Representation of Criminal Women Characters in Ruth Rendell's Mystery Fiction

Abstract The present paper is an attempt to analyze the criminal women characters which are represented in the mystery and crime with specific reference in fictional work of the acclaimed British Woman Novelist. Ruth Rendell is known as the second queen of mystery fiction. Rendell uses her mystery literature to illustrate a number of issues. She employs enigma, suspense, crime, and murder in her novels. Even though she was a female novelist, she was just as adept at expressing today's societal themes as male novelists. She often made the Sunday Times bestseller list. Her best-selling books include standalone psychological mysteries, Police Procedure that several of have been successfully adapted for television, and a third series of crime thrillers written under the pen name Barbara Vine. This paper will look into the introduction of author, meaning of crime and its causes. Furthermore, the paper will explore the criminal women characters and the actual cause for committing crimes. Hence, the paper will closely analyze the women characters in two of her novels: To Fear a Painted Devil (1965), and The Bridesmaid (1989). The aim of this paper is to analyze the above-mentioned aspects of her works and argue that the writer manages to depict a large variety of different women of her time who assume different roles in both the society and the plot of her novels. Rendell portrays the most of the women as criminal characters due the cause of their personality disorders. There is an inner and outer resistance which is explored through the tension between the individual and social, the modern, the personal feelings and the duty. The criminal women have been found as the personality disorders. Keywords: Crime, Criminal, factors of Psychological, Sociological, Economical, Biological, personality disorder,