"The Courtship of Mr. Lyon" Portrays a Journey through Manhood

I have read Angela Carter before, but I have never looked at Mr. Lyon the way we looked at him in class. The idea of otherness was accurate in describing the difference between masculinity and femininity. So many constructions of our time, race, gender, and sexuality are based on those who think in otherness-terminology. While these constructions create problems, especially when it comes to race and nationality, I cannot help but believe in "otherness". Women and men are different in genetics, bodies, and facial structures, and this difference creates a sense of otherness between each sex, which fits perfectly into this story of Beauty and the Beast. In the Courtship of Mr. Lyon by Angela Carter, we have the presentation of men as a beastly, hairy, clawed lion--bringing to light the growing of men by showing adolescent, fierce, and scary aggression. Boys have always been portrayed as aggressive, tempormental, and having two brothers I will have to agree with that description. For they are hairy and moody, and as a girl i would look at other boys in my class and see the same difference between us, that their otherness was based on their beastliness. Yet at the end of Mr. Lyon, the beast sheds into a man, portraying him shedding his violent potential and containing his aggression. I have never looked at Beauty and the Beast, or the Courtship of Mr. Lyon, as a story of growing up, maturation, and a portrayal of the journey into manhood.