{"type":"rich","version":"1.0","title":"Dirty Weekend ","description":"Can violence ever be feminist? Is anger ever useful or productive? How is it that ‘female rage’ has become a TikTok trend?\n\nTW: femicide, sexual harassment, SA, and murder.\n\nKey text:\n\nDirty Weekend by Helen Zahavi (1991)\n\nReferenced texts:\n\nThe Uses of Anger by Audre Lorde (1981)\nAmerican Psycho by Brett Easton Ellis (1991)\nGone Girl by Gillian Flynn (2012)\n\nIn this week’s episode, Alice takes us on a whistle-stop tour of the revenge fantasy genre, with a close reading specifically of Helen Zahavi’s razor-sharp cult-classic, Dirty Weekend. Zahavi’s dark comedy in which protagonist, Bella wakes up one day and realises she’s “had enough”, then embarks on a vicious killing spree of certainly-not-innocent men in Brighton.\n\nPublished in 1991, Zahavi’s dark comedy caused quite the stir — with feminist critics simultaneously lauding and rejecting it for its sardonic tone and (extremely) violent subject matter. The text was frequently critiqued in conjunction with Brett Easton Ellis’ American Psycho — another slasher published in the same year. The girls also explore why it is that one text has been forgotten about whilst the other has gone on to become a cult classic…\n\nThe revenge fantasy genre often ventures far into taboo and ethically grey areas. We do not approach the subject-matter lightly and encourage everyone who chooses to listen to the episode to do so mindfully.\n\nIf you or anyone else has been affected by what we cover in this episode, please consider reaching out to (or supporting) The Survivor’s Trust: https://thesurvivorstrust.org (https://thesurvivorstrust.org/)","author_name":"Out-of-Print","author_url":"https://audioboom.com/channels/5167871-out-of-print","provider_name":"Audioboom","provider_url":"https://audioboom.com","width":480,"height":95,"thumbnail_url":"https://audioboom.com/i/43879629/600x600/c","thumbnail_width":600,"thumbnail_height":600,"html":""}