Under the Wolf's Skin - Analysis of sexuality as liberator in The Company of Wolves
Under the Wolf’s Skin
“The wolf is carnivore incarnate and he’s as cunning as he is ferocious; once he’s had a taste of flesh then nothing else will do” quotes Angela Carter, in her reimagining of the classic fairy tale “Little Red Riding Hood” in her short story “The Company of Wolves.” The original tale by Charles Perrault served as a thinly veiled cautionary tale for young women to suppress their sexuality which comes in the form of the wolf, and submit to the servile situations, or else they come to a bad end. In Carter’s version though, she turns the tale on its head and does the opposite; Angela Carter’s story states that sexuality can neither be stigmatized nor evaded, as it is biological. She talks of how the women were taught to fear their sexuality, to run away from it as if the devil himself was pursuing behind. “If you spy a naked man among the pines, you must run as if the Devil were after you.” The image of a naked man (signifying sexual desire) is transposed on that of a raving beast who is to be eluded or escaped from. The reference to the Devil too perhaps isn’t entirely unplanned. What better way to impose iron-clad chastity on women if not reminding them of the Devil in tandem with sexual desire, the ultimate forbidden fruit? However, as Carter puts it, “the wolves have ways of arriving at your own hearthside. We try and we try but sometimes we cannot keep them out” and this is perhaps the best example of Carter’s allusion to the attempt at repressing human sexuality. Like the wolves, she states, the desire ends up dogging at your heels, no matter how much a person might attempt to keep it out. This blatant attempt on the author’s part is an attempt at restructuring the roles of the women so that they are more than just set in their gender roles which teaches them sexuality is to be reviled or feared; “sheltered” in one form or another for centuries, out of which they are beginning to emerge. Thus, in “The Company of Wolves” the author
“The wolf is carnivore incarnate and he’s as cunning as he is ferocious; once he’s had a taste of flesh then nothing else will do” quotes Angela Carter, in her reimagining of the classic fairy tale “Little Red Riding Hood” in her short story “The Company of Wolves.” The original tale by Charles Perrault served as a thinly veiled cautionary tale for young women to suppress their sexuality which comes in the form of the wolf, and submit to the servile situations, or else they come to a bad end. In Carter’s version though, she turns the tale on its head and does the opposite; Angela Carter’s story states that sexuality can neither be stigmatized nor evaded, as it is biological. She talks of how the women were taught to fear their sexuality, to run away from it as if the devil himself was pursuing behind. “If you spy a naked man among the pines, you must run as if the Devil were after you.” The image of a naked man (signifying sexual desire) is transposed on that of a raving beast who is to be eluded or escaped from. The reference to the Devil too perhaps isn’t entirely unplanned. What better way to impose iron-clad chastity on women if not reminding them of the Devil in tandem with sexual desire, the ultimate forbidden fruit? However, as Carter puts it, “the wolves have ways of arriving at your own hearthside. We try and we try but sometimes we cannot keep them out” and this is perhaps the best example of Carter’s allusion to the attempt at repressing human sexuality. Like the wolves, she states, the desire ends up dogging at your heels, no matter how much a person might attempt to keep it out. This blatant attempt on the author’s part is an attempt at restructuring the roles of the women so that they are more than just set in their gender roles which teaches them sexuality is to be reviled or feared; “sheltered” in one form or another for centuries, out of which they are beginning to emerge. Thus, in “The Company of Wolves” the author
Cited: Brooke, Patricia. “Lions and Tigers and Wolves - Oh My! Reversionary Fairy Tales in the Work of Angela Carter” Critical Survey. Berghahn Books. Jstor. November 2013 http://www.jstor.org/stable/4155725 Carter, Angela. "The Company of Wolves”. The Bloody Chamber. Victor Gollancz Ltd. 1979. Litgothic. 20 November 2013 http://www.litgothic.com/PDFOther/carter_company_wolves.pdf Film. In the Company of Wolves. April 18, 2005. 10 November 2013 The Holy Bible, King James Version. New York: Oxford Edition: 1769; King James Bible Online, 2008. 1 December 2013 http://www.kingjamesbibleonline.org/. Perrault, Charles. “Little Red Riding Hood” “Tales from Perraul” 1697. Pitt. 15 November 2013. http://www.pitt.edu/~dash/type0333.html#perrault