|
Author
|
Comment
|
sharonmorton
Unregistered User
(4/1/03 9:49 am)
|
help with my paper!!!
I am writing a paper on how the oedipus complex is portrayed in fairy tales and the writings of Kate Chopin. I am having a hard time finding people that support my thesis that you can find examples of the complex in Kate Chopins work. Can anyone help?
|
Midori
Unregistered User
(4/3/03 3:40 am)
|
which tales?
Hmmm...a little more information would be helpful here---to start with what fairy tales in particular are you looking at? Off hand, I don't think of the O.C. as especially prevelent in most fairy tales so I have been wracking my brain to try and imagine which tales you might be working with--and then what pieces in particular of Chopin's work?
|
sharonmorton
Registered User
(4/3/03 9:46 am)
|
my paper
Hey the complex I was refering to was more the Electra complex and the fairy tales are any tales where there is a main girl character whos mother is not in the picture. Many of the have them like cinderella and such. Chopins stories are The Story of an hour and The Storm. I think the characters show signs of these complexes in those stories.
|
Midori
Unregistered User
(4/4/03 5:50 am)
|
Missing mothers
O.K....it's been years since I've read Chopin...let me see if I can review those stories quickly...but be careful with those "missing mother" stories--some will work but many will not. In part because many of them have either surrogate mothers, or fantastic extensions of the mother figure (ex: "Goose Girl"--which has a cloth with drops of the mother's blood, or a FairyGodmother) \. Still you might be able to make the case in a story like Donkey Skin or Tattercoats, or the Armless Maiden, maybe even Beauty and the Beast--where the father figure behaves toward his daughter in either a sexualized way (requiring the girl to be a stand in for the missing mother) or a gesture of affection (getting the rose) which leads to the girl's alienation from the home. It's not exactly an Electra Complex--since the girl is disinclined to fulfill her father's desire...but you might be able to stretch it.
Or...are you perhaps thinking specifically of those narratives where the girl winds up in competition for the father's attention with the new stepmother? As in Cinderella--where the birth mother is missing--but the stepmother regards the daughter as a threat?
I'll look at Chopin this weekend...but you might want to check out those versions of Donkey Skin, (also known as Sapsorrow, Tattercoat, Furball, Katie Woodencloak) and Armless Maiden. (also known as Girl without Hands) and see if they might work for you.
|
sharonmorton
Registered User
(4/12/03 8:14 pm)
|
thanks
Thanks for your help. I will definitely look into those stories!!
|
