The Man Under The Mask Analyze The Phantoms Personality

by
Hsu Hei Chung
Ping Jen Senior High School
Class 203

Supervisor
Hui Hsin Cheng

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Analyze The Phantoms Personality

I. Introduction
1. The Story Synopsis
The Phantom of the Opera is a story which combines romance, horror fiction, mystery,
tragedy, comedy, and adventure. Its about a man, the Phantom, named Erik, who has
a devils appearance but an angels voice. He lives underneath the Paris Opera House
with a lonely heart because he was abandoned by his parents with no place to go.
Then, Erik falls in love with the chorus singer named Christine. He patiently teaches
her how to sing and gives a lead role to her. With Eriks help, Christine becomes the
leading lady and makes successful performances.
However, the unforeseen tragedy awaits Christine when she falls in love with the
charms of a handsome man, Raoul, who is Christines childhood sweetheart. Erik is
filled with jealousy because he cant stand Christine loving anyone else except him.
He knows he has to take action so he threatens the opera mangers to follow his
instructions to perform his new opera Don Juan and Christine must play the lead
role. Halfway through the show, the Phantom appears onstage and takes a role in it,
which scares everyone there. While on the stage, Christine unmasks Erik in front of
the audience. Feeling humiliated, betrayed, and furious, Erik kidnaps Christine from
the stage. Raoul then follows them down to the Phantoms secretly lair. Brave as he is,
he unfortunately falls into Eriks trap. Afterwards, Erik requests Christine to make a
decision: one is to have Raoul hung and go away free and the other is to free Raoul
but live with him forever. Christine doesnt choose either of them; instead, she kisses
Erik. Erik is stunned by her gentle kiss, which he never had before. At that moment,
he decides to set both of them free and disappears from the Paris Opera House
mysteriously.

II. Thesis
After reading the story, I am touched and ponder over what leads to the Phantoms
distorted character and miserable love. Under the mask, there are sure to be some
complicated reasons contributing to his misfortune. In this paper, I would like to
analysize the unique personalities of the Phantom and how these personalities bring
about the tragic love under his deformed face.

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Analyze The Phantoms Personality

1. Major Character Analysis

1-1

The Phantom

The Phantom is a genius of music but always wears a mask because of his ugly
appearance. His frightening look scared everyone; whats worse, people even thought
of him as a ghost haunted in the opera house. Joseph says the ghost is tall and he
wears a black evening coat. He has the head of a dead man, with a yellow face and no
nose And no eyes only black holes! (1) However, he found a girl, Christine,
would listen to him and look on him as an angel of the music. He then taught
Christine how to sing behind the mirror and desperately fell in love with her. But
when he found Raouls existence was a threat to him, his desire for the possession of
Christine was getting stronger and stronger.
1-2

Christine

Christine was a miner actress in the Paris Opera House at first. Someday when she
heard a beautiful voice, which sounded like an angels, she recalled the tale her father
had told her. Her father often told her Scandinavian fairy tales and a tale of the
Angel of Music was her favorite.(2) For this, she believed the angels voice was a
gift from her dead father, and thought the mysterious man behind the mirror was an
angel of music. After the Phantoms secret singing lessons, Christine became a
leading actress in the opera.
1-3

Raoul

Raoul is the Phantoms rival in love and is in every aspect different from Erik. He
had blue eyes and black hair, and a wonderful smile. The Chagny family was old and
rich, and many girls in Paris were in love with the young Vicomte.(3) He was born in
a rich, complete family, and owned a handsome appearance. He won Christines love,
which made the Phantom madly jealous of him.
2. Phantoms Personality Analysis
By exploring in depth, we can find there are several underlying reasons that lead to

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Analyze The Phantoms Personality

the Phantoms distorted personalities. It is not difficult to find it is these personalities

that make his love pathetic and wretched.
2-1

Inferiority

In his childhood, nobody wants to get along with him. Adults think he is a devil which
brings bad luck to them. Children tease him and make a fool of him. His shameful
face makes his parents hate him and ignore him. They even ask him to wear a mask
and keep him away. Erik himself laments the fact that his mother was horrified by
his appearance and that his father, a master mason, never saw him.(4) Being deserted
by the whole world, Erik has a strong sense of inferiority, choosing to close his heart
and live alone in the darkness.
Eriks inferiority makes him love Christine in a bizarre way as well. Unlike normal
people, he loves someone in the darkness. He knows well his horrifying appearance
may scare Christine so he hides behind the mirror, pretending to be an angel of music.
2-2

Jealousy

The Phantom sings to Christine as an angel, he teaches her how to sing, and he uses
his beautiful voice to control Christine and make Christine love him. He does
everything to make Christine his own. He begs secretly behind the mirror: Christine,
you must love me!(5) However, Eriks desire of the possession is fiercely growing up
when Christine says she loves Raoul. This result brings Erik into a rage and the
feelings of jealousy are strongly developed in his mind. He is so jealous of the perfect
man, Raoul, who owns everything he wants, especially Christines love.
Erik has closed his heart to the whole world for such a long time and Christine is the
first one he decides to open his heart to. As Yan Li, the Chinese translator of The
Phantom of the Opera, mentioned in his Introduction: it is Christines gentleness and
innocence that make the Phantom have a burning desire for love. (6) Christine
inspires Eriks courage to love someone. However, his jealousy brings about the
tragedy in the end. Obviously, its Christine who saves him from the darkness, but its
Christine who pulls him into a hopeless abyss as well. When he cant accept
Christines love for Raoul, all he can do is destroy his rival, Raoul, with a jealous and
broken heart.
4

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Analyze The Phantoms Personality

2-3

Hatred

With the strong jealousy in mind, Eriks hatred starts to burn like a fire after he finds
Christine dates with Raoul secretly. So he takes Christine away and makes a request
that Christine should marry him. Christine is frightened and refuses his love. He
loves me; he wants me to be his wife!(7) says Christine to Raoul with tears in her
eyes. More than this, the Phantom plans to take revenge to hurt Raoul. Thus, Christine
warns Raoul: He says hes going to kill you.(8)
When Eriks heart is filled with hatred, Christine becomes scared. Her angel of voice
becomes a devil who threatens her and her lover. She no longer admires him but is
frightened of him.
2-4

Desire for True Love

Although the Phantom is cruel, his love for Christine is, without a doubt, sincere and
true. He is desperate for acceptance and for someone who can love him. I love you,
Christine. Marry me, be my wife, and love me.(9) The Phantom says with a pair of
sincere eyes and even with some sorrows which beg for Christines love. Though
Christine doesnt accept his proposal, she walks to the Phantom and gives him a
tender kiss. Erik is shocked, saying That was my first kiss from a woman.(10)
Touched by Christines kiss, he lets go of Christine and Raoul which means he lets
go of his jealousy and hatred as well. His true love for Christine rises above his evil
spirit; his true love makes all the readers leave great sympathy for him.

3. Extremes of Love and Hatred

The Phantoms love is extreme, and so is his hatred. Hes eccentric personality result
from parents negation and the external worlds critique. Parents negation makes him
cowardly and be afraid to communicate with others. He wants to be love but he is
afraid to be hurt. Outside critique, including sneer at his odd-looking appearance also
makes him to lose confidence himself. He is not only wounded but also indignant to
those negative words. So his personality develops to spilt and extreme.

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Analyze The Phantoms Personality

The Phantom uses an extreme way to love Christine because he has never been taught
how to love people and never be loved. He is eager for love so he does lots of things
to make Christine pay attention to him, such as singing for her and making her the
lead role in a performance. However, he thinks the reason Christine doesnt love him
is because of Raouls existence, so he decides to use the most violent way to compel
Christine to marry him by killing Raoul.
Christine also has sentimentally attached to the Phantom. I sang so well on Tuesday
night because him. I am famous because of him. He is my angel of music! And he
says he loves me. How can I leave him? (11) Christine thinks of herself and feels so
sorry to the Phantom. The sentiment between them maybe is not love but a sense of
belonging to each other. The Phantom finds the meaning of subsisting for Christine,
and Christine finds her father had said an angel of musics shadow on the Phantom.

. Conclusion
Most of the people dont identify with the Phantoms thoughts and behaviors. They
may think he is the one who pursues personal desire even at the cost of other peoples
lives. His extreme personalities lead him to tragedy. And it is because of his miserable
childhood experience that makes him who he is.
Erik is never loved by anyone and even never gets love from his parents. He does not
realize friendship, either, not to mention falling in love with a girl. To him,
relationship with other people seems too difficult to establish. What with his terrible
appearance and what with his lack of relationship with others, he leads a distorted life
and loves a girl in a wrong way. This situation is just like the monster in the fiction
Frankenstein. The monster created by Frankenstein looks frightening when it is
created. Soon, it is abandoned because of its horrifying appearance. From this point of
view, it is as poor as the Phantomthey are all abandoned by the world. Moreover,
both the monster and the Phantom strongly desire to be loved. However, they use the
most extreme and terrible way to pursue love. Thats because they have never been
taught how to love a person correctly. People only see their horrible outside and dont
even give them a chance to realize their inside, which may be warn and loving.
My opinion is different from those who prejudice to the Phantom. His desire is so
6

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Analyze The Phantoms Personality

strong that hurts everybody, but thats because he loses so much in which he should
obtain love and need to be loved. Everyone abandons him when he was a child. It will
be how ruthless to a child with an immature and sensitive heart? If people could pay
more attention on his advantage and reduce the critique, maybe the Phantoms
personality wouldnt become so extreme but become more sanguine and moderate.
Reference
1. Jennifer Bassett.(1992). The Phantom of The Opera.Oxford Bookworms, p. 2
2. The Phantom Phantom of the Opera2008/12/23
http://poto.wikia.com/wiki/The_Phantom
3. Jennifer Bassett.(1992). The Phantom of The Opera.Oxford Bookworms, p.8
4. The Phantom Phantom of the Opera2008/12/23
http://poto.wikia.com/wiki/The_Phantom
5. Jennifer Bassett.(1992). The Phantom of The Opera.Oxford Bookworms, p.11
6.() (1993): : 12
7. Jennifer Bassett.(1992). The Phantom of The Opera.Oxford Bookworms, p.24.
8. Jennifer Bassett.(1992). The Phantom of The Opera.Oxford Bookworms, p.25.
9. Jennifer Bassett.(1992). The Phantom of The Opera. Oxford Bookworms, p.36.
10. Jennifer Bassett.(1992). The Phantom of The Opera.Oxford Bookworms, p.37.
11. Jennifer Bassett.(1992). The Phantom of The Opera.Oxford Bookworms, p.17.

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