Feminism in Crime Fictions – Agatha Christie as a Feminist Writer
Feminism in crime fictions –
Agatha Christie as a feminist writer
From the late nineteenth century, different movements started to work all around the world, protesting for the equality of women in the political and social life. The thesis of the feminism covered every aspect of life within a short period of time, so it had a great influence on literature as well. The feminist theories penetrated most of the genres and sub-genres; consequently, they also affected the genre of crime fiction which had been living its ‘golden age’ in the same time as the first wave of feminism occurred. Creating strong and positive leading female characters have always been a difficult task for writers, but because of the special needs of a crime story, it is especially demanding in a case of this genre. The majority of the detectives have always been men, and women have usually been the victims or the implementer of the felony, but they have - even in stories written by women - rarely been the main investigator of a crime. This fact has many reasons to be confirmed. There are several reasons, why a woman cannot be a detective, but the most obvious one is that if a woman represents all of the feminine ideals, she can only play the role of a victim, a woman; on the other hand, who does not live up to these ideals can only be the villainess in the story. However, with the appearance of the feminism, new types of characters turned up, trying to empower the main woman roles. The first step in the 1930s was to allow them to partly participate in the investigations, as girlfriends, fiancées or wives of the detectives. Another way to include women characters in the main plot of a crime story was to put them into a situation in which she has to solve a crime because she has to save somebody who is important for her or in some cases she gets in even bigger trouble if she cannot solve the mystery. This was an advantageous strategy, but it has a significant detriment, namely the heroine of
Agatha Christie as a feminist writer
From the late nineteenth century, different movements started to work all around the world, protesting for the equality of women in the political and social life. The thesis of the feminism covered every aspect of life within a short period of time, so it had a great influence on literature as well. The feminist theories penetrated most of the genres and sub-genres; consequently, they also affected the genre of crime fiction which had been living its ‘golden age’ in the same time as the first wave of feminism occurred. Creating strong and positive leading female characters have always been a difficult task for writers, but because of the special needs of a crime story, it is especially demanding in a case of this genre. The majority of the detectives have always been men, and women have usually been the victims or the implementer of the felony, but they have - even in stories written by women - rarely been the main investigator of a crime. This fact has many reasons to be confirmed. There are several reasons, why a woman cannot be a detective, but the most obvious one is that if a woman represents all of the feminine ideals, she can only play the role of a victim, a woman; on the other hand, who does not live up to these ideals can only be the villainess in the story. However, with the appearance of the feminism, new types of characters turned up, trying to empower the main woman roles. The first step in the 1930s was to allow them to partly participate in the investigations, as girlfriends, fiancées or wives of the detectives. Another way to include women characters in the main plot of a crime story was to put them into a situation in which she has to solve a crime because she has to save somebody who is important for her or in some cases she gets in even bigger trouble if she cannot solve the mystery. This was an advantageous strategy, but it has a significant detriment, namely the heroine of
References: 1. Chernaik, Swales and Robert Vilain. The Art of Detective Fiction. London: Macmillan Press, 2000. Print. 2. Bunson, Matthew. Agatha Christie világa. Budapest: Magyar Könyvklub, 2004. Print 3. Marty S. Knepper. "Agatha Christie—Feminist." Armchair Detective. Vol. 16. No. 4. Winter. 1983. 4. “Agatha Christie.” Wikipedia. n.p. n.d. Web. 5. “Feminism.” Wikipedia. n.p. n.d. Web.