Kennon, Patricia (2015) “’Little Girls are Even More Perfect When They Bleed”’: Monstrosity, Violence, and the Female Body in Kristin Cashore’s Graceling Trilogy”. Bookbird, 53 (1). pp. 52-61. ISSN 0006-7377

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Abstract

This article examines concepts of humanity, monstrosity, and female agency in Kristin Cashore’s recent Graceling trilogy of fantasy novels for young adults. In particular, the teenage protagonists of Graceling (2008), Fire (2009) and Bitterblue (2012) struggle to resist and reconfigure their societies' conservative systems of prejudice, fear, desire, difference, and violence regarding “natural” and “unnatural” female bodily experience. Cashore’s trilogy interrogates traditional concepts of normal and aberrant female embodiment and offers thought-provoking opportunities for personal and collective transformation.

Item Type:	Article
Keywords:	Kristin Cashore; Graceling; trilogy; female agency; young adult fiction; fantasy fiction; feminism; female body;
Academic Unit:	Faculty of Social Sciences > Froebel Department of Primary and Early Childhood Education
Item ID:	7028
Depositing User:	Dr Patricia Kennon
Date Deposited:	16 Mar 2016 17:41
Journal or Publication Title:	Bookbird
Publisher:	Johns Hopkins University Press
Refereed:	Yes
URI:	http://www.ibby.org/index.php?id=1035
Use Licence:	This item is available under a Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial Share Alike Licence (CC BY-NC-SA). Details of this licence are available here

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