The Bloody Chamber and Other Stories
The most representative entry point to Carter's feminist reworkings of fairy tales and her richly Gothic short fiction.
Author guide
Angela Carter Books in Order
Angela Carter was an English writer known for feminist, Gothic, magical-realist, and picaresque fiction. Her work reimagined fairy tales, myths, pornography, and popular culture through exuberant prose and sustained challenges to conventional gender roles. She wrote nine novels, short-fiction collections, poetry, children's books, essays and journalism, radio plays, screenplays, and other dramatic works.
novelsshort storiespoetryessaysjournalismdramachildren's literaturegraphic works
Catalog record updated .
Not sure where to begin?
Start with one of these
Nights at the Circus
A major, exuberant novel that brings together Carter's interests in feminism, fantasy, performance, and myth.
Outside the series
Bibliography by category
Novels (10)
- Shadow Dance
novel · 1966
The scar drew her whole face sideways and even in profile, with the hideous thing turned away, her face was horribly lop-sided, skin, features and all, dragged away from the bone. She was a beautiful girl, a white and golden girl, like…
- The Magic Toyshop
novel · 1967
In this, her second novel, (awarded the 1967 John Llewellyn Rhys Prize) Angela Carter's brilliant imagination and starting intensity of style explore and extend the nature and boundaries of love.
- Several Perceptions
novel · 1968
- Heroes and Villains
novel · 1969
Sharp-eyed Marianne lives in a white tower made of steel and concrete with her father and the other Professors. Outside, where the land is thickly wooded and wild beasts roam, live the Barbarians, who raid and pillage in order to survive.…
- Love
novel · 1971
- The Infernal Desire Machines of Doctor Hoffman
novel · 1972
The transformation of Desiderio's city into a mysterious kingdom is instantaneous: Hallucination flows with magical speed in every brain; avenues and plazas are suddenly as fertile as fairy-book forests. And the evil comes, too, as…
- The Passion of New Eve
novel · 1977
The Passion of New Eve is a novel by Angela Carter, first published in 1977. The book is set in a dystopian United States where civil war has broken out between different political, racial and gendered groups. A dark satire, the book…
- The Sadeian Woman: An Exercise in Cultural History
nonfiction · 1979
- Nights at the Circus
novel · 1984
American journalist Jack Walser travels with an enchanted circus that features literate chimpanzees, tragic clowns, idealist brigands, a structuralist Siberian shaman, and a six-foot, two-inch blond aerialist who is part swan and part woman
- Wise Children
novel · 1991
In their heyday on the vaudeville stages of the early twentieth century, Dora Chance and her twin sister, Nora -- unacknowledged the daughters of Sir Melchior Hazard, the greatest Shakespearean actor of his day -- were known as the Lucky…
Short fiction (4)
- Fireworks: Nine Profane Pieces
short_story_collection · 1974
In the short fiction of Angela Carter, the landmarks of reality disappear and give way to a landscape of riotous and uncensored sensibility. The city of Tokyo turns into a mirrored chamber reflecting the impossible longings of an exiled…
- The Bloody Chamber and Other Stories
short_story_collection · 1979
From the liars of the fantastical and fabular and from the domains of the unconscious's mysteries. . . lie the brides in the Bloody Chamber - hunts unwillingly the Queen of the Vampires - slips Red Riding Hood into the arms of the Wolf -…
- Black Venus
short_story_collection · 1985
- American Ghosts and Old World Wonders
short_story_collection · 1993
Essays and speeches (3)
- Nothing Sacred: Selected Writings
essay_collection · 1982
- Expletives Deleted: Selected Writings
essay_collection · 1992
- Shaking a Leg: Collected Journalism and Writings
essay_collection · 1997
"An electrifying intellectual autobiography, with all the narrative expanse, drama, outrage, and high comedy of the author’s fiction. Angela Carter is revealed here, anew, as one of the most important thinkers of twentieth-century world…
Children's books (6)
- Martin Leman's Comic and Curious Cats
children's_book · 1979
- The Music People
children's_book · 1980
- Moonshadow
children's_book · 1982
- Sea-Cat and Dragon King
children's_book · 2000
The underwater cat known as Sea-Cat experiences a conflict with Dragon King when they quarrel over who will own the beautiful catsuit made by Sea-Cat's mother.
- The Donkey Prince
children's_book · 1970
- Miss Z, the Dark Young Lady
children's_book · 1970
Poetry (1)
- Unicorn
poetry_collection · 1966
Plays (2)
- Come Unto These Yellow Sands: Four Radio Plays
drama_collection · 1985
- The Curious Room: Plays, Film Scripts and an Opera
drama_collection · 1996
Other (1)
- Black Venus's Tale
graphic_work · 1980
Frequently asked questions about Angela Carter
What kind of writer was Angela Carter?
Angela Carter (1940–1992) was an English novelist, short-story writer, poet, essayist, journalist, dramatist, and children’s author. She became especially known for feminist, Gothic, and fantastical writing that challenged conventional gender roles.
Sources: usa.angelacarter.co.uk (opens in a new tab)britishlibrary.cn (opens in a new tab)
Where was Angela Carter born and educated?
She was born in Sussex in 1940 and studied English at the University of Bristol.
What influenced Angela Carter’s writing?
Her influences included Gothic fantasy, traditional fairy tales, Shakespeare, music hall, Surrealism, and cinema. She also drew on myths and popular culture to recast familiar stories and question established ideas about gender.
Sources: britishlibrary.cn (opens in a new tab)theguardian.com (opens in a new tab)
Which awards did Angela Carter win?
She won the John Llewelyn Rhys Memorial Prize, the Somerset Maugham Award, the Cheltenham Festival of Literature Award, and the James Tait Black Memorial Prize.
Why is Angela Carter still influential?
Her feminist reworkings of fairy tales helped renew interest in supernatural and other disregarded genres, while her writing remains important in literary, gender, and cultural studies. The British Library preserves her manuscripts, notebooks, and research papers, underscoring her continuing scholarly legacy.
Sources: theguardian.com (opens in a new tab)bl.uk (opens in a new tab)