Carmen, the archetype of demon woman

eroticism and representation of the women in literature

Abstract

 In this research, I discuss the ways of representing women in relation to the theories of eroticism founded by Octávio Paz and Georges Bataille from the study of the archetype of the demon woman expressed in the character Carmen, originally from the homonymous novel by Prosper Mérimée, but which gained recognition from the opera, also homonymous, by Georges Bizet, beco­ming a world-renowned literary myth as a result of its numerous adaptations, especially for the cinema. Among the various female characters who embody the archetype of the demon woman, Carmen is one of the most notable repre­sentations of femme fatale. Regarding the character, it is possible to say that, both in literature and in its various adaptations, what is preserved in Carmen is the strength of her sensuality driven by the erotic charge present in her nature. Carmen is dressed in eroticism, mainly because she represents one of the stron­gest incarnations of the myth of the demon woman. It is precisely this form of abundant representation of the demonic woman that interests me in this study, as I believe that the permanence of this form of representation of the character is a reflection of an ideology that has been repeated over time in Western culture, and which guarantees the maintenance of the power relations in patriarchy My objective is to verify the predominance of a specific male thought about eroticism and about women, which tends to place women as an erotic object, therefore, I base my discussion based on feminist and gender studies supported by theorists such as Judith Butler and Lisa Jardine, among others.