The Theme Of Women In The Chaser By John Collier

In the short story, The Chaser, by John Collier, there are three areas that can be analyzed by using the feminist perspective the idea that women need to be controlled, through being overly attentive and by being jealous. The Chaser tells the story about a man, Alan Austen, who is deeply in love with a woman, Diana. But Diana does not like him at all. Actually, she seems to despise him and this is the main reason for Alan’s search for a man known for his abilities on doing magic potions. After entering the house he finds an old man sitting in a chair. The man seems to know Alan, since he says Alan’s surname and asks him to sit down. The old man is very polite all the time, as a typical businessman interested in money would be. The Chaser …show more content…
How carefully she will look after you. She will never allow you to be tired, to sit in a draught, to neglect your food. If you are an hour late, she will be terrified. She will think you are killed, or that some siren has caught you. When the old man says that Diana won’t neglect Alan and will be so jealous when he’s late he’s saying that she’ll live only for Alan’s purpose and whims, that’s a clearly evidence of a sexist position and a patriarchal ideology which considers man as superior to women. In this case, the patriarchal ideology is evident when the old man says that if Alan cheat on Diana, nothing will happen , he won’t need to worry about Diana’s opinion, once she’ll forgive him. All this sexist opinions from Alan and the old man are considered when we think that Diana would take the potion, but of course, that in real world such a thing doesn’t exist, so this position of them clearly shows their real opinions about women. The obsession and illusion of Alan. He’s obsessed with Diana and is willing to do anything to gain her love, at the same time he’s deluded about the potion the man is trying to sell to him. There are no love in this story, only a self-love of Alan and selfishness of the old man. Alan don’t fight for love, he believes that women should love him anyway. Diana is objectified in Alan’s …show more content…
That’s another patriarchal ideology, economically to be more precisely. The old man sold a drink for a low price, but he knew that Alan would come back and ask for the other drink, because he knew that the first one wouldn’t work, or if it did, the consequences would made Alan back to purchase the drink that could clear the things. There’s no clear evidence of a traditional gender role in the text, that is, there’s no evidence that the characters believe that women are week, emotional and or nurturing, but as they believe that a simple drink would made Diana madly fall in love with Alan, they show a believe in this gender role related to the woman’s submission, because this is no easy, even with a strong potion a person needs to be persuade to drink and the person’s mind need to be willing to believe that something different is happening in its