https://doi.org/10.67147/literariness.v1i2.013
Wolves and Women: Rereading Angela Carter’s Wolf Trilogy from a Zoocritical Perspective
Dr. Aditi Chatterjee
Assistant Professor of English
Mount Carmel College (Autonomous), Bangalore
Abstract: Angela Carter’s renowned short story collection, The Bloody Chamber is a feminist retelling of popular European fairy tales. The “wolf trilogy” in this collection not only challenges the prevalent misogynist stereotypes but also problematizes the conventional portrayal of animals in literature. This paper aims to look at these stories from a zoocritical perspective and to emphasize how the narrative actively dismantles the existing boundaries between the human and animal world by questioning the assumed hierarchical supremacy of humans over the animals. Zoocriticism is an emerging subfield under ecocriticism that focuses on the representation of animals in literature and raises ethical questions in understanding the relationship that exists between humans and animals. It critiques the established anthropocentric assumptions regarding the secondary positions of animals in relation to humans and aims at providing a more conscious and ethical perspective that allows the world to recognize them beyond mere symbols used for anthropocentric representations. Angela Carter in this work, interrogates the anthropocentric approaches that promotes anger, hatred, violence, mistrust and cruelty towards animals in popular children’s stories that play a great role in conditioning the attitude of humans towards animals as well as the natural world.
Through her retake of these tales she also attempts at liberating the characters in her stories from the throes of a deeply dominating, controlling patriarchal world, that not only strips women of any agency but also denies the animals, specifically the wolves their primordial nature and existence in the wild. The deep, dark, mysterious forces that pervade the natural world mirrors the wild, untamed, unpredictable and primitive in the human and non-human characters that strives to constantly break free of the violence inherent in the passive, patriarchal world. Her stories teach us to rebuild the relationship that exists between the human and animal world, by fostering mutual trust and respect as opposed to fear and violence.
Keywords: Ecocriticism, zoocriticism, feminism, anthropocentrism, Angela Carter, Wolf Trilogy