Sharon McCann

Bio: Sharon McCann is an academic researcher. The author has contributed to research in topics: Subversion & Trope (philosophy). The author has an hindex of 1, co-authored 1 publications receiving 2 citations.

"With redundance of blood": Reading Ireland in Neil Jordan's The Company of Wolves

Abstract: Angela Carter's "The Company of Wolves" became the subject of a cinematic retelling a mere five years after the first edition of The Bloody Chamber (1979) was published in Britain Directed by Neil Jordan from a screenplay he wrote in collaboration with Carter, the film differs considerably from the original short story, the subsequent radio play, and, for that matter, the screenplay itself Set in a contemporary "middle-class England complete with the Volvoowning nuclear family of the Big House," Jordan's film focuses on Rosaleen, die youngest and most troublesome member of the family (Rocke tt 37) Remaining within the confines of her bedroom and refusing to converse with her parents and older sister, the girl falls asleep and dreams her way into a fairy-tale world where she assumes the persona of Little Red Riding Hood As a thoroughly defamiliarized rendition of Carter's tale, since its release in 1984 The Company of Wolves has had a mixed and often hostile critical reception Armed with a feminist and/or Freudian set of critical tools with which to tackle their subject, many of Jordan's critics approach the film with a firm set of expectations based on their reading of Carter's story Several express their disappointment at the director's failure to realize his cowriter's feminist agenda Emer and Kevin Rockett, for instance, take issue with the fact that, unlike Carter's heroine, Rosaleen does not laugh in the face of her antagonist The problem with the film as a feminist text, they argue, is that "no such act of resistance or subversion happens Instead, Rosaleen acquiesces when she comes face to face with the handsome werewolf and he demands his kiss" (19) Similarly, Maggie Anwell concludes that "the reluctance to allow a positive image of the girl's sexuality in such a violent film is what is most fundamentally at variance with the impact and meaning of the story" (85) Although both of these opinions are valid, it should be noted that they are only valid if we assume that Jordan intended to reproduce faithfully the impact and meaning of Carter's tale What his critics fail to consider, in other words, is the possibility that the director may be pursuing a political agenda of his own Although Carter and Jordan cowrote the original screenplay, their collaboration appears to have been somewhat one-sided Contrary to the director's assertion that the text was largely the product of his cowriter's imagination (Dwyer), in an interview with John Haffenden, Carter made clear the fact that "there didn't seem to be any point in writing things he didn't want to film" (85) As she states: "[I]t's not my movie, after all, it's filtered through another sensibility which has a good deal in common with mine but is quite different in many respects For one thing, Neil Jordan was brought up in Catholic Ireland" (Haffenden 84) Despite distancing herself from authorship of the film, Carter nevertheless objected to the charge that it lacked a subversive message (Neale 106) In an interview that appeared in Marxism Today shortly after the film's release, she had the following to say: "I would hotly deny that the movie was a piece of escapism The Thatcherite censorship certainly found it subtly offensive They couldn't put their finger on it, but they knew something was wrong" (Carter, "Company" 22) Arguably, what is "wrong" with The Company of Wolves is the perplexing Irish nationalist subtext that pulses beneath its skin: a subtext that is born of Jordan's Irish Catholic sensibility and is directly related to modern Irish history and, more pertinently, to the so-called Troubles in Northern Ireland The key to unlocking the door to this particular bloody chamber lies in a series of important departures in the film from Carter's original short story It is on these several deviations that this article will focus its attention - specifically, Jordan's use of the extended dream sequence, his incorporation of the literary trope of the big house, and, in the first instance, his representation of the heroine, Rosaleen …

ペロー童話集 = The fairy tales of Charles Perrault

Abstract: In eighteenth century France, Charles Perrault rescued from the oral tradition, fairy tales that are known and loved even today by virtually all children in the West. Angela Carter came across Perrault's work and set out to adapt the stories for modern readers of English. In breathing new life into these classic fables, she produced versions that live on as classics in their own right, marked as much by her signature wit, irony, and subversiveness as they are by the qualities that have made them universally appealing for centuries.

Encountering the Werewolf—Confronting the Self: On and Off the Path to The Company of Wolves

Abstract: This chapter examines British movies—The Curse of the Werewolf (1961), Legend of the Werewolf (1975), The Company of Wolves (1984)—as well as werewolf films that feature Britain, including Werewolf of London (1935), The Wolf Man (1941) and An American Werewolf in London (1981). It investigates werewolves’ origins and migrations, as films demarcate territories of ‘home’ and the exotic or marginalized, amidst the multiple versions of ‘Little Red Riding Hood’ that permeate the films. Motivating reflection on what makes us human, or animal, the werewolf expresses tensions between conscious / unconscious (or repressed / liberated), predicated upon a dualistic (Jekyll / Hyde) understanding of self /‘other,’ or culture / nature. Despite the films’ final containment, their critique of societal repression has an indelible force.