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The Femme Fatale and Her Portrayal in Angela Carter's Works Master‟S Diploma Thesis

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The Femme Fatale and Her Portrayal in Angela Carter's Works Master‟S Diploma Thesis Masaryk University Faculty of Arts Department of English and American Studies English Language and Literature Bc. Hana Šafrancová The Femme Fatale and Her Portrayal in Angela Carter's Works Master‟s Diploma Thesis Supervisor: prof. Mgr. Milada Franková, CSc., M.A. 2015 I declare that I have worked on this thesis independently, using only the primary and secondary sources listed in the bibliography. ………………………………………… Author’s signature I would like to thank my supervisor, prof. Mgr. Milada Franková, CSc., M.A., for her valuable advice and kind guidance. I would also like to thank my family, friends and Ing. Adam Hurta for his endless support throughout my studies. Table of Contents 1. Introduction.................................................................................................................5 1.1 The Concept of the Femme Fatale…..............................................................8 1.2 Early Femme Fatales.....................................................................................13 1.3 History of the Femme Fatale-like Character in Literature............................18 2. Characteristics of the Femme Fatale………………...............................................23 2.1 Posing a Challenge……................................................................................23 2.2 Appearance and Sexuality.............................................................................25 2.3 Castrating and Devastating...........................................................................27 2.4 Theme of Death............................................................................................29 3. The Work of Angela Carter.....................................................................................32 3.1 Heroes and Villains.......................................................................................33 3.2 The Passion of New Eve...............................................................................34 3.3 The Bloody Chamber....................................................................................35 4. Angela Carter’s Femme Fatales..............................................................................37 4.1 Identifying a Femme Fatale..........................................................................37 4.2 From a Puppet to a Fatal Woman.................................................................43 4.3 Variations on the Concept............................................................................48 4.4 Women under Transformation Process........................................................52 5. The Threatening Female..........................................................................................55 5.1 Fear of Castration.........................................................................................55 5.2 The One Being Destroyed............................................................................59 6. Conclusion..................................................................................................................63 7. Works Cited...............................................................................................................66 8. Resumés......................................................................................................................71 1. Introduction The term femme fatale has been appearing in all sorts of literary genres since their very beginning. Some, like Hirsch, even go as far as to claim that the term dates back to “the very origins of storytelling” (187). It has often been used both by the general public in everyday speech to denote an exceptionally beautiful or dangerous woman, and by academics to describe an archetype of a fatal woman in literary works. Although the phenomenon is apparently not a newly invented one, there still seems to be a certain degree of confusion about the nature of a femme fatale. The uncertainty over what a femme fatale is and what she is not is also caused by the fact that there is no single characteristic and definition that would precisely define what is the basis of the phenomenon. There are countless variations of the concept of the femme fatale, which leads to the fact that it is seen as an elusive concept. Rather than falling into a neat category, the phenomenon has many different shapes and appearances. Yet the femme fatale is more than just a diabolical female character that brings destruction to those around her. The thesis aims to provide a comprehensive concept of the femme fatale phenomenon, while still highlighting that it is a term with no single correct definition or clear structure. As a result, the femme fatale is ever-changing, bringing up the possibility of a discussion whether it is at all possible to find an answer to what a femme fatale is and in what way she is portrayed. The author of this thesis has chosen this topic because in spite of the fact that the femme fatale concept is commonly known and quite popular, there are not many academic articles dealing with the femme fatale as a whole. What is available is mostly a range of one-sided approaches to the concept in question. These focus on a limited number of elements in a femme fatale. Furthermore, there has been an on-going 5 discussion about the femme fatale‟s nature and while several definitions have been come up with, they may considerably differ. Also, it has not been made clear what conditions a female character must fulfil in order to be perceived as a femme fatale and there are different perspectives on the issue. The aim of this thesis is to analyse the figure of a femme fatale and demonstrate that there is more to her than simply being a female character destroying all male characters that fall in love with her. Its focus is not to defend the femme fatale for she definitely is a disastrous woman, often cold and violent. Rather, it strives to show how fascinating and complicated a true femme fatale might be and that she might be seen from various angles. The introductory part is devoted to the theoretical background of the femme fatale. It deals with a short evaluation of definitions of the term and assesses fatal women throughout the history of literature in order to provide context for the following chapters. On the whole, the thesis is divided into two main parts. The first part is concerned with the femme fatale‟s typical characteristics – it explores what kind of challenge she poses and to whom exactly. Subsequently, it concentrates on the question of her sexuality and castrating qualities, which leads to her having a pernicious influence on male characters. Later on, the attention is paid to the femme fatale‟s connection with the theme of death and her overall devastating effect. The plot and characters of selected Angela Carter‟s works will be briefly touched upon to create space for the analysis. The second part of the thesis deals with a femme fatale‟s portrayal in three of Angela Carter‟s works. For the analysis itself, two novels and one collection of stories have been chosen. These include The Passion of New Eve (1977), Heroes and Villains (1969) and The Bloody Chamber (1979) with its stories The Lady of the House of Love 6 and The Company of Wolves. The reason for choosing these works is not only the fact they rank among Carter‟s most popular works, but also because in all of these stories, there is some variation on the concept of the femme fatale. It is expected that each of them will provide a slightly different point of view on the matter. While The Passion of New Eve is useful for discussion of fatality and both metaphorical and literal castration, Heroes and Villains is suitable for pointing out the issue of distribution of power between male and female characters in a relationship, which is important because out of the two the woman cannot be the helpless and defenseless one and be considered a femme fatale as well. What is more, Heroes and Villains demonstrates a female character who is half-typical and half on her way to a femme fatale, even though she does not fulfil the conditions yet. The Lady of the House of Love is used to illustrate an example of an animal-like femme fatale and last but not least, The Company of Wolves is included as it depicts the perfect inconspicuous femme fatale in the form of an innocent girl, who is far more powerful than she seems to be and becomes the unexpected fatal woman. Other Carter‟s works in which the phenomenon can be traced might be mentioned marginally to provide more examples and comparisons. The main question raised here and at the same the basic motif pervading the entire thesis concerns what or who is a femme fatale and what characteristics are attributed to her. Apart from the question of what renders women femme fatales, there are also several points for discussion which help shed light on the fatal female character and employ a different perspective. These additional questions will cover topics such as whether the femme fatale must necessarily be a human being or whether she can also have non-human qualities. It is also of interest to pinpoint whether such a threatening female must always pay for her destructive nature and thus inevitably come to an 7 inglorious end and pay the price a fatal woman usually ends up paying for her destruction of men. 1.1 The Concept of the Femme Fatale When it comes to pinpointing the definition of the term femme fatale, different dictionaries provide varying levels of information. The reason might be that, as Praz argues, there is “no established
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