Synopses & Reviews
In this major contribution to lesbian theory/cultural studies, Lynda Hart analyzes the way violent women have been represented in literature, plays, film, and performance. Starting from the historical link between criminality and sexual deviancy, Hart builds a complex and original theory in which the shadow of the lesbian animates representations of violent women from the Victorian novel to the recent proliferation of films depicting women who kill. This cross-disciplinary study critiques constructions of gender, race, class, sexualities, and the cultural politics of the 1990s in one of the first book-length contributions to lesbian theory. Fatal Women is certain to be read widely by scholars, students, and anyone interested in the politics of representation.
Hart's introductory chapter constructs a theory of female violence across the discourses of sexology, criminology, and psychoanalysis. Subsequent chapters detail this theory in the Victorian novel and stage sensation Lady Audley's Secret, Frank Wedekind's Lulu Plays, which introduced the "invert" onto the European stage, the popular films Thelma and Louise, Mortal Thoughts, and Basic Instinct, the political intersection of race and gender in Single White Female, the performance art of Karen Finley in the context of the censorship debates, the fate of Aileen Wuornos, dubbed the first "female serial killer" by the FBI, and the Split Britches' performance Lesbians Who Kill.
Review
"It is a female-centered, deeply thoughtful and provocative work, a most original contribution to lesbian readings of popular culture that is sure to inspire further lesbian theory."
--The Women's Review of Books
Synopsis
"A key event in the study of women and sexuality. Linda Hart's discussion of the paradox of lesbianism in modern culture offers the most important contribution to lesbian studies to date. Its smooth negotiations among sexology, legal discourses, psychoanalytic theories of desire, and sexual politics in relation to class and race yield a brilliant view of lesbianism as what Hart calls the ghost in white heterosexual patriarchy."--Julia Epstein, Haverford College
Table of Contents
| Preface | |
| Acknowledgments | |
1 | Introduction: The Paradox of Prohibition | 3 |
2 | The Victorian Villainess and the Patriarchal Unconscious | 29 |
3 | Enter the Invert: Frank Wedekind's Lulu Plays | 47 |
4 | Chloe Liked Olivia: Death, Desire, and Detection in the Female Buddy Film | 65 |
5 | Reconsidering Homophobia: Karen Finley's Indiscretions | 89 |
6 | Race and Reproduction: Single White Female | 104 |
7 | Why The[word is lined out] Woman Did It: Basic Instinct and its Vicissitudes | 124 |
8 | Surpassing the Word: Aileen Wuornos | 135 |
9 | Afterword: Zero Degree Deviancy - Lesbians Who Kill | 155 |
| Notes | 161 |
| Works Cited | 187 |
| Index | 197 |