Sandys Narrativization of Miss Brodie and the Narrators Collusion: The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie as an Anti-Fascist Text

Abstract

This paper attempts to read Muriel Sparks The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie as an anti-fascist narrative that reveals the consequences of abusing authority while at the same time exposing the desires and participation of the fascist follower. Spark maintains an ironic distance between herself and the novels narrative voice; the highly problematic morality of the narrator betrays his/her collusion with Sandy Strangers objectification of Jean Brodie as an emblem of fascist authority. Reading the narrators narrative techniques to aid and abet Sandys gaze as authorial irony exposes fascist strategies of representation and narrative that the fascist follower deploys in order to secure the position of the powerless victim and thus occlude his own active participation within the fascist community.