain after a personal experience where it was impossible to medically diagnose a continuous physical discomfort. This allows the writer to rethink the topics associated with the health of women in the different cycles of their lives. Clavícula is, thus, a novel that presents the vulnerability of a woman in crisis (social and personal) through the semiotics of her body.

This work is the result of qualitative research and is based on conceptual tools of contemporary literary theory. The reflections of Hélène Cixous (1995) on female writing are also taken as reference, as well as the notions of Byung-Chul Han in Psicopolítica (2014). This article aims to identify the aspects by which the proposal of Sanz is relevant to gender effects, claiming the power of language as a tool of female self-representation.