Changing the plot, #2

As I was saying, what makes a good heroine has changed a lot since M.G. Lewis's time. That's why I'm going to be changing the female characters the most -- aspects of their personality as well as what they'll end up doing in the plot.

I'll be doing more detailed character sketches later. For now, here are some basic notes on what about them I want to change.

Matilda vs. Audrey

As I said before, Matilda is perhaps the only truly interesting female character in The Monk. She has disguised herself as a man to get closer to Ambrosio -- showing that she takes initiative in her own life. She also somewhat bizarrely changes from being Ambrosio's lover to helping him abduct and rape Antonia. Bizarre, but interesting.

The first thing that Ambrosio notices about Matilda when she reveals herself to be a woman is that she looks just like a painting of the Virgin Mary that he is fond of (perhaps a bit too fond of). Of course, the irony is that Matilda is actually the devil -- if not Satan himself, then some kind of demon (blame my faulty memory for this ambiguity).

The fact that Matilda is a demon sort of forces me to ignore her awesomeness. She's not a normal woman at all -- she's supernatural. So of course she wouldn't behave like Agnes and Antonia do. It's much more interesting to me before we know about that plot twist. MUCH more interesting.

So the first thing I'm doing with Audrey, my version of Matilda, is that I'm making her 100% human and real. I'm actually going to have Ambrose wonder whether she's some sort of spirit or hallucination, but look a bit foolish for thinking so.

Instead of her behavior being guided by the fact that she's the devil, her behavior will be guided by something else that I haven't quite decided. The most obvious thing would be desire for Ambrose, and envy that he's moved on to someone else. I'm not sure that's the most interesting choice, though. I think Audrey's character sketch is going to be the most important, because there are so many directions I could take her, and I want something really good.

The only thing I'm sure of is that I don't want Audrey to represent the evil force that corrupts Ambrose (and anyone else who ends up a bit corrupted by the end of this novel). That would be boring and a bit too misogynistic for my taste. She is definitely going to be important in the ending, but I'm not sure how.

Thinking about this, I'm reminded of one of my drama teacher's interpretations of Lady Macbeth. Now, traditionally, Lady Macbeth is basically an evil, ambitious sociopath. But one of my drama teachers suggested, based on her monologue where she summons evil forces to help her murder the king, that maybe she's not pure evil -- maybe she's summoning those forces because she needs help.

I like this concept, and I'm going to toy with something similar for Audrey. Maybe Audrey isn't sure she's making the right decisions and ultimately reforms at the end of the novel, or at least decides that no, these aren't the right decisions for her. Maybe she'll be the only one who's allowed to escape in the end.

What she's going to escape I'll get to next time.