Describe the use of setting in The Bloody Chamber

Setting in The Bloody Chamber is used to explore the theme of acquiring knowledge and corrupting innocence. Carter’s use of chambers as setting encourage female characters to acquire sexual knowledge, emphasising Carter’s influence of the Marquis De Sade. The Bloody Chamber anthology was written long after the height of the gothic genre, and coincided with a second wave of feminist ideology. The natural settings therefore can be seen as a way of exploring the idea that female characters are no longer trapped and are in fact liberated from a domestic life under the eyes of a dominant male figure. There are several comparisons with the feminist stance of Carter’s anthology and Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, which uses setting in order for characters to explore and acquire knowledge, while Shelley’s use of the sublime takes power and purpose away from the leading male character, Victor Frankenstein.

Setting in both texts is used by characters as a way of exploration. Carter forces her characters to delve deeper into the unknown, as seen in the titular story. Shelley uses the setting of the North pole in Frankenstein in order to explore the dangers of seeking knowledge. This is further demonstrated by the isolation of Victor’s laboratory, which is described as his ‘workshop of filthy creation’. This description has clear connotations with Stevenson’s later work, Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, as Jekyll’s laboratory is constantly locked and is described as having a ‘foggy cupola’, emphasising the uncertainty and seclusion of the setting. This isolation and exploration of furthering knowledge creates a gap in the relationships between characters, and therefore causes conflict within the novel. This can be seen with the monster acquiring his own knowledge from abandoned books while he is abandoned, which causes him to realise his plight and thus wreak havoc on those close to Victor. Victor’s own acquisition of knowledge takes him away from his friends and family to the laboratory, which causes his relationship with his fiancé, Elizabeth, to be strained. The lack of voice from Elizabeth could be seen as Shelley critiquing the role of women in society, as she may have been influenced by the views of her mother, porto-feminist Mary Wollstonecraft. Shelley therefore uses setting in order to isolate her characters, hindering their relationships and therefore causing conflict.