Zero to Hero? Disabled People in Literature

I have chosen the primary texts, A Christmas Carol (1843) by Charles Dickens Brave New World (1932) by Aldous Huxley and The Passion Of New Eve (1977) by Angela Carter as representative of influential writers of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.

This dissertation will examine literature and how novelists in their writing, have been influenced by their social environment from the early nineteenth until the late twentieth centuries with regard to the representation of people with disabilities. It will demonstrate that the writing of Thomas Robert Malthus have been reflected in the work of prominent novelists such as Charles Dickens and Aldous Huxley. The influence of Charles Darwin and Sir Francis Galton on later writers, Aldous Huxley and Angela Carter for example, will be discussed.

Colin Barnes informs us, "twelve percent of Britain"s population are disabled people….Disablism in the media is no longer simply morally and socially reprehensible it is economically inept.' (Barnes, 1992, 39). Since such a large percentage of our population has impairments, Barnes is stating that they have the potential to become a powerful lobby, politically and economically. However, as Barnes says, "Disabling stereotypes which medicalise, patronise, criminalise and dehumanise disabled people abound in books." (Barnes, 1992, 38). According to Dr David Bolt in a paper delivered at Keele University "Literature informs and is informed by society" (Bolt, 2004:1).

Of particular importance are the eugenics movement and the Nazi "euthanasia" murders of thousands of disabled people. Both affected their social environments and the Nazi murders effected a radical change in the view of eugenical ideals. The role of Tiny Tim and Ebenezer Scrooge will be examined as symbols of the social ills of Dickens' time and his attack on proposals by the social economist, Thomas Malthus.

The birth of eugenics will be discussed and the interest shown by writers of the day; H.G. Wells, George Bernard Shaw and Benjamin Kidd for example. The popularity of eugenics and its political ramifications will be explored as the attitudes of modernist writers are demonstrated in the various extracts from diaries and letters written by Virginia Woolf and D.H. Lawrence.

Aldous Huxley's Brave New World will be examined next with regard to the influences of Malthus and Galton. The Nazis' keen interest in the theory of eugenics as practiced in the USA and other European countries culminating in Hitler's attempt to establish a "master-race" is to be examined. The Holocaust's beginnings with the so-called "euthanasia" killings of thousands of mentally and physically disabled people are especially important as it marks a turning point in global attitudes towards eugenical ideals.

Angela Carter's post modern novel The Passion Of New Eve will be the final novel to be studied since it also warns of the dangers of genetic manipulation. It also contains satirical overtones and it would appear, at first glance, that Carter has been particularly harsh in her portrayal of the disabled character, Zero. I will demonstrate that Carter uses Zero in juxtaposition to Eve to design the story to be read at different levels.

In other words the representation of the characters as metaphors or symbols can be interpreted in more than one way.

I believe this discussion of disabled people's representation in literature is important because, although many novels have been re-read to critique their sexist or racist aspects, comparatively little research has been carried out by disablist critics.

It is difficult to interpret every writer's portrayal of a disabled character. This dissertation will demonstrate there is the possibility that some writers use the disability of their characters as a criticism of society's attitudes towards disabled people.

Discrimination against disabled people takes many forms and is not always easy to detect but may be comparable to racism. In "A Thousand Plateaus" we read,

From the viewpoint of racism there is no exterior, there are no people on the outside. There are only people who should be like us and whose only crime it is not to be' (DeLeuze and Guattari, 2003: 178)

This interpretation of racism could be applied to "disablism" a term explained by Colin Barnes, "”Disablism” ... refers to prejudice, stereotyping or “institutional discrimination” against disabled people."(Barnes, 1992, 42). People with disabilities are the "people who should be like us" as DeLeuze and Guattari comment and as they also assert, "Racism operates by the determination of degrees of deviance in relation to the White-Man face." (DeLeuze and Guattari, 2003: 178). In other words, the "White-Man" face is perceived to be the norm and people from other ethnic groups are discriminated against according to the extent to which they differ from the norm.

Disablism operates in a similar way to racism as perceived by DeLeuze and Guattari. That is to say, a non-disabled person is the "White-Man face" or the norm and the severity of a person's disability decides how far from the norm that person is and the extent of discrimination against that person.