Yes -- it wasn't clear to me that it could have been meant this way. ThanksOriginally Posted by blp
Yes -- it wasn't clear to me that it could have been meant this way. Thanks
Life is either a daring adventure or nothing.
To keep our faces toward change and behave like free spirits
in the presence of fate is strength undefeatable.”
Helen Keller
The thread starter meant a female protagonist who is also a bodybuilderYes -- it wasn't clear to me that it could have been meant this way. Thanks
Really?
Haven't thought of it like this .
Mmm. Well there's a surprise.The thread starter meant a female protagonist who is also a bodybuilder
Million Dollar Baby?
The first one I thought of is Helen Graham The Tenant of Wildfell Hall , by Anne Bronte.
I believe she is a strong character, though she doesn't triumph. She does what she can to survive, to achieve what she believes is her place in society through the means she has learned are the appropiate means to do so; she makes mistakes. She's human, but not weak. Like all tragic heros, she realizes her mistakes at the end. She's a wonderful character.
Last edited by myrna22; 02-17-2010 at 04:15 AM.
The answers you get from literature depend upon the questions you pose.
- Margaret Atwood
Yes, it very much depends on this. A strong character, male or female, may not be one who triumphs. For example, both Hamlet and Macbeth do not triumph. Would anyone say these are not strong male characters? Is Willy Loman in DEATH OF A SALESMAN a weak character?
Last edited by myrna22; 02-17-2010 at 04:16 AM.
The answers you get from literature depend upon the questions you pose.
- Margaret Atwood
All female characters by Nicci French.
Also, Jane Eyre, Elizabeth Bennet in "Pride and Prejudice", and Anna Karenina
Oooo, oooo! And Beatrice from Much Ado About Nothing!!Oh, how can we forget Portia from Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice and Viola from Twelfth Night. Both are very strong characters concerning that Shakespeare belonged to a patriarchal age.
Bathsheba Everdene and Jane Eyre both have strong characters. Helen Graham in The Tenant of Wildfell Hall also has a great moral power like Tess to face the evils of the world.
Well! Let's throw in Catherine the younger and Nellie from Wuthering Heights too then.
One has to laugh before being happy, because otherwise one risks to die before having laughed.
"Je crains [...] que l'âme ne se vide à ces passe-temps vains, et que le fin du fin ne soit la fin des fins." (Edmond Rostand, Cyrano de Bergerac, Acte III, Scène VII)
I disagree
Anna Karenina committed suicide .
Maggie Tuliver from The Mill on the Floss was considered inspirational in her time.
If you want an early example of a strong lead woman how about the play The Roaring Girl by Thomas Middleton and Thomas Decker
What are regrets? Just lessons we haven't learned yet - Beth Orton
Agreed. It would have been so easy for her to have behaved as everyone else in her society did, and carried through the half-hearted attempts to marry a rich husband. She also withheld the letters which could have helped her out of her desperate situation earlier. She tried to survive by working her way out of her troubles, albeit a futile attempt, but she did not resort to behaving like Bertha, or betraying her when it would have been so easy to do.
This was my thought as I was reading through the first string of answers.
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