70 pages • 2-hour read
The Lamb
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Background
Literary Context: Folklore and Feminist Horror
Lucy Rose joins the ranks of many authors who blend fairy tale/folklore elements (like archetypes, tone, symbols, settings, and plot points) with horror to explore feminist themes. Angela Carter is often considered the pioneer of this genre with The Bloody Chamber and Other Stories, and other notable entries include Eyes, Guts, Throat, Bones by Moira Fowley-Doyle, Bunny by Mona Award, and Follow Me to Ground by Sue Rainsford.
Known informally as “femgore” (feminist gore), the genre uses horror-movie and folklore tropes to address the complex relationship between feminine desire, women’s anxiety about their bodies, and patriarchy. Exploitative tropes like women’s bodies as the site of male violence are inverted so that women are both the perpetrators and victims of gore. In Mona Awad’s Bunny, a clique of young men magically transforms animals into “drafts,” or “darlings,” often males they can court, before the drafts disintegrate, while in Monika Kim’s The Eyes are the Best Part, a teenager dreams of eating the eyes of the man who has supplanted her father.
The horror genre is also used to explore fears around motherhood and childbirth. The feminist horror genre examines the consequences of female rage, which popular culture has traditionally ignored. Fairy tale tropes are fertile ground for expressing female rage and autonomy, with contemporary feminist horror often subverting these well-known stories to make room for resourceful heroines and complex mothers. In The Lamb for instance, Margot puts a spin on the folk trope of the damsel in distress by emerging as the story’s hero.
Geographical Context: The Cumbrian Region of England
The Lamb is set in Cumbria, a ceremonial county (administrative region) adjoining Scotland in northwest England. A largely highland and rural area, the region is home to the Vale of Eden, the valley of the River Eden. The highlands, woods, streams, as well as the Lake District National Park invite many hikers and tourists throughout the year.
Cumbria has a long history of human inhabitation, with waves of settlers, colonizers and migrants, including the Romans in the early centuries of the common era, arriving in the area, often leading to wars between populations. In an interview, author Lucy Rose describes Cumbria, where she grew up, as undergoing a period in history when “it wasn’t claimed by either Scotland or England and thus became a dangerous, almost lawless space, where people could cross the border to commit their misdeeds […] even though a lot of that history is long forgotten […] it’s still felt today in the atmosphere and in the culture” (Davidson, Helena, and Lucy Rose. “The Lamb: Interview with Lucy Rose.” New Writing North, 31 Dec. 2024).
Rose uses the physical isolation, complex past, and rich natural landscape of Cumbria to infuse both wonder and horror in her novel. Margot’s imagination is inspired by local folklore, such as the giants sleeping under the fells, and the abundance of nature around her, from the woods to the River Eden, to the cockle shells at the nearby beach. At the same time, the rural isolation of her life—her bus stop is located in the middle of the woods—shuts her away from society. Thus, Rose uses the Cumbrian landscape to emphasize both the nurturing and savage aspects of nature, a prominent thematic element in the novel.
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