Happy Ending

In Book One of Angela Carter's Nights at the Circus I noticed that all the female characters from Nelson's whore house and Madame Shreck's museum all had happy endings. Every character went on to live life happily or atleast comfortably, none of them were left for dead or taken advantage of.

I was left to wonder why the author purposely chose to give all the female characters from the whore houses happy endings. There are three possible motives that I could think of, all of which may be true. The first is that this was the author's way of indicating that Fevvers is more fiction than fact. Angela Carter is constantly bringing up the theme of whether Fevvers is "fact or fiction" and since in real life situations rarely does everyone end up with happy endings this might be the author's way of helping the reader resolve whether Fevvers narrative is believable. Another possibility, is that Angela Carter was incorporating elements of Magic Realism into the narrative by maintaining the fairy tale happy ending motif. As mentioned, happy endings are not an element experienced in the factual world but are a common element of most Disney fairy tale movies. A final possibility is that this novel has a reaccuring theme of female empowerment and thus to have female characters end up in tragic circumstances would take away from that theme.

I feel like all of these motives are possible because all add to the overall story and the themes the narrative is trying to achieve. It was not accidental that Angela Carter took the time to detail out what happened to every female character after they left contact with Fevvers. I found this to be one of the most noticeable elements of the story because at first I was left wondering why the author was spending so much time talking about characters that were barely even in the story. Nothing is left in a story that does not have a purpose, however, only Angela Carter is the only one who knows the whole purpose. I can only speculate.

Which freak is freakier?

I have found myself dwelling on the quote that was dicussed last class from pg 20 of Katherine Dunn's Geek Love "... a true freak cannot be made. A true freak must be born." In my opinion in order to be a freak one must be shocking and unsettling. Without those elements I would argue that someone who is different is purely just "strange" or "weird" but not a freak. A freak should have something about them that makes people who are normal feel uncomfortable. This opinion is partially based on what I have interpreted from our dicussions in class and from personal experience. I think that a person who chooses to become a freak is much more shocking than a person who is born a freak. A person who is born a freak can have the same shock factor with their outward appearance as someone who has become a freak, but the person who chose to become a freak has an extra shock factor: their mental state. I find that people who choose to become freaks like the Arturans in Geek Love much more unsettling than the born freaks, the Binewski children. The Arturans have chosen to purposefully mutilate their bodies in order to become freaks and the mental state that drove them to do this is much more disturbing than their outward appearance probably ever would be. Therefore, in my opinion, a true freak is someone who makes themselves into a freak. Their outward and inward state is disturbing and unsettling. A born freak is just freaky on the outside but can be a completely normal on the inside. However, a born freak can make themselves into a true freak by accquiring a disturbing mental state. Arty from Geek Love is a perfect example of this.

Even though I think that a true freak must be shocking and unsettling, I wonder if this is the goal of the freak. Are people who choose to become freaks looking to be shocking? Or do they simply pine for a need to be different and go to extreme lengths to do so? Its probably different for every case but I think for the Arturans it was probably more the need to be different and special rather than to be shocking. I think it is this lack of knowledge of this goal that makes them even more disturbing and freakier because it shows lack of self awareness and unattachment from what is perceived as normal. Perhaps to be a true freak one is not aware that they are a freak at all?