PRESENCE: MARGARET THATCHER

#thatcher #margaretthatcher #thatcherism

Margaret Thatcher is one of my deepest fascinations, even if I was born six years after her tenure -- or reign of terror, depending on your point of view -- had ended. Her legacy casts a vast Nosferatu shadow over Britain in nearly every walk of life, the train station, the post office, the prisons, hospitals etc. I've always been fascinated with how people reach for Roald Dahl/ Brothers Grimm analogies when describing this woman, calling her a "witch" or a "wolf" in this caricature of a woman who, while rightly rejecting ever facet of fascism, basically represented the personality of a fascist leader ("The Iron Lady"). So, who better than to anchor Presence in genuine human emotion??!!! As Carrie's mother, she casts much the same "presence" in the book as she does in Britain today, distant, not there physically, haunting everything. In a way, the relationship with Margaret Thatcher is similar to the one with Queen Victoria, this austere, harsh, gothic figure lingering over our austere, harsh gothic land.

Plenty of colonial types saw Queen Victoria as their mother or as a mother archetype. So it's quite right that our young private school environmentalists view Elizabeth Chaplin (The book's Thatcher stand-in) as their own mother, even if they're not quite aware of it. The boys have a complicated relationship, for sure, with Elizabeth Chaplin. So does Carrie. Mrs Chaplin is her mother, for god's sake. So she doesn't have an easy route with fighting Chaplin as well as trying to love her. The book is about that struggle and, to be honest, it never really gets resolved. How can Carrie navigate the liberal and conservative instincts inside herself? In the end, she doesn't.