ABSTRACT
Reading the body as text is one of the most fundamental literacies in which we engage. Reading the body as object its size, shape, the cultural significance of the body as a thing is an automatic response, but it is also naturally a very subjectively determined evaluation. This chapter examines how the interaction between the two in turn mirrors interactions of minds with bodies. It examines Helen Dunmore's Talking to the Dead and Angela Carter's The Magic Toyshop represented bodies within the texts are necessary catalysts for readers' interpretations of those texts beyond their obvious surface narratives. In Helen Dunmore's Talking to the Dead, two sisters, Nina and Isabel, are characterized through their relationships with food perhaps more than any of the female characters. The novel's prologue indicates that the narrative to follow is Nina's: Isabel is dead, and the tale to come will be explanatory and will lead readers to an understanding of the.
