The Quest of the Female Hero in the Works of Patricia A. Mckillip

University of Calgary PRISM: University of Calgary's Digital Repository Graduate Studies Legacy Theses 2001 The quest of the female hero in the works of Patricia A. McKillip Mains, Christine Mains, C. (2001). The quest of the female hero in the works of Patricia A. McKillip (Unpublished master's thesis). University of Calgary, Calgary, AB. doi:10.11575/PRISM/15559 http://hdl.handle.net/1880/40979 master thesis University of Calgary graduate students retain copyright ownership and moral rights for their thesis. You may use this material in any way that is permitted by the Copyright Act or through licensing that has been assigned to the document. For uses that are not allowable under copyright legislation or licensing, you are required to seek permission. Downloaded from PRISM: https://prism.ucalgary.ca THE UNIVERSITY OF CALGARY The Quest of the Female Hero in the Works of Patricia A. McKillip by Christine Mains A THESIS SUBMITTED TO THE FACULTY OF GRADUATE STUDIES IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF MASTER OF ARTS DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH CALGARY, ALBERTA AUGUST, 2001 O Christine Mains 2001 National Library BiMioWque nationale 1+1 dcmada du Canada Acquisitions and Acquisitions el Bibliographic Services services bibliograp hiques 395 WdKngton Street 385. rue Wellington OtWwoOFJ K1AW Ottaw~ONK1AW CMada Canada The author has granted a non- L'autew a accorde une licence non exchsive licence allowing the exciusive pennettant a la National Library of Canada to Bibliotbtique nationale du Canada de reproduce, loan, distribute or sell reproduire, praer, dktribuer ou copies of this thesis in microform, vendre des copies de cette these sow paper or electronic fomats. la fonne de microfiche/film, de reproduction sur papier ou sur format eectronique. The author retains ownership of the L'autem conserve la propriete du copyright in this thesis. Neither the droit d'auteur qui protkge cette these. thesis nor substantial extracts fiom it Ni la these ni des extraits substantiels may be printed or otheMrise de celle-ci ne doivent &re imprids reproduced without the author's ou autrement reproduits sans son permission. autorisation. Abstract The path followed by the questing hero of myth, fiction, and film has been the subject of several analyses, one of which is the monomyth described by Joseph Campbell in The Hero with a Thousand Faces. Feminist critics, concerned by gender imbalances in Campbell's monomyth, have produced other versions of the monomyth, concluding that except in a few instances, the female hero's quest for an identity that includes both a sense of self and a loving relationship is doomed to failure. This is not true of the quest fantasies written by American fantasist Patricia A. McKillip, which can be better described using the structure of the duomyth rather than the monomyth. In the duomyth, the focus is on both a male and female hero, who shift between actantial roles rather than being confined to a single role, thus allowing for a resolution free from gender inequality. Acknowledgments I would like to take this opportunity to gratefully acknowledge all of those who have contributed, directly and indirectly, to this work, beginning with the Department of English and the Faculty of Humanities for support, financial and otherwise, that allowed me to further my research. I would especially like to honour my supe~sor,Susan Stratton, whose insightfid comments and probing questions encouraged me to dig more deeply and to work past my resistance. Thanks are also due to my instructors in both undergraduate and graduate courses who allowed me to explore different facets of the hero's quest, particularly Tom Henighan, who set my feet on this path to begin with. I am also appreciative of my fiends and colleagues who listened patiently, on many, many occasions, while I rambled my way around my ideas. Finally, I feel it especially necessary to express my gratitude to all of the artists, musicians, and authors who created narrative worlds in which I quested for a self that could be both powem and beloved, and peopled those worlds with images of women both inspiringly powerful and hauntingly powerless: John William Waterhouse's La& of Shalott and La Belle Dame sans Merci; Stevie Nicks' "RhiannonY'and "Gold Dust Woman"; Joss Whedon's angst-ridden, karate-kicking Bu-the Vampire Slayer; Neil Gaiman's sweet and cheerful big sister Death; Hans Christian Andersen's "Little Mennaid"; and especially Patricia McKillip7sfemale heroes, fiom the power-hungry sorceress Nyx and the self-sufficient wizard Sybel to the lovelorn Rois and the five female warriors of "The Fellowship of the Dragon." These images have done much to shape my own sense of identity and power-within. This work is dedicated with love and respect to the memory of my mother, Doreen Ouellette Mains, a Lifelong student and caring teacher, who was brave enough to encourage me to follow a different road than she had taken, understanding enough to support me when I made the same mistakes that she had, and responsible enough to know that daughters need to choose for themselves. No female hero could ever have a better mentor. .. Approval Page ................................................................................................................. 11 ... Abstract .............................................................................................................................HI Acknowledgments ............................................................................................................ iv Dedication ..........................................................................................................................v Table of Contents ............................................................................................................. vi Chapter One: Ringing the Changes on the Hero's Quest ...................................................1 Chapter Two: The Duomyth and Marriage ...................................................................... 29 Chapter Three: The Quest for Self and the Doubling of the Hero in Riddle-Master ....... 46 Chapter Four: The Quest for Community in The Forgotten Beasts of Eld ...................... 72 Chapter Five: The Quest for Love in Winter Rose ........................................................... 94 Chapter Six: Conclusion ................................................................................................. 117 Works Cited ................................................................................................................... 124 Appendix: Selected Bibliography of the Works of Patricia A . McKillip ....................... 128 Index ..................................................................................................................... ......... 130 Chapter 1 - Ringing the Changes on the Hero's Quest The great fantasies, myths, and tales are indeed like dreams: they speakfiom the unconscious to the unconscious, in the Iangwge of the unconscious -symbol and archetype. (Le Guin 52) Two of the most common themes explored in the narrative worlds of fiction, film, and television are the hero's quest for identity and the search for love. The difficulty in successfully achieving both of these goals is the central concem of many works written by women and featuring female protagonists, as is revealed by an examination of much of the critical analysis dealing with the female hero. In criticism, in fiction, and in real life, it seems almost impossible for the woman to enter into a romantic bond with a man without taking on a submissive role in a relationship founded on hierarchies of power rather than on equality and balance. After an exhaustive exploration of hundreds of texts, two noted feminist critics conclude that "even when male and female characters love each other with the same commitment and intensity, there is an inherent imbalance of power in the relationship" (Pearson and Pope 34). And yet these same critics acknowledge that their overwhelmingly negative conclusion is not necessarily true in the case of the female hero of fantastic fiction. A more positive outlook for the female hero is revealed in the type of work that could be considered the exemplar of the quest for knowledge, the quest fantasy. The quest fantasy is, by the simplest definition, a narrative work belonging to the genre of fantasy and fashioned out of the concerns and structure of the quest for identity. The quest fantasy has always been marked by the concem for both knowing and being. The question "Who am IT' central to the quest contains both the sense of "knowing," of seeking an answer that will add to a store of knowledge, and the sense of "being" as indicated by the verb "am," the W-person singular form of the verb "to be," which is concerned with matters of existence, with a state of being in the world. The questing hero seeking an answer to the question "Who am I?" desires knowledge of an identity, to know and to understand his or her self and that self s place in the larger world. The quest for identity has both a private and a public component. The hero must develop a private sense of selfhood, an inner sense of a unique and whole self mature enough to take responsibility for making choices that honestly reflect that self. "Whole" means a self resulting fkom the Jungian process of individuation, of integration of the different aspects of personality resident in the psyche (Le Guin 53-4). This self transcends gender, integrating both masculine and feminine qualities.

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