Carrie, Stephen King
10/14/2009Female Anger Carrie as a Sympathetic Monster The Creation of the Other Fear of Female Sexuality Prom Menstruation Narrative Structure Similar to Bram Stoker's Dracula Narrative Structure Mimics Experience of Adolescent Female Subjectivity Christianity It Takes a Village to Make a Monster Sue Changes Places with Carrie The Ordeal Carrie as Lord of Misrule Femme Fatale Women Are Monsters Because They Are Women Children and Adolescents as Evil Arrested Development and the Entwickelungsroman Telekinesis, Witchcraft that the Gaze Brian de Palma's 1976 film of Carrie
Female Anger: Carrie's monstrous power is ultimately borne of her anger over her treatment by the people of Chamberlain. Her anger is represented as monstrous rather than a justifiable response to external stimuli because doing otherwise would force people to re-examine their role in her death and the Black Prom. If it takes a village to raise a child, it also takes a village to make a monster. Mrs. White isn't the only one responsible for her daughter's explosion of rage. Also culpable are the kids who picked on her and the parents and school administrators who did little to stop that teasing, and the neighbors who did nothing to stop Mrs. White's abuse of her daughter. Because Carrie isn't simply born a monster as is the case with earlier horror texts, there is also leaves open the possibility that more monsters like her can be made. While the White Commission concludes that Carrie was an aberration, and no others like her will be born, Sandra Jenks' niece at the end of the novel demonstrates that this is untrue. The T. K. gene which can lead to explosive episodes of female anger is only dominant in females. With Carrie, this gene causes a sort of killer PMS.
Carrie Is a Sympathetic Monster. Perhaps she does have extraordinary powers and eventually goes on a killing spree, but, to the reader at least, her anger is justified. At any rate, we can see what shaped her as a monster, and can't easily despise her, because in order to do so, we must then despise what lurks in ourselves that creates monsters.
The Creation of the Other: The Other is all we loathe in ourselves. Once embodied in a monster, it becomes controllable, and we believe that it can be destroyed. There is someone like Carrie in every school, every community. This Other is everything that her creators believe they are not, and making her allows them to feel invulnerable, and that their elaborate system of cliques and popularity is fixed, not some capricious creation. Carrie is an example of a type of horror where we actually see the creation of the Other; it doesn't just exist, as is the case in both earlier and later texts. We see how she is shaped by her family situation, her community, and even her genetic abilities. But unlike other texts that reveal the creation of the Other or the monster, King isn't trying to assign blame and lull readers into a false sense of security. Maybe Carrie is dead at the end of the novel, but others like her can come into being. Sandra Jenks' niece at the end of the novel has the potential to be the next Carrie if circumstances are right.
Furthermore, Carrie is also the product of someone who put herself into the role as Other, something she did by viewing everyone outside of herself in this category.
Fear of Female Sexuality: Carrie's extraordinary powers wax and wane with her development as a sexual being. Her powers first surface before she even enters the Oedipal situation. She has t.k. abilities in the crib and as a toddler before she's really aware of how she fits into patriarchal civilization as a sexual being. And the last and most explosive demonstration of her powers before puberty occurs just before she will have resolved this Oedipal situation, that is, learned how she will fit into patriarchal civilization as a sexual being. At age five, she expresses interest in the neighbor's "dirty pillows," which enrages her mother and causes her to nearly kill her. At about this time, children come to resolve the Oedipal situation by fully repressing any incestuous and inappropriate desire for their parents, and any sexual feelings go underground, not to surface until puberty. In older horror texts, female sexuality is something to be feared and repressed at all costs. Yet in this novel, part of the reason Carrie is creates is because of her parents' extreme repression of their own sexuality. Her mother especially fears her own sexuality. But completely open expressions of female sexuality are not completely good in this novel either. Chris Hargenson's sexuality, especially regarding her desire for Billy Nolan, someone whose class background is completely different from her own, is represented as bestial, and perhaps a key to her own cruel nature. Only Sue Snell's sexuality is represented as unproblematic with her fumbling, budding sexual relationship with Tommy Ross. When Sue becomes sexually responsive after their third try, she is "normal" in a very narrow context of female sexuality that privileges penile/vaginal intercourse.
Prom: For girls, senior prom is nearly as significant as a wedding. This is one of those events where the more "successful" girls are able to demonstrate their superior femininity through their choice of gown, date, and even method of arriving. To be crowned queen of the prom is to be queen of one's female peers for the night. Because of Carrie's role as the Other, her crowning at the prom cannot go unchallenged since her Other status has always been used to support the non-Other status of everyone else, particularly her female peers.
Menstruation: It is significant that Carrie's powers re-surface with the onset of menstruation, the ultimate outward representation of female sexuality. It is at this time that Carrie also begins to see herself as a woman and find her body attractive, and when Tommy Ross asks her to the prom, to dress in a way that her mother, and perhaps more conservative elements of her culture wouldn't approve. Carrie was born with her powers, which became dormant on the day she spied the neighbor's sunbathing daughter and expressed curiosity about her mature female body, also wondering about the potential development of her own body. Mrs. White, of course, felt intensely threatened at this moment, since her daughter was demonstrating an interest in her own sexuality through her questions. After the big mother/daughter fight that culminates in the rain of stones, Carrie's powers become dormant. At the same time, knowledge of her self as a sexual subject becomes dormant (as it does in all children around this time), not to resurface again until menarche.
Narrative Structure Similar to Dracula: Written as a quilt of narratives constructed after the Black Prom. Many of these narratives come from scientific sources or reputable university presses, allowing the reader to suspend disbelief. Also, the preponderance of scientific sources documenting the Black Prom and the t.k. phenomena give the comforting illusion that something like this can be prevented as knowledge allows us to contain it. But as we see at the end of the novel, that's not really true.
Narrative Structure Mimics Experience of Adolescent Female Subjectivity: To be a teenaged girl is to always experience yourself as being viewed by an audience. Specifically teen girls are encouraged to assess themselves through the hypothetical gaze of teen boys whose attention they are supposed to attract. We see Carrie attempting to mold herself so that she is viewed less critically by this audience. She attempts to fit in as much as possible given what her mother will permit her to do. She wears lipstick, looks through magazines to fantasize about how she would dress if her mother would let her, and even showers with the girls in the locker room, partaking in a mass ritual where they are all grooming themselves for this gaze as much as they are getting clean. But unlike her peers, Carrie is never favorably assessed by this gaze, and her female peers in particular harass her in this respect. The structure of the book replicates this gaze, switching back and forth from Carrie's interior thoughts to her peers' impressions of her.
Carrie's mother similarly grooms her daughter to always perform for a hypothetical audience in that she enjoins her daughter to always consider that God is judging her. And everything Carrie would do to win the approval of her peers is something that will bring down the wrath of God.
In the end, Carrie is unable to give a performance that makes either audience happy. Mrs. White, as representative of her God, sees her daughter's "performance" as good Christian woman as so lacking that she plans to kill her when she returns from prom. And on Prom Night, when Carrie is momentarily able to present herself in a way that pleases her peers, they are made extremely uneasy, and are grateful when the pig's blood is dumped on her head because now she's back in her place. Soon after, someone starts laughing, and when Carrie falls while trying to run away, someone kicks her.
Christianity: In patriarchal cultures, the ultimate proof of woman's degenerate nature and basic uncleanliness is her ability to menstruate. According to Christianity, menstruation is one of Eve's punishments for disobeying God. Christianity also helps make Carrie into a monster in that Mrs. White uses her unique scriptural interpretation to justify her treatment of her daughter. According to Mrs. White, Carrie is the ill conceived product of her parents' sin, and should've of been killed at birth. And Carrie's development of breasts and her menarche are further signs of her moral degeneracy. Mrs. White's abuse of her daughter is based on a concept of a punishing loveless god, a scary father. And she, as this father's representative on earth, becomes a sort of phallic mother, a woman who has usurped masculine privilege and overstepped her boundaries.
It Takes a Village to Make a Monster: If others in Chamberlain were responsible for making Carrie into a monster, Mrs. White as Carrie's mother bears the most responsibility according to our culture. Mrs. White is the monster that she is because of her own fear of human sexuality. Traumatized by what she perceives as her family's sexual excesses and of her own difficulty controlling her body (she gives in to Ralph at least once before they're married and suffers a miscarriage soon after), she embraces fundamentalist Christianity as a way to at least explain, if not thoroughly control, her flesh.
Sue Changes Places with Carrie: Sue Snell is able to survive the night of the Black Prom because she was able to step out of the binary logic of her culture (Carrie--different = bad/Everyone else--normal = good) and question its basic assumptions. She takes responsibility for the rotten taunting she participated in and feels genuinely sorry for Carrie. As penance for her crime, Sue convinces her boyfriend to take Carrie to the prom and effectively switches places with her. On Prom Night, Sue is at home sewing while Carrie has taken her place at the prom with her man and is crowned Prom Queen. Sue is also a non-menstruator at this point (her period is late). And when Sue finds Carrie dying in the parking lot of the Caviler, her period comes upon her suddenly without warning as a sort of further demonstration about how she identifies with Carrie by changing places with her.
Carrie as Lord of Misrule: At the Black Prom, Carrie is transformed into the lord of misrule. Those of you familiar with Mardi Gras should be familiar with the Lord of Misrule. He's the king of Mardi Gras, and his original function was to preside over the bacchanalian festivities where people indulged in behaviors they couldn't get away with in everyday life. In earlier traditions, when the festivities come to an end, the Lord of Misrule is blamed for everyone's behavior, and he can even be sacrificed. Today we just take responsibility for our own actions and the king goes home. Carrie is a sort of Lord of Misrule figure. At the beginning of the prom, she's beautiful and students and teachers alike don't know how to deal with her since they're so used to her in her role as school scapegoat. When she is transformed by her ordeal, then they recognize her for what she is and feel comfortable once again when they can tease her. But the school's attempt to sacrifice her backfires on them because Carrie has been mistreated one too many times.
The Ordeal: Central to horror is the ordeal usually suffered by the hero/heroine. Surviving the ordeal makes one stronger and better. This is what happens to Sue in the novel. She survives being spurned by her peers, changes places with Carrie, and lives through the night of the Black Prom to emerge a better person. Carrie doesn't survive her ordeal, but she too is briefly transformed by it, going from the butt of all jokes to the queen of the prom.
Femme Fatale: Carrie is a type of femme fatale, a woman who uses her physical appearance as her chief weapon. More traditional femme fatales are generally extremely beautiful, and this quality allows them to bedazzle their victims (examples of this sort of woman can be seen in Carmilla, Dracula's Daughter, Nadja and Ginger Snaps). Carrie only has one moment when she can be considered beautiful, and that moment is ruined when Chris Hargenson and Billy dump pig's blood on her. Then she becomes a sort of terrible beauty who kills everyone who looks upon her. She is a Medusa figure; to look upon her means death.
Women Are Monsters Because They Are Women: In horror, women are monsters because they are women, because they have female bodies that can menstruate and reproduce, or because they have female hormones which can allegedly make them irrational. This is certainly the case with Carrie, who is represented by King as monstrous because of her female body. Telekinesis, according to this novel, is something that only women can possess, and apparently menstruation increases those powers.
Children and Adolescents as Evil: In horror, children and adolescents are often represented as evil in that their youth threatens the older, dominant culture. Children are reminders to the old that one day, they will die and be replaced by their heirs. Children are also represented as evil in industrialized society since they aren't the assets they are in an agrarian culture. Instead, they require a great deal of money and time to prepare for their entry into adult life, and often, they can be seen as a type of vampire, demanding what seems to be a disproportionate share of the family resources.
Carrie is represented as particularly evil because she's an adolescent whose body is visibly changing. As her mother observes, after the blood come the boys. Perhaps Sue Snell engineered Tommy Ross's asking Carrie to the prom, but once she gets there, people begin to notice that she's physically changed. She's prettier. This often happens to adolescents, who need some time to grow into their changing bodies and their looks. Adolescents are often demonized in our culture, outside of horror. All too often, they are seen as the perpetrators of senseless violent crimes. At the very least, they are often seen as illogical and irrational due to wild fluxes in their hormones.
Arrested Development and the Entwickelungsroman: In the typical YA novel, the protagonist must travel outside of his/her cultural milieu in order to return with knowledge that permits him/her to develop. Carrie also follows this structure, but her development is arrested by her peers, who have a vested interest in her not developing. If Carrie is able to demonstrate maturity through her ability to fit in with the rest of them, then their own identities are rendered precarious as the foundation upon which they rest is that they are not Carrie. But ultimately, this strategy backfires. When Carrie has had enough of being the butt of every joke, her rage becomes uncontrollable and she kills nearly everyone in town. Sue lives in part because her sense of self wasn't dependant upon Carrie's Otherness. Chris, on the other hand, dies because her sense of self is wholly dependent on seeing herself in relation to those she torments. Carrie's mother similarly has a vested interest in her daughter's failure to develop since she sees any signs of sexual maturity as evidence of diabolic contamination. If Mrs. White can prevent her daughter from growing into a woman who menstruates and has "dirtypillows," then perhaps she will be forgiven for the sin of being human and succumbing to the lusts of the flesh with her husband.
Telekinesis, Witchcraft that the Gaze: Carrie, with her ability to move things by looking at them or visualizing them, inverts the male gaze. Instead of being "put in her place" as a woman by this gaze, she looks back. This is an element of horror that Carol Clover observes in Men, Women and Chainsaws. The witch too is able to cast spells merely by looking at people: through the evil eye, she can sour milk or render men impotent. Furthermore Carrie's telekinetic ability is magical in how it is connected to her will. Suddenly, instead of being subjected to the whims of others, Carrie has the ability impose her will on the world around her. At first, she can merely shatter glass or push children off their bicycles, but later, she can move cars or actually kill people.
Brian de Palma's 1976 film of Carrie: De Palma's film removes much of the back story about Carrie's early upbringing, and relies on visuals and our own familiarity with the iconography of high school to tell the story. We are supposed to just know that Carrie is the school's sacrificial goat after the first scene in gym class where she is clumsy and reviled by her peers for costing them the game. What has happened there is something so much more than a mere bad day. By the same token, we're supposed to just know that Sue is virtuous and Chris is not by their appearances--Chris is far more glamorous than Sue, and also far more scornful of authority, things established in the very first shots--and we have all known girls like this in high school, so they conform to the stereotype. DePalma plays with the iconography of the prom in order to render it horrific. It goes from being a magical event where everyone is transformed into someone beautiful to something else in slow motion because we all know what is supposed to happen, both within the context of the film's plot and in the wider metanarrative of high school, and so the moment is slowed down for us to deconstruct. As a director de Palma clearly has a fascination with female bodies given the number of shower and bathing scenes, and also with the close ups of their bodies as they are in gym class. Here he is reproducing that male gaze I discuss earlier in these notes. By translating this gaze to the screen, he recreates the experience of being female in our culture, which is to be constantly on display (at least if you are a certain age), and to be constantly aware of how you might be judged, both by males, and also by other women, who as we see in Mean Girls, are often tasked with policing the borders of femininity.