Thursday, May 9, 2013

Who Run the World: Self Made Female Heroes in British Literature


Most women characters through history have been consistently written as meeker damsels that service as a plot point and prop to the courageous hero. There are a few notable characters, however, that manage to defy the damsel archetype in varying levels of boldness. Even as representation of women remained largely within the same stereotype, writers found ways to manipulate the submissive expectation to create women with greater deception. The Victorian era saw less obvious portrayals of self-saviors, but nevertheless the time period held its own version of proto-feminism that discreetly possessed women defiant of the expected norm. Within each of their respective time periods, these heroines find ways to work around societal repression and end their stories in possession of their own agencies. 
Texts such as Tennyson’s “The Lady of Shalott,” and Radcliffe’s “Romance in the Forest” are written slyly enough to invoke drastically varying interpretations, but could ultimately be read with strong female characters.  “Romance in the Forest” presents the most difficult analysis of early feminism, as Adeline does not immediately inspire confidence as the fiercest woman character. However small hints in the writing imply that Adeline is in fact capable of more than she lets on, such as manipulation. In the late eighteenth century, most women were expected to act the way Adeline seemed to be: weak, meek, and quiet. Radcliffe writes Adeline with the appearance of the malleable woman, but adds a mysterious dimension to her that fleshes Adeline into a real woman. Strong female characters do not always need to brandish weapons or be boldly outspoken, but simply women in literature that possess the multilayered personality real women have. Adeline is an early example of this, as she begins the novel a sniveling mess, but slowly evolves into a woman capable of secrets and mystery. Adeline even ends the novel in success, being bequeathed a considerable inheritance that leaves her better off than most of the other characters. Even as different interpretations of this text are made today, what must be considered is how the modern feminist viewpoint can alter the intentions of the original work. “Romance in the Forest” is probably less feminist when read from its time period’s perspective. Though it holds potential for being influentially feminist today, it theoretically holds little ground on influencing nineteenth century women in a proto-feminist way.
In Alfred Tennyson’s “The Lady of Shalott,” a cursed woman is trapped within the confines of her room, forbidden to look outside. Her story is easily interpreted into a commentary about the roles of women in the early nineteenth century, but the kind of observation Tennyson is making is up for debate. A feminist approach would suggest that the Lady of Shalott gains her freedom, even in death, and that Tennyson is warding against the binding expectations women of the century fell prey under. After a long, unhappy life of weaving blankets and living under an invisible rule, the Lady of Shalott decides to take matters into her own hands, even if it means death. Though Lancelot is featured in the poem, he is not the hero that saves the maiden from the tower, rather the maiden leaves on her own accord. Possessing her own agency, the Lady of Shalott saves herself from the tower instead of waiting idly by, and becomes a symbol of rebellion against the submissive “angel of the house” role.

The curse is actually dying from boredom. 

Later in the century, Oscar Wilde treated his two heroines with less subtlety and wrote both as fairly independent women, despite the nature of late nineteenth century courtship and marriage. Gwendolyn and Cecily both believe themselves smarter and more confident than most women of the time would portray, and throughout the play, subject their respective men to various demands. Both women manipulate the men and mold them into exactly the version of Ernest the girls’ desire, thus making themselves women with independent agency and the capability for ambitious desire. Everyone is rambunctiously pleased by the end, but only after each woman – including Lady Bracknall – has given her approval to the men. Wilde gives the women of his play independence even as they weave through the rigid social structure of the time period, demanding what they desire from men in a way that still conforms to the social structure.



Inconspicuously taking the women roles and giving the heroines more autonomy then would normally be allowed, permits writers to weave defiance of the social hierarchy even as the characters work within it. In “Earnest,” Gwendolyn and Cecily use their roles as courted women to regulate the men, working both inside and outside society’s demands as strong female characters. Adeline in “Romance In the Forest” silently maneuvers through the stereotype her surrounding characters (and even the readers) cast her as, quietly slipping her independent thinking into her character with the deception of a girl that appears to have no strength, but possesses much. Pandering to the role others have placed her in allows for a heroine to move unnoticed through the social structure even as she defies it, giving her character not only autonomy beyond hierarchy, but a type of manipulation she is thought to be incapable of.
Angela Carter’s narrator in “The Bloody Chamber” is a modern example of this type of control as she slips indications of her true intentions in the beginning of the story. The girl knows the stories of the Baron’s past wives, but nevertheless insists they marry. However she never admits that she weds him for love, but rather because she just knows she wants to marry him. Carter’s writing implies an underlying tone of deception that the narrator possesses, one that makes the protagonist capable of both awareness and destruction.  Even the narrator admits that she believes she has as capability for corruption, indication not that women are pure young innocents susceptible to the dark nature of men, but rather that women can own the same type of carnal forces already embedded with in her. Women, essentially, are not corruptible, but rather their corruption lies dormant until triggered. This natural possession of strength changes the nature of feminine archetypes and allows for a stronger heroine role to emerge. Carter changes the end of the original fairytale to include not a prince savior, but rather the mother. A mother killing a brutal man without hesitation, saving the protagonist from certain death is not the conventional type of storybook ending, but realistic one nevertheless. Carter’s feminist twist on an original fairytale is slightly more obvious, with reason for her late twentieth century time period, but she still plays within the audience’s expectations by painting only subtle indications of the protagonist’s capabilities, and shocking the end with a different twist. Most readers would believe that the young girl would be either killed, or saved by a hero of sorts, and Carter sticks to the latter but incites deeper interpretations by merely changing the gender. This simple act, however more bold and brazen to her nineteenth century counterparts, jolts the audience enough to prove that female heroes are still in short supply, even a century later.
These women arguably could all be labeled as female heroes. They wield weaponized femininity and use the subordinate class position to their advantage. Some work through inaction, allowing men to dismantle themselves before swooping in to collect the resulting royalties; while others utilize their stereotype by enforcing it as a tool of manipulation men would not be aware of. It is relatively easy to write heroines that blatantly step out of the feminine role and don metal armor to mimic men, but the type of female hero that uses her submissive archetype as both a shield, invisibility cloak, and weapon in one device invokes a greater complexity of social commentary. Adeline’s strength is faint enough to be argued and reimagined copiously. Tennyson, Wilde, and Carter are better known for their varying types of social commentary, but still leave their characters with enough typecast to be questioned. The glory of this restraint leaving room for interpretation means audiences are giving the respective texts more consideration then they normally would have, spurring deeper thought processes that trail on to reflect on problematic societal norms. This contemplation of society's complexities is the foundational theme of each story, and the stimulation of it means the stories are successful.


Works Cited
Hall, Lesley A. “Sex, Gender and Social Change in Britain Since 1880.” Macmillan: 2000.

Davidoff, Lenore. “Class and Gender in Victorian England: The Diaries of Arthur J. Munby and Hannah Cullwick.” Feminist Studies, Inc: 2011. 

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