The Serpent Within : How the Angel/Monster Dichotomy Constructs Madness in the Women of Dorothy Parker’s Stories

Abstract: This essay aims to prove the thesis claim “the female characters in Dorothy Parker’s stories are portrayed as mad because they are women navigating an ideal that is impossible to fulfil. The essay also aims to show the advantages of using a critical reading of Parker’s stories in a classroom. This is done by doing a critical reading of five of Parker’s stories as well as through theories on women and madness and the process of othering by Phyllis Chesler, Luce Irigaray and Simone De Beauvoir while analyzing quotes from five of Parker’s short stories. The essay concludes that the thesis claim is proven correct, the female characters in Parker’s stories are perceived as mad because they are women and that it is prudent to use Parker’s stories in a teaching environment.