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Women in Fiction: Beauty vs. IntelligenceDaniel Defoe’s Moll Flanders | ||
| Journal of Research Diyala humanity | ||
| Article 1, Volume 0, Issue 30, 2017, Pages 211-248 | ||
| Authors | ||
| ; Munthir A. Sabi | ||
| Abstract | ||
| Beginning with the story of Adam and Eve in the Bible and throughout ensuing fiction, the role of women has been most prominent. William Dean Howells asserts, in his Heroines of Fiction (1901), that the greatness of any piece of fiction depends on the importance of its women, and that realistic fiction succeeded better than any former romance (p. 113) in this respect. This paper’s purpose is to study a series of fascinating women who enlivened the fictional worlds in which they lived, beginning with Defoe’s Moll Flanders, showing the role of these women in their respective stories. It seems that male writers’ emphasis is more on physical beauty than intelligence while in female novelists’ writing the emphasis falls more on intelligence. Despite the fact that writers (especially female ones) find some difficulty, and sometimes fail, in the depiction of a character from the opposite sex, Defoe seems to succeed wonderfully in creating his Moll Flanders; “of all his heroes and heroines Moll Flanders is the most attractive.” (Sutherland, XII) Born in Newgate Prison and bred in poverty, she learns at a very early age what advantage there is to be made out of her dazzling beauty. Putting this to good use, she leads a life of abandonment and pleasure, impelled by her own ambition to be a lady and live like one. Moll Flanders (1722), a tale of prostitution, incest, bigamy, larceny, and lust is, at the same time, a great work of literature. Defoe tells his fascinating story with humour and understanding which leave the reader with the impression that in spite of her sinful life, Moll Flanders is in many ways an adorable and good-hearted woman, and Defoe is “one of her many lovers.” (Sutherland, V) | ||
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