Title: Mrs. Caliban
Author: Rachel Ingalls
Date of First Publication: 1982
Place of Publication: Faber and Faber
Type: Novel
Characters: No Character
Themes: QUEER; RACE/POLITICS; SYMPATHETIC MONSTER; WOMEN WRITING MONSTERS
Critical Summary: Set in 1950s California, Mrs. Caliban follows Dorothy, a dissatisfied housewife married to an adulterous husband. Dorothy’s life changes when a fish-man, having escaped from a torturous research facility, sneaks into her home. The monster’s name is Larry, a name given to him by the scientists at the research facility. Dorothy decides to take care of him, and they quickly form a bond. Soon, their relationship gets physical, and Dorothy begins her own affair with this fish-man. She and Larry make trips to the beach at night to swim and make love, as well as plan for Larry’s eventual return to his underwater home in the Gulf of Mexico. Larry, however, becomes restless and begins to make trips out on his own. On one such trip, Larry runs into a group of teenagers who begin assaulting him. Larry kills them, heightening tensions and pressuring Dorothy to get Larry to his home sooner.
Larry, like Frankenstein’s creature, is tragic because he is tortured and misunderstood. They both kill several humans, though Larry’s murders are acts of self-defense. Prior to his meeting Dorothy, he kills the scientists who are performing painful experiments on him at the research facility. Towards the end of the novel, he kills a group of teenagers who are assaulting him. Larry’s plight has strong parallels to that of real life minorities. He is unable to associate with humans (aside from Dorothy) because of his appearance and the wildly different social customs of his species. He is treated like an object, rather than as a living thing with a unique perspective. One of Dorothy’s initial plans to help Larry is actually to make a legal defense for him on the basis of discrimination. This novel depicts a “queer” relationship in that Larry is not a typical lover. He is an Other, an outsider, and Dorothy’s relationship with him is anything but typical. Like Frankenstein, this novel presents a sympathetic monster to the reader. The two characters differ greatly, however, namely in their motivations. Victor Frankenstein’s monster grows into a hateful, scheming, villain, while Larry maintains animal-like instinct, innocently killing in the same way an animal would when provoked.
Administrative Notes: Aron Miller, CSUF; Alexis Shanley, CSUF (Editing)