Final essay question.

'In a patriarchal society, the 'the male association with reason, intellect; the female is irrational.'


Using ideas from your critical anthology, to what extent do you agree with this?



The Tiger's Bride, The Courtship of Mr Lyon and The Erl-King.

Gothic Elements In My Chosen Texts.

The Tiger's Bride.

•  Gothic Fairy tale with elements of romance.
• Dutiful daughter and loving, doting father.
• Beast lives in a big house-like a castle-showing power, authority and wealth.
• White rose symbol.
• She transforms in to a tiger like him.
• Dark setting.
• Female-Innocent and pure.
• Male gaze-he wants her to undress, but she negotiates and he does first.
• Elements of the females gaze.

The Courtship of Mr Lyon.

He transforms in to a man again because of her-still has a crooked nose. He needs her (she is more active at this point.)

The Snow Child Questions

1.In what way does the tale allude other stories or fairy tales? Name them.

This tale links to other stories or fairy tales because it is the objectification and using of women in society. The Count in this narrative pictures the perfect child of his desires who was 'as white as snow(...)as red as blood(...)as back as that bird's feathers.' This is the construction of the perfect female who has no floors or  defaults. She is beautiful, too beautiful for the Countess' liking. This alludes to the fairy tale Snow White where the woman in the story is jealous of her beauty and thinks 'how shall i be rid of her?' It also links to the story of Sleeping Beauty at the end, where the child 'pricks her finger on the thorn.' She is immediately destroyed-may be because of that one wrong mark,she could be then seen as wasteful and not perfect so not worthy.

2. How does this story link to other stories in The Bloody Chamber Collection?

This story links perfectly to all the feminism and objectification the the other stories within the collection present. The man desires the perfect woman/girl and is active where the woman is passive. It has the symbolic reference to to 'white' where it is a representation of purity and innocence. This could also be a representation of virginity. This significant colour is apparent in 'The Tiger's Bride' too. The rose that the father gives to the protagonist is also white and when she acknowledges her desires, she smears it with blood.

3.The girl melts at the end. Why do you think this is the case? What do you think Carter could be trying to communicate?
The girl is the image of the Count's physical desires. He wishes for her to be beautiful and perfect and so she is. he created her existence and gave her a 'life'. The melting of her at the end could show how passive she is and the lack of control she posses within their relationship. Here she is a neglected child with no clothes on her back and it is the Count who who becomes her saviour, which leads to her death; once she has fulfilled her purpose of becoming the Count's sexual object, she can then die. She melts at the end because her innocence(virginity) is taken from her. She is no longer a symbol of purity and therefore useless or unimportant in society. Carter could be trying to communicate the lack of power and control women had and how they are just object for the man to posses and do as he pleases.

4.What do you think it means when Carter says "it bites!" at the end? What is "it"?
At the end of the story, when Carter states "it bites!" The rose is not accepting of her  touch as she is impure. Society does not accept her because of this. The "it" is the the rose, which may be only accepting of innocence and purity. The rose is an object and still she, as a woman, is judged for not being a virgin-it is not only men who are judgmental.

The Erl-King Questions

1. How is the Erl-King presented?

Towards the start of the story, the Erl King is presented as 'an excellent housewife' and seen as the perfect husband to every woman. By stating that he would be an excellent housewife and not choosing to use the word husband, may be this is a challenging factor of the binary opposites as he is ultimately being compared to a 'woman's role.' His eyes are green and hypnotizing to a woman's heart. She falls in love with his eyes,which are green may be to represent envy; He will be jealous if she was to find another man or lose interest in him so he must satisfy her. The protagonist states 'He winds me into the circle of his eyes on a reel of birdsong' suggesting that he does in fact, in a way, intrigue her through the use of his eyes alone. The bird songs are that  of his past women that he comforted and impressed in the same way as her and then trapped in cages. Reading more in to the story, we can see that may be his appearance of 'white pointed teeth with the spittle gleaming on them' could actually be a big reflection of his personality and inner person.

2.How is the narrator presented?

The female narrator is at first presented as a naive, innocent and irrational young woman- these are the stereotypical female binary opposites. The narrator finds it 'easy to lose yourself in the woods' showing her irrationality and naivety as she is easily influenced and lost in other things. Further on, the narrator is shown to be perhaps more thoughtful than emotional and she recognizes that 'The Erl-King would do me grievous harm'. By showing this, she is presenting herself and more wise then what the Erl-king thins she is. Towards the end of the story, the protagonist presents herself as more rational and thoughtful- this is a breaking down of the traditional gender roles. 'Take two handfuls of his rustling hair(...) and (...) I shall strangle him'. This is showing her to have a lot more control and making her own decisions for herself without him.

3.Carter uses symbols in the narrative. The narrator describes the Erl-king's eyes as 'quite green'. This is a massive symbol of jealousy and envy. He will be jealous and envious if she was to ever find someone else to love and he was to loose her. The birds in the narrative can symbolize women as a whole. They are trapped in cages, passive and kept private. The Erl-king sees them as possessions or objects and keeps them all to himself. He does not want to share them with anyone.

4.How does Carter use allusion to tell the story?

Carter uses elements of fairy tales such as: Little Red Riding Hood (an innocent girl in the woods), Alice In Wonderland ('Eat me, Drink me'), Light sufficient to itself (Emily Dickinson's line used) as well as intertextuality with the motif of 'The Green Eyed man' and Othello (The Green Eyed monster).

5.‘The Erl-King’ can be seen as the most innovative and experimental of the narratives. This is because it plays around the voice and tense of the narrator. "The woods enclose and then enclose again" is in third person, present tense yet "It is easy to lose yourself in these woods." reverts to second person. This suggests that the Erl King is the most experimental as none of the other texts do this.

6.How does The Erl-King fit with other TBC narratives?

As well as in the other narratives in The Bloody Chamber, The Erl-king is too very feminist and dominant. It involves similarities with the fact that the setting is isolated and there is a female narrator (the same with all the stories minus Puss In Boots). The protagonist kills the male figure (the same with The Bloody Chamber, and company of wolves).

Possible Essay Questions.

'Angela Carter doesn’t only suggest the deconstruction and redefinition of

femininity but also of masculinity.'

Using ideas from the critical anthology to inform your argument, to what extent do you agree with this view?

Independant Reading

Overall Analysis of The courtship of Mr Lyon and The Tiger's Bride, Angela Carter and the Gothic for the AQA A2 Lit B Exam.

 

• Questions:

What are psychic transformations and what does it have to do with fairy-tale?

 Psychic-Mental.

Transformation-Change.

It gives the writer's, like Angela Carter, the chance to show/express their protagonist and break out of the traditional boundaries.

 

What is defloration?

Defloration-Floral.

Taking somebodies(usually a woman) virginity-sometimes known as taking their flower.

 

• 5 sentence summary:

Fairy-tales contribute to perpetuate the patriarchal ideology and status quo by making female subordination an inescapable fate...

 

Carter's characters are always ambiguous, presenting both sides of the pairs.

 

In a patriarchal society, the soul is viewed as masculine and the body as feminine.

 

Carter challenges gender roles and social constructions.

 

Carter strongly emphasises the woman desire and sex liberation, playing with the reader's expectations about the traditional roles of masculine and feminine.

 

• 5 word summary:

Inescapable.

Ambiguous.

Patriarchal.

Constructions.

Traditional.

 

• Full summary:

Carter's aim was to transcend the ideological views in which fairy-tales are usually written. Her characters are always ambiguous and are successful in challenging the traditional binary opposites, which society viewed as acceptable or the 'norm'. In both The Courtship of Mr Lyon and The Tiger's Bride, the woman seems to acknowledge her sexual desires and liberation; through this the traditional binary opposites-Rational and irrational, Active and passive-are shrewdly challenged. She expresses the idea that gender difference is socially constructed to what society views as normal. According to this view, society and culture create gender roles, and these roles are prescribed as ideal or appropriate behaviour for a person of that specific gender.(Wikipedia)