An Interpretation Of Female Identity In The Bloody Chamber And Other Stories And Wise Children

As one of famous female writers in Britain in the 20~thh century,Angela Carter enjoys multiple identities,namely a novelist,playwright,reporter,critic as well as essayist.With bold and frank language style,her works skillfully involve magical realism,feminism,Gothic and dark fairy tales.The representative works of Carter contains full-length novels such as The Circus Night,New Eve's Passion and Wise Children and short stories like The Bloody Chamber and Other Stories.In the works of Carter,women who are brave to resist patriarchy,own female consciousness,liberate themselves from physical and psychological constraints and finally pursue happiness.This thesis analyzes four stories based on traditional fairy tales from The Bloody Chamber and Other Stories,including The Bloody Chamber,The Courtship of Mr.Lyon,The Tiger's Bride as well as The Company of Wolves and a novel Wise Children from a feminist point of view.In addition,this thesis aims to examine the opinions of Carter on the issue of female identity and explore the realization of their independent self-identity.This thesis is composed of four chapters.Chapter One introduces the personal experience and works of Angela Carter,describes the research on the works of Carter at home and abroad and then gives an introduction of the value of the research.Chapter Two gives the theoretical introduction of this thesis,respectively summarizes the development of feminism,makes an explanation for the main schools of feminism and analyzes the living predicament of women.In Chapter Three,the first part tries to probe into the road of female resistance and combines with text analysis in the four short stories from three aspects,namely the awakening of women's female consciousness,the seeking for female subjective status and the realization of equal and harmonious relationship between the two genders.The second part explains the disintegration of patriarchal family and the establishment of female identity in their“new family”in Wise Children,and the growth of Chance sisters'career and the maturity of their emotion.Chapter Four concludes Carter's embodiment of female consciousness and the pursuit of harmonious gender relations that Angela Carter has expressed in these two works.Cater also reflects that the exploration of female self-liberation not only powerfully attacks patriarchal thoughts,but also writes the historical legends of women.The thesis explores female identity through feminist theory in Angela Carter's two works,which can provide a new perspective for the research of Angela Carter.