Research Abstract
Reflecting the Gaze
Moving beyond Lacanian theories of the “mirror stage,” Angela Carter demands we “see” ourselves, and women’s desire to be seen as more than just objects to be consumed. Carter’s work shows how women’s bodies and women’s desires are finally recognized only when the women can see themselves, fully, with their own eyes. This recognition is often obstructed by the “male gaze,” but may be supplemented by mirrors, which allow women to look upon their own bodies and prioritize their own perspectives. In Carter’s collection of short stories, we see an emphasis on reflections and mirrored surfaces that range from hungry male monsters’ eyes, to water, to actual mirrors. This paper, then, will examine the need for mirrors, and the way mirrors reflect a liberated, embodied way forward for women, in the Bloody Chamber.
Capstone Description
Werewolf Nose Best
For decades, branding villains with large, pointed, and crooked noses has been linked to anti-Semitic tropes, popularized in the 1800s; but what of those villains with no nose at all? In Marie de France’s 12th century short story, “Bisclavret,” the werewolf of that same name bites off his wife’s nose as retribution for stealing his clothes and forcing him to remain in canine form. The distinct intention behind this act is emphasized by the narrator’s rhetorical query: “what worse punishment could he have inflicted upon her?” The real questions, however, ought to be: why is losing a nose more devastating than losing any other part of one’s body? And why did this mutilation reproduce itself in the wife’s female offspring? In this presentation, I will delve into such questions in order to evaluate the implications of Bisclavret’s revenge, specifically as they pertain to misogyny, “othering,” and human/animal binaries. By reading the removal of the wife’s nose as more than a negligible detail of a larger act, we may better understand what registered as “monstrous” in the 12th century.
