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C H A P T E R 3 Over His Dead Body Female Murderers, Female Rage, and Western Culture VANESSA F R I E D M A N I stand now where I struck hi m down. The thing is done. Thus have I wrought an d I will not den y it now. That h e might no t escape no r bea t asid e hi s death , a s fishermen cast thei r hug e circling nets, I spread deadly abundance of rich robes, and caught him fast . I struc k hi m twice . I n tw o grea t crie s o f agon y h e buckled a t the knees and fell . When he was down I struck him the third blow, in thanks and reverence to Zeus the lord of dead men underneath the ground. — Aeschylus, Agamemnon Unspeakable femal e rage , whe n enacted , expresse s th e darkest , deepes t secrets o f Wester n patriarcha l order . Th e first though t tha t probabl y comes t o min d whe n peopl e hea r abou t a woma n wh o ha s committe d murder i s that a crime agains t natur e ha s occurred . Tha t is , primarily a crime against her culturally prescribed nature. Somehow, almost nothin g would see m a s horrible o r pervers e a s a woman wh o ca n kill . Women , after all , giv e life—the y ar e no t suppose d t o tak e i t away . Me n kil l frequently i n man y deliberat e way s (i.e . a s soldier s i n war ) an d ou r sensitivities d o no t see m nearl y a s offende d whe n w e encounte r me n who have murdered, unless they have done so in a particularly gruesom e way. However, when confronte d b y a murder o f the so-calle d faire r se x we somehow feel repelled at a much deeper level, as if what has occurre d is not onl y a crime agains t society , but a perversion o f nature , a perver sion of her nature as woman. Western cultur e fear s th e woma n wh o kill s an d he r rag e i n a wa y quite unlik e th e fea r hel d toward s th e mor e commo n mal e murderer . A 6 2 Over His Dead Body 6 3 woman wh o murders , lik e an y woma n wh o step s outsid e he r sociall y sanctioned role , test s society , pushe s agains t no t onl y it s socia l an d political boundaries , but its ideological underpinning s an d substructure . An inquir y int o why a woma n woul d murde r (and , indeed , wh y mor e do not), along with whom the y murder (th e vast majority murde r mates , and occasionally , thei r ow n children) , an d how the y commi t thei r acts , offers a t root an exploration into the political and philosophical relation ship betwee n th e woman , he r act , an d th e culture/societ y i n whic h sh e lives. W e can , o f course , com e u p wit h a numbe r o f socia l theorie s concerning th e natur e o f he r oppression , abuse , economi c status , etc . Often he r murderou s ac t ca n b e see n a s a n understandable , althoug h unacceptable, respons e t o he r situation , especiall y whe n confronte d b y an abusiv e partner . Bu t thes e theorie s provid e onl y th e partia l trut h about her act, and one that I believe conceals a deeper meaning, the rage behind it . The woman who murders the one she loves often expresse s more tha n merely he r acut e distres s wit h he r particula r persona l situation . Al though on e shoul d no t generaliz e t o al l suc h cases , I d o believ e tha t frequently he r crim e i s no t onl y a self-preservativ e act , bu t...

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