The female heroic figure in Fight Club

quest may include call to adventure and leaving community behind; crossing of the threshold into the underworld; finding helpers and prophets; tests and ordeals; recovery of the boon or treasure; possible marriage, atonement with father figure, or apotheosis; victorious return to community
hero has exceptional attributes, often aristocratic,; innate abilities such as stamina, intellect, physical prowess (think Luke Skywalker)

Toole sets up boxing as heroic endeavour:
dangerous (2), intellectual as well as physical demanding, requiring ‘science and heart’ (5), it’s about getting respect (7-8) (note that the film script version is “getting respect and taking it away from someone else”) , not instinctual
quest also operated on personal level as Maggie seeks to overcome obstacles of birth and geography, to rise above her poverty and ignorance; succeed despite lack of support from her family; obtaining an identity – Frankie wants Maggie to be “somebody”
Maggie’s entry into the Hit Pit is like the descent into the underworld – go “down a flight of twenty steps” into a hot, steamy room, “close to one hundred degrees” (62) – suggests Hades
Maggie finds helpers: Frankie teaches her the rules (65); Scrap is the one-eyed prophet (Note that his character is imported from another story in the book)
she has the natural attributes of the fighter/hero, both physically and mentally: “Long arms and a short body, perfect for a fighter” (70) and ““Just right, Frankie thought, tall and rangy for her weight, with the reach and power” (75); also able to make a four year commitment, fight beyond endurance; heart of warrior and Frankie “ loved warriors” (62)
tested through ordeals of training:

“She worked so hard he wished his boys worked the same way. He tested her power and stamina by taking her round after round on the punch mitts. He went with her to make sure she ran right. He taught her the correct stance….” (74)

Danger and Shawrelle work as foils; Danger has heart, but no ability; Shawrelle has ability, but no heart; their inadequacies point up Maggie’s exceptional qualities
goal, the ‘holy Grail,’ is the winning purse, but also respect; Maggie makes money – purses of $50,000 and $100,000
we’re told that Maggie’s tragic flaw is that she forgets Frankie’s mantra to “always protect yourself”

revisionist elements:

instead of woman as object of the gaze or goal of the quest, woman is heroic, active, independent
Maggie is doubly marginalized in the gym – she’s Caucasian and female; must also fight against sexual stereotypes. Frankie “don’t train girls” (64).
Frankie’s reasons:

-“didn’t like seeing women get hit…went against everything he believed in (65).

-“Scheduling fights around periods”, “bruised tits”, “miscarriage”

-she might cry

-“he couldn’t cuss”

-boxing doesn’t conform to Frankie’s idea of feminine behaviour: “half of them [women boxers] are degenerates wearing purple jockey shorts and talking feminist bullshit….” (66)

-women fighters are lesbians (66)

- “I’d have to change too much. And I only got so much gas in my tank, see?” (66)

-Maggie is too old

-female boxing fights are a freak show

-there is no money in women’s boxing matches (and thus no money for the trainer

atonement with family comes not in reconciliation with her family, but in Maggie’s ability to walk away from their dependency upon her
at some point, her abilities transcend gender:

“A gym rat called up to boy. “Hey, man! You gonna let a girl beat you?”

Frankie said, “that ain’t a girl, that’s a fighter”” (76)

but traditional heroic ending is thwarted by Maggie’s permanent injury; instead of triumphant return to community, Maggie is “humiliated every day of her life” (36) in the hospital; given time given to plot elements of demonstration f her prowess, we are shocked by her incapacitation
anti-feminist ending
Boxing is the only remaining, socially sanctioned form of violence exclusive to men
aggression is traditionally seen as exclusive domain of men; women who are aggressive are ‘bitches’
Gilbert and Gubar – in 19^th century novels, women who step outside bounds of sanctioned behaviour are banished to the attic, driven mad
Similarly, Maggie must be ‘punished’ for her transgression of gender norms in the 20^th century
Punishment comes from another woman, Astrakov, the Blue Bear

“Astrakov was a big-busted, masculine looking Russian girl living in Hamburg, who grew a faint moustache and dated fashion models. A former Moscow prostitute, she paraded herself in white tuxedos ad lavender ties…. Considered the dirtiest fighter in the female ranks, she was known to head-butt and throw elbows….Her favourite trick was to get inside and jam the palm of her glove into her opponent’s nose, breaking it. That she might kill them didn’t worry her. She promised to knockMaggie out.

“After I vip [sic] her,” she said at the weight-in, grinning and winking at Maggie, “I take her to my room. On a leash” (80).

Astrakov breaks several of Frankie’s rules – she is a curiosity in her outrageous dress, she’s masculine in looks and behaviour, she’s interested in domination, not sport
Astrakov is also woman and aggressive
When the purse for Maggie, the challenger, is more than for the champ, Astrakov takes it personally.: “The champ was outraged that she got the short end and vowed revenge for the insult” (80).
Boxing is shown to be unsuitable for women not because they are incompetent boxers but because

1) women are too emotional and take things personally; ‘they get angry’

2) they’ll get seriously hurt

3) only way you can win is to sacrifice your femininity and morality

Maggie’s punishment is so thorough that any independence she won from her family or in economic or gender terms is totally undermined
can’t even die without help
suggests that the real tragic flaw is that she dared to think that a woman could take on the heroic role reserved for men
nature of Astrakov as villain points up the story/film’s real concerns: she is a mannish, aggressive, lesbian who plays dirty and may be into S&M. Ergo: ‘real’ girls don’t fight
story/film allows a communal consideration of the possibility of female aggression, which we are then forced to reject as too dangerous, ostensibly to the female participants; this approach hides the underlying concern which is that female aggression is a threat to traditional gender roles
it is clear that if Frankie hadn’t broken with convention and trained a girl, he wouldn’t have to make such a difficult decision in the hospital
story/film is a great deal more traditional than it seems at first glance

Film elements of consideration:

we are trained to watch the placement of the stool; the camera focuses on it in every fight so that when the stool is in the wrong place in the “big” fight, we anticipate the tragic fall and tension is created; lest we miss the significance, Maggie’s fall is filmed in slow motion
muscled, female boxers are visually contrasted with the hyper- female score keepers in short shorts and high heels; comparison points up the deviation of the boxers from the female ‘norm’; contrast is never verbalized, but we are shown the dichotomy between active and passive, fighters and objects, sexless-mannish and sexy-desirable
contrast between Astrakov and Maggie in the final fight has elements of a Western gunfight; Maggie is dressed exclusively in white, clingy attire that makes her appear flimsy; Astrakov initially appears hooded looking like Darth Vader with what appears to be a 5’o’clock shadow; her hair is severely braided giving her a mannish look, her skin is dark, her robe is dark (How are we to see race in the film given the ‘darkness’ of the Astrakov, the villain?)
music in the film is melancholy Spanish guitar, suggesting isolation, loneliness, anxiety of an unknown situation – elements of cantina scene in a western where white hat stumbles into possibly hostile and foreign situation
lighting – Eastwood uses a lot of shadows; Frankie is partially in darkness while packing his gym bag with the adrenalin; moves completely into shadows as he zips the bag closed suggesting his ‘fall’ into depravity; While the gym rats watch the film together in full light, Scrap watches the film alone in partial darkness; suggestions of tension between aspects of the self
film takes few risks; ending is changed (trainer, not Frankie who fails to move the stool in time; Maggie’s death is more gentle); in many ways conforms to boxing film genre (think Raging Bull, Rocky)
brings up the contentious issue of euthanasiabut without exploring any of the complexities of the issue – the only struggle we see is with Frankie’s decision – Maggie’s real test would come in dealing with a disability
film gives rather narrow definition of self-respect as arising solely from successful competition