The alchemy of the word: Angela Carter's revision of surrealism

Abstract

Angela Carter was a prolific writer. I have therefore restricted myself to the study of three of her novels and a brief discussion of her seminal essay, The Sadeian Woman. The first chapter of this thesis summarises the critical debate surrounding Carter's work. It also introduces the precepts of Surrealism and the contemporary/feminist critiques of the Surrealist movement. At the conclusion of the first chapter, I introduce Carter's argument for "moral pornography" as it is presented in The Sadeian Woman and as it relates to Surrealism. In chapter two I argue that The Infernal Desire Machines of Doctor Hoffman is doubly inscribed as an exploration into, and critique of, Surrealism. On the one hand, Carter appropriates Surrealist themes and imagery in order to diagnose the nature of male fantasy and the misogynist mind. On the other hand, Carter critiques the solipsism and political impotency of the Surrealist movement itself. I argue, however, that just as the characters and events of the novel are trapped within the dictates of "desire," the narrative is trapped within diagnostic and revisionary practices. The question I ask in my reading of Dr Hoffman is whether Carter is any more successful than the Surrealists in escaping the reinscription of patriarchal myth and in asserting a revolutionary voice. In chapter three I examine the Surrealist themes and motifs in The Passion of New Eve. The Surrealists adopted in their work the theme of the alchemical quest and the motif of the alchemical androgyne. I argue that, in The Passion of New Eve, Carter explores issues of gender using the same structure of the alchemical quest and the ideal of androgyny. In this chapter I discuss Carter's fascination with the modernist/Surrealist model of the androgyne. Chapter four concentrates on the poststructuralist carnival of Nights at the Circus. I argue that Circus offers a clear denunciation of some of the Surrealist precepts that, in Carter's earlier writing, seemed to hold some appeal. The lone male alchemist/Surrealist/hero who narrates New Eve and Doctor Hoffman, is replaced by the omnipotent Fevvers who precipitates events, effectively overthrows agents of patriarchy, and approaches her world always open to dialogic exchange. My discussion of Carter's work is informed by the argument that, where her early work facilitates a revision of Surrealism, it sometimes seems caught in the very tradition it seeks to revise; Nights at the Circus, however, abandons Surrealist philosophy to provide a joyful prescription for a liberated (poststructural) world.