Final Thoughts On 'The Bloody Chamber'

Nice creepy little picture there.

So, we have finished The Bloody Chamber, so here are my thoughts about it overall, and my thoughts about then ending of the short story.

First of all; the ending. I thought that when the Marquise was told that she was going to be punished through decapitation, she was very calm about it. She is a very passive character, she doesn't protest against him, and when she's waiting, she doesn't try to escape. This could be for many reasons, she may find the attempt fruitless, because she knows how cunning her husband can be, or she herself may feel like she needs to be punished, though she;s not actually done anything incredibly wrong, so she just accepts her head needs to come off.

I do believe in female intuition, but I think that the whole thing about her mother knowing to come and save her daughter is a little far fetched.

Major themes in The Bloody Chamber

Punishment

These Gothics and their punishment. The Marquis thinks that she is the one that's done wrong by him disobeying his 'rule'. By her disobeying him, it allows him to justify his own sin, it's a bit of a vicious circle, because as the wife disobeys, she dies then the next wife will disobey, then she dies etc. I watched a film once (I think it was a film) about this guy, his motive behind murder was that he was banishing sinful women from the world. A bit like 'doing God's work' only it wasn't gods work, he just did it for the lols I assume.

Sexual Connotations

What's a Gothic tale without a bit of sex. There's plenty of it in The Bloody Chamber. At the very beginning she's on a train, which according to Freud, the train is a phallic symbol and the movement of the train (it's rhythmic...thing) symbolises sex. It continues like this; "12 husbands penetrating 12 brides" etc.

Power and The Male Gaze

As I mentioned above, the mirrors for the Marquis represent power, the more he sees himself doing stuff (like the 12 husbands/12 brides thing) the more powerful he is. Hopefully not too many of you have read American Psycho by Bret Ellison because it is a VILE book, but it's the same story there, he likes to look at himself in a mirror whilst having sex because a) he's a psycho and b) he likes to feel powerful. Moving onto the male gaze, what's interesting is that the blind piano tuner, because he is blind, has no male gaze, which could be why she falls in love with him, or it could be because then he doesn't conform to male gender stereotypes which is another major theme of the novella.

VERY quick overview of the story I know.