The Horror of Silence: Exploring Gender-Violence Against Men in Daphne du Maurier’s Short Stories

European Institute of Gender Equality states that “both women and men experience gender-based violence but the majority of victims are women and girls”. This disproportionate focus on women as victims of gender-based violence has tended to marginalise or overlook men who suffer gender-based violence at the hands of women. This problem is compounded by patriarchal stereotypes of masculinity and machismo which deny men the space to address or even acknowledge their victimhood. My paper will address this issue by analysing how two of Daphne du Maurier’s short stories “Kiss Me Again Stranger” and “The Apple Tree” explore how adherence to gender stereotypes make men vulnerable to or the victim of gender-based violence. In “Kiss Me Again Stranger” a petite, young orphan lures RAF personnel with her feminine charm only to murder them. And the young men fall into her trap because their stereotypical ideas about gender blindsight them to the fact that a woman can be a serial killer. The “The Apple Tree” deals with psychological violence perpetrated by a wife on her husband. Portraying herself as a martyr by skillfully exploiting feminine gender stereotypes of sacrifice and service only to make her husband feel guilty. Unable to criticise her openly for fulfilling her gender roles the husband remains entrapped in a psychological hell of frustration. Even after the wife’s death the psychological violence continues when the husband is haunted by a shrivelled apple tree in the garden which he imagines to be his wife. My paper will thus explore how du Maurier creates a dark, Gothic atmosphere in these short stories to explore the horror of unaddressed gender violence perpetrated against men.

Keywords: Men, Masculinity, Violence, Daphne du Maurier