Gender Criticism in the Lamb to the Slaughter, By Roald Dahl

1.0. INTRODUCTION This essay will discuss on the gender approach used by Roald Dahl in the short story “Lamb to the Slaughter”. First of all, I will enlighten the definition of gender criticism. Gender critics look for the reinforcement or deconstruction of gender stereotypes in literature (Parkrose, 2011). Because literature is timeless, it greatly influences the way society views gender differences, therefore, gender criticism examines how an author may have influenced gender perceptions through a work of literature. Gender criticism examines the influence of gender on the way literature is written and read. Gender criticism perceives men and women as different because they write differently and read differently, and these differences should be valued. Some gender critics look at works by men or women to see what approaches in these works, including language use, portrayal of characters and plots, and use of images and symbols, are essentially female or male. Other gender critics explore the effect that male-dominated cultures exert on works of literature and on writers. 2.0. GENDER CRITICISM IN THE LAMB TO THE SLAUGHTER The story, „Lamb to the Slaughter‟ is about a six months pregnant Mary Maloney who is knitting in her parlor while waiting for her husband, Patrick Maloney, to get home from work. In this scene, we can identify that during that era, gender play great roles where it differentiates the job that the people will have, where women takes care of the house, while the men go out to work. Patrick, a gloomy and unfriendly police detective, returns home in a very bad mood. After drinking glasses of whiskey, Patrick tells Mary that he is leaving her. Roald Dahl portrayed the male character as a dominant character where they have all the power to do things, which is in contrast of the female character. As the pregnant wife shocked, she prepares dinner, acting like nothing had happened. While preparing the dinner she goes for a frozen leg of lamb from the freezer. When her husband tells her not to bother, she crushes the back of his skull with the frozen lamb leg. Mary proceeds to get her alibi prepared by putting the lamb in the oven and then heading to the butcher‟s. Returning, she puts the lamb in the oven and 1

pretends to have discovered her murdered husband. She calls the police and her husband‟s colleague come in investigate. In the end, she offers them the leg of lamb and they eat the murder weapon. Roald Dahl was graduated from Repton School in 1933, and then he went to work for the Shell Oil Company of East Africa until World War II started in 1939. He then served in the Royal Air Force as a fighter pilot and he became a Wing Commander. As the consequence of his long travel, he became an open minded person, leading him to portray the female gender as a dominant gender in The Lamb to the Slaughter. We can see that Roald Dahl portrayed both gender as dominant gender but in the end, he shows how women can be powerful against men. From the setting of the story, we can identify some elements that are related to gender criticism. Roald Dahl uses the words that symbolize the female character, Mrs. Maloney‟s attitude. “The room was warm and clear, the curtains drawn, the two table lamps alight - hers and the one by the empty chair opposite”. The words like warmth, clear and alight symbolize life which means the room is alive, therefore, the people living in the house are alive and their relationship is well. The opening sets the scene as a seemingly happy family, with a traditional wife who sticks firmly to traditional patriarchal values, and who loves her husband and cares for him. This shows how Roald Dahl portrayed the female gender as calm and better gender, in contrast of Patrick Maloney who came into the house in a moody state. When Patrick Maloney came into the house, they had a conversation. The conversation has a question-answer-format in which Mrs. Maloney asks the questions and Mr. Maloney furnishes answers, generally minimal responses (Fellegy, 1995) as the word count and the silences bear out, making the conversation more like an interrogation or a school lesson than a conversation between two intimate equals. For example, when Mrs. Maloney asked, “Darling, would you like me to get you some cheese? I haven't made any supper because it's Thursday”. Then Mr. Maloney replied with a “No”. This shows how Mr. Maloney refuses before telling that he wants to leave her, causing her to crush the back of his skull with the frozen lamb leg. With that, these are the reason or the starting point where Roald Dahl started to portray the 2

female gender as a more powerful gender than male. The change of words usage from the setting, which is harmonious to the words used during the conversation which are negative words, explains the change of Mrs. Maloney‟s behavior which is from a calm wife, to an aggressive murderer. The elements of gender criticism are used here as it is ironic when a calm wife kills her husband, which is a detective that should be more aware and agile. This evidence really shows that Roald Dahl has implemented the gender criticism, where women are able to dominate men. This is because, during that era, it is widely accepted that men are more powerful than women. In the beginning of this story, Roald Dahl described Mrs. Maloney as a housewife, a faithful and obedient wife. The society during this era admitted that men are cleverer and more powerful than women, as most of the important job such as police and detective are occupied by the men. On the other side, Roald Dahl has exemplified the gender criticism by showing that female gender is cleverer than male gender. Mary Maloney pretends her husband has not yet arrived home and she starts preparing supper by putting in the murder weapon, which is the frozen lamb leg into the oven at a high temperature. Actually, it is a very smart act because she is able to think brilliantly on how to hide the evidence. She then goes out to the local shop to buy more food for the evening meal, and returns home pretending not to find her husband. She acted like she discovered her husband‟s dead body and called the police, which are her husband‟s colleagues and friends. They immediately arrive, found out that their chief is indeed dead and proceed with the investigation. Since his wife is the nearest suspect, they necessarily do the investigation on her alibi by going to the shop and carry out a systematic inquiry into the shopkeeper. Her story is the same as the shopkeeper‟s. Her planning is thoroughly succeeded and this shows Roald Dahl‟s victory in implementing the gender criticism where men should not get tricked by women but it is the vice versa. Furthermore, Roald Dahl also exemplified the gender criticism elements when the police said that she has no immediately apparent motive for killing her husband as they are having a happy family. This shows that the police never expect the unexpected where women also can do something that is smart and incredible. Hence the police form the hypothesis that the chief arrived home, that someone entered the house or 3

was with him, and that that someone killed him. The medical evidence establishes that the murder weapon as being something extremely heavy and large, such as a club, but the police search fails to unearth the weapon. Again, showing how Roald Dahl successfully inserted the gender criticism elements, where the men are beaten by a woman as the men are unable to find the evidence hidden by the woman. Meanwhile it is getting late, the policemen are tired and hungry, and so Mrs. Maloney invites her husband‟s friends to dine with her, so that the dinner will not be wasted. Though at first embarrassed, the policemen finally conquered by tiredness and hunger thereby, not aware of the full facts, destroyed the evidence of the murder weapon. They will leave the house that night without arresting the guilty but clever Mrs. Maloney. Using the theme of Dark humor, Roald Dahl has put the gender criticism elements into the story, by showing that women are better than men. Mary Maloney fooled the police by asking them to eat the evidence and get away from being caught. 3.0. CONCLUSION Dahl has produced a story which is characterized by his usual black humor. He tells the tale of a traditional woman who is happily brought her husband under control. However, when the husband announces that he wants a divorce, the woman rightly feels betrayed for she has sacrificed her entire life for him. He then created the story line where the woman killed her husband and persuaded the readers to be on the woman‟s side. Thus when the wife kills her husband, the readers still supporting the woman for it was not a murder, but symbolically justice, implementing gender criticism into the story.

(1500 words)

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4.0. REFERENCES 1) Dahl R. ( 1961/1979) “Lamb to the Slaughter”, in Tales of the Unexpected. Harmondsworth, Penguin. 2)critical approaches to literature. (n.d.). Retrieved March 30, 2012, from charles youngs: http://www.charlesyoungs.com/english12honors/criticalapproachestoliterature.html 3)GENDER CRITICISM. (n.d.). Retrieved April 1, 2012, from http://faculty.mckendree.edu: http://faculty.mckendree.edu/brenda_boudreau/English%20290/gender_criticism.htm 4)Henfridsson, H. (2008). A thematic of Dahl's Adult Fiction. Lamb to the Slaughter , 11-16. 5)Lombardi, E. (2012). Literature. Retrieved March 28, 2012, from Classic Literature: http://classiclit.about.com/od/literaryterms/g/aa_whatisliter.htm

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