61 pages • 2 hours read
Sarah J. MaasA Court of Mist and Fury
Fiction | Novel | YA | Published in 2016A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Summary
Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Character Analysis
Themes
Symbols & Motifs
Important Quotes
Essay Topics
Book Club Questions
Symbols & Motifs
Feyre’s Tattoo
When Rhys makes the bargain with Feyre Under the Mountain, the process leaves a mark: a blue-black tattoo on her left arm with an eye on the palm of her hand. Initially, Feyre sees the bond as a necessary sacrifice to save the lives of Tamlin and his court. As her relationship with Rhys grows more intimate, however, the bond—and its visual signifier, the tattoo—take on a deeper meaning. As she and Rhys share their thoughts and fears telepathically, the eye symbolizes their ability to see into each other’s minds, and their willingness to stand naked (physically and emotionally) before one another. When the King of Hybern breaks the bond, the tattoo shrinks. The king has broken the visitation contract, but he cannot break the bond of mating, a connection deeper than any magic. Rhys has become physically imprinted on Feyre, a symbol of their inextricable natures.
The Color Red
Feyre frequently paints in red or imagines red in her art. Red represents anger, courage, love, and war—the common thread of which is passion. Feyre is at her lowest ebb when she cannot express that passion, when Tamlin keeps her sequestered in his manor. A fire burns inside her—her dormant faerie power—and its only outlet is physical expression, be it painting, sex, or battle. Maas connects the visceral nature of Feyre’s connection to the color red with other female characters in the novel as well. Red is also the color of blood, a symbol of life and vitality. In the Illyrian culture, menstruation is the time at which a female must be controlled and subjugated because that blood is the symbol of a female’s divine power, the power of creation. When Mor menstruates for the first time, a great wave of power is unleashed. That power, however, is not a demonstration of her value as a warrior or member of her clan but rather of her value as marriage material. Mor refuses that stigma and carves out her own destiny, despite the consequences.
The Subversion of the Male Gaze
The male gaze refers to the stereotypical sexual objectification of women by men; Maas subverts this gender dynamic frequently in the novel by portraying female characters as sexually empowered. The narrative is told in first person from the perspective of Feyre sumptuously appraises nearly every male character’s physical attributes. Men are described as “beautiful” or “handsome”; she swoons at Rhys’s rippling musculature and his generous wingspan (often used as innuendo. Cassian and Azriel, though brutish, exude an almost feral sexuality. The effect of this focus on masculine physical beauty is to create a reality in which males’ other functions as warriors or rulers are secondary to the arousal they generate in their female companions, inverting patriarchal gender dynamics and empowering Maas’s female characters as sexual beings in their own right. Maas’s emphasis on female pleasure is common in romance stories, and Maas both reinforces and subverts traditional straight motifs of the genre. Feyre enjoys playing a submissive role in the Hewn City with Rhys, yet she tops Rhys when they are sexually intimate in Chapter 55, a reversal of the power dynamic of their foreplay.
Related Titles
By Sarah J. Maas
