Powerful Perspective In Angela Carter's The Bloody Chamber

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Powerful Perspective in Angela Carter’s The Bloody Chamber There are times when certain aspects of form can contribute a heavy significance to the overarching message of the story itself. The choice of narrator, for instance, can greatly impact the story being told and can be utilized as a vehicle in which to convey a deeper, influential argument. In her short story The Bloody Chamber Angela Carter employs first person narrative through the eyes of a female protagonist in order to depict the sinister nature of masculine power, the redeeming nature of positive maternal empowerment, and to illustrate the unequal balance between gender and power within the story. Through the eyes of a young girl, Carter is able to share with the reader a great…show more content…
However, this sense of power contrasts immensely with the preeminent form of masculine power in this story. The narrative conveys the mother as a woman who is positively empowered. For example, she describes her mother as an “eagle-featured, indomitable mother” (Carter 7). This is an immediate depiction of the strength that this character has; she is “indomitable”, unable to be defeated. Carter effectively enforces the theme of feminine power that is woven throughout the text due to the narrative form. The reader is also shown the mother is caring and self-sacrificing when the female states “I, the little music student whose mother had sold all her jewellery, even her wedding ring, to pay the fees at the Conservatoire” (13). The mother is willing to give up her most precious material items in order to send her daughter to music school. It is interesting that the female protagonist should choose to mention this, as it demonstrates that the daughter acknowledges her mother’s care and sacrifice. The reader is left with a striking image of how a mother who would do anything for her daughter. As stated before, the daughter depicts her mother as a woman of strength, however, further on in the story, she coveys her mother as a source of strength from which she can draw upon. “Until that…show more content…
In the case of the mother, this is deliberately done to convey the strength, courage, and power she has, not only as a mother, but as a woman. Essentially, Carter’s narrative choice defines the theme of maternal feminine power in the story. An example of this is discovered when she shares that her mother has accomplished so much in her youth. The daughter explains, in a brief moment that her mother “had outfaced a junkful of Chinese pirates, nursed a village through a visitation of the plague, [and] shot a man-eating tiger with her own hand” (Carter 7). It is important that these are all events that are traditionally not feminine, especially for the period this short story is placed within. This is also illustrated when the mother comes to rescue her daughter: “You never saw such a wild thing as my mother . . . my husband stood stock-still, as if she had been Medusa” (Carter 40). The mother is described as “wild” as she rescues her daughter from the Marquis. This is important as it connects back to the idea that the mother rises up against, and is able to overcome many traditionally un-feminine social constraints. She is able to perform this feat as a result of her strength and undefeatable spirit, particularly in her daughter’s eyes. The mother is
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