Published 1991 / Length 232 pages
‘What a joy it is to dance and sing.’
Wise Children is a bawdy carnival of a novel narrated by Dora Chance, looking back over her ribald and sometimes ramshackle seventy-five years. Dora and her twin sister Nora are illegitimate offshoots of a sprawling theatrical dynasty, ‘song-and-dance girls’ who plied their trade on the stage – and once, ill-fatedly, on screen – throughout the twentieth century, having been born as the Zeppelins’ bombs fell on London during the First World War. Carter explores themes of memory, paternity and legitimacy throughout: the Hazard clan is peppered with twins, disputed or dubious heredity, and multiple marriages of Shakespearean complexity. It’s a joyous romp of a story, glittering with earthy humour and garlanded with a playful linguistic virtuosity. There are elements of magical realism to the plot, but such is the power of Dora’s stardust-sprinkled tale, it is easy to suspend all disbelief and let it sweep you away, trailing paper moons, costume jewellery and greasepaint.
‘Carter’s insistent aim is to show how thoroughly the legitimate and illegitimate worlds are entangled, and in a country whose cultural life continues to be crippled by false distinction between “high” and “low”, this is an important subject.’ – The Guardian
• ‘A father is a moveable feast’: how does the novel explore the nature of paternity and, at times, incest? Are there any adequate fathers in the book?
• How well do you feel the roles of hazard, chance and coincidence are handled?
• What does the book communicate about memory and ageing – both gracefully and disgracefully?
• Who do you think is most likely to be the mother of Dora and Nora?
• How does Dora’s narrative convey the changing face of London, and the world, over the course of the twentieth century?
• Wise Children was Angela Carter’s eleventh and last novel, and this may inform its retrospective theme. It has also been suggested that she began writing it after having been diagnosed with cancer.
• Melchior and Peregrine have been seen as representative of the comic and tragic faces of theatre.
• In an interview about Wise Children in New Writing (1992), Angela Carter said: ‘[I wanted] to have a transparent prose that just ran, I wanted it to be very funny, and at the same time I wanted the complex ideas about paternity and the idea of Shakespeare as a cultural ideology.’
• Nights at the Circus by ANGELA CARTER – another earthy theatrical saga steeped in magical realism.
• The Passion by JEANETTE WINTERSON – gorgeous Venetian fantasy with fairy-tale elements.
• A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Hamlet, A Comedy of Errors and King Lear, among others, by WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE – Wise Children includes numerous Shakespearean parallels.