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Help! Help! An Analysis of Female Victims in the Novels of Lois Duncan
As English teachers we are often in the position of selecting or recommending books for adolescent readers. In that role, we must be constantlyaware of the subtle (and sometimes not-so-subtle) images that are communicatedthrough literature. Teachers, of course, should attempt to avoid books thatcontain characters that are stereotypically racist or sexist. But consideringthe sheer number of stereotypes one encounters in reading adolescent fiction,selecting appropriate novels can indeed be a difficult task.
Suspense novels have always been the favorite genre of my students. This genreabove all others seems to harbor stereotypical characters -- both male andfemale. In suspense/horror film, television, and books of decades past, onecould almost guarantee that any victim would be female, her assailant male, andthat she would predictably have the gun taken from her, scream for help, twisther ankle in running away (probably because of her high heels), and invariablybe rescued by a male (Lieberman, p. 391). Things haven't changed. In today'ssuspense movies, the victims are still overwhelmingly female. As the violenceagainst them mounts, becomingly alarmingly more vicious, sexual, and graphic,they seem to do little to defend themselves.
This fact raises a question: In popular adolescent suspense fiction, how dovictims fare? Are female characters presented as true victims -- helpless,stupid, and perhaps even responsible for or deserving of the treatment thatthey receive? I was particularly interested in looking at female victims in thesuspense novels of Lois Duncan because these novels are widely read andregularly enjoyed by middle-school-aged students. Duncan's novels all contain ateenage female protagonist who is the victim of an antagonist's evil intent. Ithas been my experience as a seventh-grade English teacher that these novels aremuch more frequently read by female students than by males. Readers at thisimpressionable age are, perhaps at least subconsciously, seeking role modelssince they are just beginning to figure out how to be "girls" (Christian-Smith,p. 1). Will teenage girls find in these popular novels weak, silly,stereotypical, victimized girls who depend on a strong male to save them? Orwill they find alternate role models -- girls who are strong, intelligent, andsavvy enough to take care of themselves?
The Stereotype
The ubiquitous stereotype of a female victim as a damsel-in-distress,passive and waiting for a prince to rescue her, has its roots in thecenturies-old folktales that dominated early oral tradition. These stories nowin the form of children's books or Disney movies continue to set forth the ideathat females (e.g., Cinderella, Snow White) are waiting for a strong man torescue them. In today's horror movie/book genre, the typical female victim isoften terrified and terrorized by one male and then eventually rescued byanother. The pervasive stereotype of the female victim seems to encompass manyof these standard traits. She is physically weak, hysterical, unable to make adecision, unable to anticipate the actions of the antagonist, unable toformulate or execute a plan to defend or free herself and unable to retaliatewhenever the situation requires (Lieberman, p. 397). Does she sound familiar?You've probably heard her screaming once or twice.
Duncan's Protagonists
In analyzing folktales, Lieberman concludes that "the underlyingassociational pattern of these stories links the figures of the victimized girland the interesting girl. What these stories convey is that women in distressare interesting" (pp. 389-390). This premise certainly holds true for Duncan'sprotagonists. There is nothing particularly special or noteworthy about any ofthese girls until they become somehow involved with the antagonist. All but oneof the girls are sixteen- or seventeen-year-old high-school students.
Laurie Stratton (Stranger With My Face) is a bright, self-confident girlwho breaks up with her handsome but chauvinistic and possessive boyfriend anddates a boy who has been horribly disfigured in an explosion. Kit Gordy(Down a Dark Hall) is a fourteen-year old who decides to make the bestof a bad situation when she is forced to attend boarding school. Tracy Lloyd(The Twisted Window) is very intelligent, aloof, physically active, andrebellious enough to be goaded into doing things against her better judgment.The protagonist of Don't Look Behind You, April Corrigan, begins as asomewhat stereotypical character. She is a popular, pretty tennis star whodates the senior-class president and thinks of herself as a princess. She isself-centered and given to temper tantrums and sulking when things don't go herway. While her family is in the witness protection program, she contacts herboyfried. Doing so almost costs her family their lives. Sue McConnell(Killing Mr. Griffin) is easily the most stereotypical character of thegroup. She is a quiet, studious girl who is constantly embarrassed by the menin her family. She allows herself to be pulled into a kidnapping plot simplybecause a cute boy, David, has asked her. She constantly turns to her fatherand other strong males when confronted with any problem. She is generallypresented as weak, unstable, and often given to tears and hysteria in crisis.
The girls all seem to be perceptive enough to have a sense that something iswrong or that something menacing is going to happen. These perceptions usuallytake place very early in the story -- usually within the first twenty or thirtypages. The girls are often in the impossible position of not being able to tellsomeone because there is not actual proof of anything sinister. None trusts herown intuition or instinct.
None of Duncan's teenage protagonists has a model relationship with her family.April Corrigan (Don't Look Behind You) resents her father for havingbecome involved in an FBI undercover operation because it later disrupts herlife. Her mother begins to drink heavily under the strain of the situation. InThe Twisted Window, Tracy Lloyd's mother has been murdered and herself-centered actor father hasn't time for Tracy. She goes to live with anolder aunt and uncle who don't understand teenagers. In Down a DarkHall, Kit Gordy's mother has recently married a man Kit dislikes. She ishighly resentful when they deposit her in a boarding school so that they can goon a year-long European honeymoon. Only Laurie (in Stranger with MyFace) and Sue (in Killing Mr. Griffin) have even remotely supportiveparents. Sue's parents push her to date and are generally unaware of her realfeelings, but they try to do what they think is best. Laurie's parents areeasily the most "normal" and supportive. However, when Laurie finds out, at theage of seventeen, that she was adopted and subsequently shows interest inlearning about her birth family, her mother is viciously resentful.
Duncan's Antagonists
Lois Duncan gives us a spectacularly wide range of villains. Hers arenot the crazed ax-murderers of the movies setting out to stalk the teenage girlin the old dark house. Sometimes as readers, we don't even know who theantagonist is until the book is half-finished. They are believable because theydon't ooze evil. In fact, many of them are often quite pleasant, and all butone are known to the protagonists before their positions as antagonists areobvious. Perhaps surprisingly, the antagonists in two of these five novels arefemale. While it is relatively common for evil witches, queens, stepmothers,ogresses, and the like to prey on sweet innocent protagonists in folktales(Lieberman, p. 391), it is not nearly as customary in today's popular media forantagonists to be female.
The male antagonists in these novels differ widely. Brad Johnson (TheTwisted Window) is a handsome, charming boy who earnestly believes that inconvincing Tracy to help snatch his sister that he is doing the right thing.There is a romantic interest between Brad and Tracy that allows her to besucked into his plan. Mark Kinney (Killing Mr. Griffin) is somewhatmenacing from the start -- a "dangerous" boy, ruthless and merciless, but astrong and competent leader when the plot to kidnap Mr. Griffin turns intomurder. Even though Sue is interested in David, she feels drawn to Mark andfinds him attractive. Mike Vamp (Don't Look Behind You) is actually amob hitman who is coldly efficient and remorseless in his effort to destroyApril Corrigan's family in order to keep Mr. Corrigan from testifying in a drugcase. Of the three, only Mike Vamp easily fits into an existing villainstereotype, but he is a stereotype perhaps because we never get to know him. Heis a flat, black-and-white character. He is always evil and always relentless,as predictable as a machine that consistently operates as we expect it to.
The female antagonists are a truly scary pair, powerful and willing to dowhatever it takes to accomplish their goals. In Stranger With My Face,Laurie Stratton's identical twin sister, Lia, is the most evil of theantagonists. The sisters are separated and adopted at birth. Lia contactsLaurie through astral projection and does not hesitate to attempt to "steal"Laurie's life. Lia has physically attacked and almost killed several charactersand outsmarts everyone until the very end. Madam Duret (Down a DarkHall) is as much a capitalist as a villain. She has created Blackwood, aboarding school, for girls whom she has selected because of their sensitivityto the spirit world. Even knowing that it will cost the girls their sanity andperhaps their lives, she forces them to "channel" creative forces from thespirits of dead artists, writers, and musicians, then sells the works aslong-lost originals.
In an interesting note, Lois Duncan says that her editor asked her to changesome of the spirits that were to "possess" the girls to females. She had chosenthe poet Alan Seeger to contact Sandy, but her editors were concerned that allthe spirits were male and their victims female (the other spirits includepainter Thomas Cole and composer Franz Schubert). She changed Seeger to thespirit of Emily Bronte (Donaldson and Nilsen, p. 152).
The Confrontation and Escape
The focal point of any suspense novel or movie is the inevitableconfrontation of the protagonist and antagonist and the ensuing escape of theprotagonist and/or destruction of the antagonist. Lois Duncan's novels arecertainly no exception to this hard-and-fast rule. Sadly, in much of thesuspense genre, it is at this point that the final and most brutal insultoccurs. The hapless female protagonist has managed to get herself into asituation with the evil and intelligent antagonist and doesn't know what to do.At the last possible moment, the boyfriend, husband, father, or nearestavailable responsible male charges in and saves the day (Lieberman, p. 391).This male rescue communicates a not-so-subtle message to the female audiences-- you don't have to use your wits or your strength. Just endure long enough,and eventually someone -- probably a man -- will save you.
Taking Responsibility for One's Actions
In a publisher's interview, Lois Duncan says that she wants tocommunicate an underlying message to readers. She feels that it is importantfor teenagers to take responsibility for their actions ("A Conversation withLois Duncan"). Presumably she includes being responsible for one's own self andnot always relying on outside help. A study of the climatic scenes fromDuncan's novels suggests her protagonists are indeed able to keep their witsabout them and be responsible for themselves.
After spending much of Killing Mr. Griffin in near hysterics, SueMcConnell musters enough nerve at the story's climax to make a verystereotypically foolish decision. Throughout the novel she has whined and criedand wanted desperately to ask her father for help. When she realizes that Markhas committed murder, she foolishly confronts him to tell him that she's goingto the police. He, of course, tries to kill her. She is saved only when thepolice arrive at the last minute and pull her out of the house that Mark hasset on fire. Sue is an embarrassingly stereotypical victim through andthrough.
In Don't Look Behind You, April Corrigan begins the story as astereotypical girl, from her lace-and-flowers bedroom to her temper tantrums,but she manages to pull away from the stereotype during the climax. When themob hitman, Mike Vamp, locks April and her grandmother in the closet during hisattempt to murder the rest of the family, April uses brains, brawn, and nerveto escape. She is able to outrun him and get to her car. When her car won'tstart, he holds her at gunpoint. April attacks him with a tennis racket, knockshim out, and actually kills him.
Laurie Stratton from Stranger With My Face must contend with herantagonist, Lia, on a spiritual plane. Both girls are able to project theirspirits or souls from their bodies and travel instantaneously through space.Lia is extremely envious of Laurie's life. While Laurie is out of her body, Liaenters it. Laurie's help in regaining her body comes from her eight-year-oldsister, Megan, who recognizes that something is not right. It is only whenMegan confronts and disorients Lia that Laurie is able to reclaim her own body.While Laurie does indeed receive help in getting rid of her antagonist, thereis little she could do to save herself in her spirit form; and what assistanceshe does receive comes from another female.
At the climax of Down a Dark Hall, Kit Gordy is both brave and smart.Trapped at the isolated boarding school, she confronts Madame Duret andconvinces the other students to destroy the work they've done that Madame Duretwas planning to sell. Kit convinces Madame Duret's son, Jules, to drive theminto the nearest town. Kit's appeal to an older male has more to do with agethan gender. Only fourteen, she is at the mercy of the antagonist more becauseof her age than her gender. She doesn't drive, and her parents haveunsuspectingly entrusted her care to Madame Duret. Leaving Blackwood is,however, Kit's idea, and she alone secures the help that the girls need. Infact, when Blackwood is later set afire by a lightning storm, Kit bravelyreenters the building to save a fellow student.
In The Twisted Window, Brad Johnson convinces Tracy Lloyd to help himsnatch his baby sister away from his non-custodial stepfather. It is only afterthey have kidnapped the child in Texas and started back to Arizona that Tracyrealizes that the girl is not Brad's sister. Tracy makes very clever decisionswhen she begins to suspect the truth. She is also ready to take responsibilityfor her part in the kidnapping regardless of how misinformed she had been. Helpcomes in the curious form of Jamie Hanson, Brad's best friend. Throughout thenovel, Brad tells Tracy about Jamie, who was always taller and stronger than hewas and who taught him to stick up for himself when they were younger. Bradalso tells about Jamie's being able to work on any car. Here Duncan plays withour own tendency to stereotype, because given this information, we, like Tracy,assume that Jamie is a male. It is not until page 146 that we realize thatJamie is a female. Eventually, she and Tracy outsmart Brad. They successfullyget the child away from him, even though he has a gun.
Only Sue McConnell (Killing Mr. Griffin) completely fits the pervasivestereotype of the female victim. She makes foolish decisions and then isrescued by a male. Only April Corrigan (Don't Look Behind You) is ableto effect her escape with no help whatsoever. Not only does she not rely onanyone else, but she outsmarts and then physically overpowers a larger male.Even though April begins as a somewhat stereotypical character, she ends upbeing the farthest away from the stereotype of the female victim. The otherprotagonists fall somewhere in the middle, but most land closer to April thanto Sue.
Laurie Stratton (Stranger With My Face) is helped by a young sister.Laurie is both brave and clever; ultimately she does as much as she can doalone -- which is not enough. Were it not for Megan, Laurie would not havesurvived. Megan is not prompted by her older sister to take the action that shedoes. By virtue of this, Laurie lands slightly toward the stereotypical victimside of the continuum.
Kit Gordy (Down a Dark Hall) is helped slight by a male, but it is herown courage, determination, and intelligence that sets the action into motion.Tracy Lloyd (The Twisted Window) depends on Jamie Hansen, not to saveherself, but to rescue the kidnapped child. Tracy resembles Kit in that she ishelped, this time by a female, but it is her bravery and ability to make quickdecisions that set the plan into motion. Both Tracy and Kit, while relying onhelp from another party, actively seek their own escapes. They are the primaryplanners and decision-makers and the greatest effect on their chance ofescape.
With the regrettable exception of Sue McConnell in Killing Mr. Griffin,Lois Duncan's female protagonists do not fall in sync with the pervasivestereotype of the female victim. Although they are not all able to effect theirantagonist's defeat entirely alone, as April Corrigan does, these girls arehardly passive, meek, or foolish. In reading these novels, young women can findother young women to be proud of.
Works Cited
A Conversation with Lois Duncan. Bantam Doubleday Dell, 1990.
Duncan, Lois. Down a Dark Hall. Little, Brown and Company, 1974.
______. Killing Mr. Griffin. Bantam Doubleday Dell, 1978.
______. Stranger With My Face. Little, Brown and Company, 1981.
______. The Twisted Window. Delacorte Press, 1987.
______. Don't Look Behind You. Delacorte Press, 1989.
Deborah Wilson Overstreet teaches in the Department of Language Education atthe University of Georgia in Athens, Georgia.
