I really wanted to address the question I felt that wasn't fully answered at the end of class today, which was essentially "Why keep Sojourner Truth's speech in the Southern dialect which was not her own?"
Campbell answers this question in part when she says near the end of the article, "Ironically, I have come to believe that what began as degrading dialect had and continues to have the agency to transform itself into the silenced voices of Truth's most despised sisters" (14). Truth may not have spoken in the dialect that Gage had transcribed her speech in, and it's irrelevant (at least in this specific context) why Gage decided to write it as such. What results from it is that her message is put in the dialect of those who were most ignored and discriminated against in the time-- uneducated African Americans in the South. It somewhat disappointed me to read in Campbell's article that Douglass described Truth as, "'a genuine specimen of the uncultured negro... [who] cared little for elegance of speech or refinement of manners... [and who] seemed to feel it her duty... to ridicule my efforts to speak and act like a person of cultivation and refinement'" (14). I can understand why he would make such a criticism, for how were whites supposed to take an uncultured black woman seriously? This dialect was seen as inferior and easily dismissible by whites.
It reminds me, in a certain sense, of Gilbert and Gubar and their description of "anxiety of authorship" in the feminine literary tradition. Truth's speech as transcribed seems to reject the stylistic tendencies of white male authors and orators, for if written or spoken in this form, it does not nearly have the same impact. The transcription does not conform to the language of those in power, the white male literary precursors. It instead builds upon a different tradition of language, the dialect of the powerless, the group which is most deeply impacted by the issues brought up in the speech. As Campbell points out, "the women [Truth] most represented... are rendered more perfectly in language that expresses so painfully the terrible costs of slavery-- the loss of literacy, the loss of education, the loss of access to public dialogue that, even when overcome, is constrained by being rendered in language that ridicules and demeans" (14).
The message, even if written in a different dialect, would not change, but its emotional impact of it certainly does. The fact that this dialect is seen as inferior is exactly what gives it its unique power. Certainly the arguments made hold water regardless of the dialect, but using this dialect gives voice to those women who are most silenced, showing that they too have a voice and legitimate points to bring to the discourse about race and gender.
This may be a bit of a tangent (so feel free to overlook this!), but this characterization of power really reminded me of a song by Bob Dylan called "The Lonesome Death of Hattie Carroll". It describes the murder of Hattie Carroll, a black kitchen maid who worked in a hotel, at the hands of a young, white tobacco farm owner while he was staying at the hotel. Dylan beautifully characterizes the station of her and her children by saying they, "carried the dishes and hauled out the garbage/ and never sat once at the head of the table/ and didn't even speak to the people at the table".
(If you care to listen: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b7h6xAxe_aY)
The table can be seen as a metaphor for society at large, in that African Americans were routinely excluded from the national discourse and were certainly not allowed to be in any position of power. It is analogous to the placement of the Southern black dialect in conjunction to the "white" dialect (is that even the right word for it?) This dialect seems to be excluded from what some would call the "legitimate" literary discourse, as it, at least in the specific dialect of Gage's transcription of Truth's speech, "[includes] extreme indicators of lack of education or mastery of standard English" (9). I cringe at the phrase "standard English". Perhaps that's what the "white" dialect (god, another cringe) really is at heart. It is simply how language is used by the majority (aka those in power) and in this sense is seen as most correct or valuable.
When Campbell rewrites the original transcription in standard English, her intentions are noble. Understandably, Campbell originally wanted to remain true to how Truth really spoke and move away from the racialized dialect her speech is transcribed in. She then realizes the power of Gage's transcription, saying, "the speech recreates participation in public discourse that is constrained by debased language, but that finds another kind of agency in vernacular speech" (13). I understand that the dialect the speech is written in can be seen as inferior or debased, but is that really an inherent quality? After all, is it just not the product of our society's values? We see speaking using standard English to be an indicator of being educated, which is certainly valued. But are there not educated people who speak in the common vernacular? Must they put on the mask of standard English to be taken seriously?
I suppose the best way I can sum this all up is by the conclusion of Dylan's song. Throughout, he after he continues to narrate the tragedy of Carroll's murder, he repeats, "take the rag away from your face/ now ain't the time for your tears". This changes at the closing of the song, and I wouldn't really be doing it justice by simply quoting a few lines. He sings:
"In the courtroom of honor, the judge pounded his gavel
To show that all’s equal and that the courts are on the level
And that the strings in the books ain’t pulled and persuaded
And that even the nobles get properly handled
Once that the cops have chased after and caught ’em
And that the ladder of law has no top and no bottom
Stared at the person who killed for no reason
Who just happened to be feelin’ that way without warnin’
And he spoke through his cloak, most deep and distinguished
And handed out strongly, for penalty and repentance
William Zanzinger with a six-month sentence
Oh, but you who philosophize disgrace and criticize all fears
Bury the rag deep in your face
For now’s the time for your tears"
The real tragedy of the story is that the murder of Hattie Carroll was not ultimately judged by the act in it of itself, but by the context and manipulation of the situation. Although it's important to acknowledge context in law or in literature, we should always pay mind to what has shaped the context, especially when looking at what is deemed to be the norm and why it has importance in comparison to what is deemed as inferior.
(I'm not quite sure if I've answered any questions, or I've just brought up a whole bunch of them. Regardless, hopefully I've given some food for thought.)
January 27, 2012
January 26, 2012
Madwoman in the Attic
I thought I would write a bit about the concept of the "Madwoman in the Attic". I was so disappointed the first time I was introduced to Gilbert & Gubar because I thought I had come up with this idea myself. I was, however and as one might expect, enchanted with the idea.
Digressions aside: The Madwoman in the Attic is basically an archetypal situation involving two women, a heroine and her foil, on the necessary backdrop of a patriarchal society. Gilbert and Gubar write, "the vexed and vexing polarities of angel and monster [and] sweet dumb Snow White and fierce mad Queen... are major images literary tradition offers women" (449). The heroine of the story takes the Snow White role. She is not always submissive (Jane Eyre, for instance), but she is always bound by the restraints of patriarchal society. Her foil is the mad Queen, the liberated, wild, often literally insane side of the polarity (Cathy Earnshaw, Bertha, the Queen of Hearts, the woman behind the yellow wallpaper). The Madwoman in her role of "monster" is a mirror image of the heroine in her role as "angel". These stories end sometimes simply with the destruction of the madwoman (as in Snow White), but in many of them the madwoman and the heroine are finally synchronized: the two sides of the polarity brought together in one balanced entity.
Take Jane Eyre, for instance, the source of the phrase "Madwoman in the Attic". As Jane deals with Mr. Rochester's general foulness and sense of entitlement, she is also plagued with apparitions of Bertha, Rochester's insane wife who is being kept in the attic. In a psychoanalytical interpretation, which is how the Madwoman in the Attic archetype is uncovered in a text, one might say that Bertha is part of Jane's psyche which has been locked away because is does not fit in with the her Victorian "training in femininity" (Gilbert & Gubar, 455). No, Jane is not stereotypically Victorian, but she is quiet, bookish, and well-behaved. Bertha is everything that is not well-behaved. Interestingly, she is also beautiful, while Jane is plain. When Jane comes in to her own power and leaves Rochester towards the end of the novel, Bertha symbolically enacts Jane's escape by burning down the walls which have imprisoned her. Jane's new-found power can be seen when she returns to Rochester and finds that he has been blinded (by Bertha during her escape, reversing the George Eliot's idea of patriarchy as "a disease of the retina" (Gilbert & Gubar,458)) and she is suddenly more powerful and capable than he.
In an idea not really touched on by Gilbert & Gubar, I believe the Madwoman in the Attic can also be found in literature by men. I mentioned already the Queen of Hearts from Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. She exists in the text as a perfect polarity for the generally demure, obedient Alice. Consider Alice's constant changes in size as she attempts to fit in with the proportions expected of her in Wonderland, and compare with Gilbert and Gubar's notion that in "learning to become a beautiful object, the girl learns anxiety about-- perhaps even loathing of-- her own flesh. Peering obsessively into the real as well as metaphoric looking glasses that surround her, she desires literally to 'reduce' her own body" (455). I do not think it can be argued Alice is synchronized with the Queen of Hearts until Through the Looking-Glass and What Alice Found There, in which Alice undertakes a journey to be crowned White Queen and reign alongside the Red Queen, an incarnation of the Queen of Hearts.
There is also the interesting case of the madwoman appearing in the form of vampirism in Dracula, in which Lucy becomes a vampire after a period of living as an invalid. Gilbert and Gubar write that "it is debilitating to be any woman in a society where women are warned that if they do not behave like angels they must be monsters" (454). Lucy, an archetypal angel, experiences debilitation and proceeds to turn in to a monster. "Social scientists and historians... have begun to study the ways in which patriarchal socialization literally makes women sick" (Gilbert and Gubar, 454), and Lucy's response to her period of Victorian womanhood as an invalid on the brink of death (which has followed a period of typically Victorian courtships and girlishness) is to set loose the Madwoman in the Attic, becoming the thing which the men around her dread. Through vampirism Lucy gains a power and agency she never had before, and is able to manipulate the men around her. Her hunting of children signifies womanhood turned on its head. However, in this novel by a man, the newly liberated Lucy is not allowed to live and is destroyed by the men she is threatening.
In summary, the Madwoman in the Attic archetype is a psychoanalytical and feminist lens that can be placed on literature, particularly that of the Victorian period. Gilbert and Gubar use it to identify the influence of patriarchy on the female author and her depictions of womanhood, as well as her own writing. The Amy Lowell poem "The Sisters" deals interestingly with the anxiety of authorship, literary foremothers, and in the Elizabeth Barrett Browning section, disease and dis-ease, but the ultimate example of everything Gilbert and Gubar write about is in Charlotte Perkins Gillman's "The Yellow Wallpaper". I leave you with the final illustration from the story, in which the narrator (an author herself) has liberated her Madwoman in the Attic from behind the yellow wallpaper and overcome the cause of her disease: patriarchy.
Digressions aside: The Madwoman in the Attic is basically an archetypal situation involving two women, a heroine and her foil, on the necessary backdrop of a patriarchal society. Gilbert and Gubar write, "the vexed and vexing polarities of angel and monster [and] sweet dumb Snow White and fierce mad Queen... are major images literary tradition offers women" (449). The heroine of the story takes the Snow White role. She is not always submissive (Jane Eyre, for instance), but she is always bound by the restraints of patriarchal society. Her foil is the mad Queen, the liberated, wild, often literally insane side of the polarity (Cathy Earnshaw, Bertha, the Queen of Hearts, the woman behind the yellow wallpaper). The Madwoman in her role of "monster" is a mirror image of the heroine in her role as "angel". These stories end sometimes simply with the destruction of the madwoman (as in Snow White), but in many of them the madwoman and the heroine are finally synchronized: the two sides of the polarity brought together in one balanced entity.
Take Jane Eyre, for instance, the source of the phrase "Madwoman in the Attic". As Jane deals with Mr. Rochester's general foulness and sense of entitlement, she is also plagued with apparitions of Bertha, Rochester's insane wife who is being kept in the attic. In a psychoanalytical interpretation, which is how the Madwoman in the Attic archetype is uncovered in a text, one might say that Bertha is part of Jane's psyche which has been locked away because is does not fit in with the her Victorian "training in femininity" (Gilbert & Gubar, 455). No, Jane is not stereotypically Victorian, but she is quiet, bookish, and well-behaved. Bertha is everything that is not well-behaved. Interestingly, she is also beautiful, while Jane is plain. When Jane comes in to her own power and leaves Rochester towards the end of the novel, Bertha symbolically enacts Jane's escape by burning down the walls which have imprisoned her. Jane's new-found power can be seen when she returns to Rochester and finds that he has been blinded (by Bertha during her escape, reversing the George Eliot's idea of patriarchy as "a disease of the retina" (Gilbert & Gubar,458)) and she is suddenly more powerful and capable than he.
In an idea not really touched on by Gilbert & Gubar, I believe the Madwoman in the Attic can also be found in literature by men. I mentioned already the Queen of Hearts from Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. She exists in the text as a perfect polarity for the generally demure, obedient Alice. Consider Alice's constant changes in size as she attempts to fit in with the proportions expected of her in Wonderland, and compare with Gilbert and Gubar's notion that in "learning to become a beautiful object, the girl learns anxiety about-- perhaps even loathing of-- her own flesh. Peering obsessively into the real as well as metaphoric looking glasses that surround her, she desires literally to 'reduce' her own body" (455). I do not think it can be argued Alice is synchronized with the Queen of Hearts until Through the Looking-Glass and What Alice Found There, in which Alice undertakes a journey to be crowned White Queen and reign alongside the Red Queen, an incarnation of the Queen of Hearts.
There is also the interesting case of the madwoman appearing in the form of vampirism in Dracula, in which Lucy becomes a vampire after a period of living as an invalid. Gilbert and Gubar write that "it is debilitating to be any woman in a society where women are warned that if they do not behave like angels they must be monsters" (454). Lucy, an archetypal angel, experiences debilitation and proceeds to turn in to a monster. "Social scientists and historians... have begun to study the ways in which patriarchal socialization literally makes women sick" (Gilbert and Gubar, 454), and Lucy's response to her period of Victorian womanhood as an invalid on the brink of death (which has followed a period of typically Victorian courtships and girlishness) is to set loose the Madwoman in the Attic, becoming the thing which the men around her dread. Through vampirism Lucy gains a power and agency she never had before, and is able to manipulate the men around her. Her hunting of children signifies womanhood turned on its head. However, in this novel by a man, the newly liberated Lucy is not allowed to live and is destroyed by the men she is threatening.
In summary, the Madwoman in the Attic archetype is a psychoanalytical and feminist lens that can be placed on literature, particularly that of the Victorian period. Gilbert and Gubar use it to identify the influence of patriarchy on the female author and her depictions of womanhood, as well as her own writing. The Amy Lowell poem "The Sisters" deals interestingly with the anxiety of authorship, literary foremothers, and in the Elizabeth Barrett Browning section, disease and dis-ease, but the ultimate example of everything Gilbert and Gubar write about is in Charlotte Perkins Gillman's "The Yellow Wallpaper". I leave you with the final illustration from the story, in which the narrator (an author herself) has liberated her Madwoman in the Attic from behind the yellow wallpaper and overcome the cause of her disease: patriarchy.
January 25, 2012
Crazy Lady With A Pen
Another query for Gilbert and Gubar's work, this one involving the connection of madness to female creativity.
The text mentions that known female author Anne Sexton suggests, "female art... has a 'hidden' but crucial tradition of uncontrollable madness"(457). What with the text's earlier account of the "monster-woman" in comparison with the Evil Queen from the Snow White fairy tale, I was very intrigued by how female madness and the portrayal of the over-thinking woman as mad were both connected by language relating to dance. The women who write are "dancing the death dance"(457) and the Evil Queen's dance, or, "mad tarantella is plainly unhealthy and metaphorically the result of too much storytelling" (456). As a patriarchal society has encouraged women to be sickly as a part of their femininity, does it contain a counterpart that encourages the portrayal of female artists as mad creatures caught up in their own dance? If the perfect woman is idealized as the sweet but suffering invalid, is the female writer, once she breaks through the discouragement of others, in fact encouraged to take on the role of madness in creativity?
One part of the text that made it clear to me that the role of female creative madness was meant to be darkly romanticized was the inclusion of the Magaret Atwood passage where the character (a female author herself) steps on glass and feels that she has discovered "the real red shoes, the feet punished for dancing. You could dance, or have the love of a good man. But you were afraid to dance, because you had this unnatural fear that if you danced they'd cut your feet off" (457). Anne Sexton had also written a poem about wearing red shoes in connection to female creativity, and the poem was also cited in the text. With the inclusion of the two inserts, I felt that the authors were pointing out that the mad and creative women had become just as much of an ingrained, romanticized product of patriarchal socialization about womanhood, and it's fascinating.
I think that Gubar and Gilbert were definitely trying to imply that the "angelic invalid", while the ideal good women, does have its ideal negative counterpart. The mad female author would be a romanticized tragic figure unto herself. So while a woman is discouraged from writing, especially in the 19th century, once she enters into that zone of creative madness she becomes the intriguing but forbidden tragic figure that people to some degree must have enjoyed. Is it possible that these two authors are suggesting that the patriarchal society, in creating the positive "angel", created the "mad woman" simultaneously and purposefully? Did it work? If Anne Sexton is right, and female art encompasses a necessary madness, have women writers today become that negative icon? Are they admired and romanticized?
Apparently these socialized female ideals and archetypes are still hanging around.
The text mentions that known female author Anne Sexton suggests, "female art... has a 'hidden' but crucial tradition of uncontrollable madness"(457). What with the text's earlier account of the "monster-woman" in comparison with the Evil Queen from the Snow White fairy tale, I was very intrigued by how female madness and the portrayal of the over-thinking woman as mad were both connected by language relating to dance. The women who write are "dancing the death dance"(457) and the Evil Queen's dance, or, "mad tarantella is plainly unhealthy and metaphorically the result of too much storytelling" (456). As a patriarchal society has encouraged women to be sickly as a part of their femininity, does it contain a counterpart that encourages the portrayal of female artists as mad creatures caught up in their own dance? If the perfect woman is idealized as the sweet but suffering invalid, is the female writer, once she breaks through the discouragement of others, in fact encouraged to take on the role of madness in creativity?
One part of the text that made it clear to me that the role of female creative madness was meant to be darkly romanticized was the inclusion of the Magaret Atwood passage where the character (a female author herself) steps on glass and feels that she has discovered "the real red shoes, the feet punished for dancing. You could dance, or have the love of a good man. But you were afraid to dance, because you had this unnatural fear that if you danced they'd cut your feet off" (457). Anne Sexton had also written a poem about wearing red shoes in connection to female creativity, and the poem was also cited in the text. With the inclusion of the two inserts, I felt that the authors were pointing out that the mad and creative women had become just as much of an ingrained, romanticized product of patriarchal socialization about womanhood, and it's fascinating.
I think that Gubar and Gilbert were definitely trying to imply that the "angelic invalid", while the ideal good women, does have its ideal negative counterpart. The mad female author would be a romanticized tragic figure unto herself. So while a woman is discouraged from writing, especially in the 19th century, once she enters into that zone of creative madness she becomes the intriguing but forbidden tragic figure that people to some degree must have enjoyed. Is it possible that these two authors are suggesting that the patriarchal society, in creating the positive "angel", created the "mad woman" simultaneously and purposefully? Did it work? If Anne Sexton is right, and female art encompasses a necessary madness, have women writers today become that negative icon? Are they admired and romanticized?
Apparently these socialized female ideals and archetypes are still hanging around.
G&G: Exploring or Ignoring?
There was something that troubled me about the Gilbert and Gubar essay that I thought I'd give a stab at.
Towards the end of the essay, when the authors are elaborating on the "socially conditioned epidemic of the female illness", they gives the two extremes of the negatively portrayed female condition in literature. First off, there is the "angel in the house of literature", or the heroine that is generally portrayed as either being chronically ill, some form of a hypochondriac, or is just the helpless sweetheart that loses her marbles. This heroine, this angel, does not suffer "just from fear and trembling but from literal and figurative sicknesses onto death". Is is an idealized role for women in literature in which they are pure and sweet and the ultimate example of femininity but they also suffer from some kind of illness.
Then, soon after that, the two authors mention the other extreme, the Evil Queen to the angelic Snow White. This extreme of womanhood seems sprung from too much mental exertion. They say, "the despair of the monster-woman is also real, undeniable, and infectious. The Queen's mad tarantella is plainly unhealthy and metaphorically the result of too much storytelling".
So here we have the authors making a claim that both the angelic and the monster visions of literary and socially conditioned womanhood are the only options that a patriarchal society offered women, especially in the 19th century. They claim that women were conditioned to believe that these were their options for public opinion, the suffering saint or the crazy woman, but are they saying that these two opposing visions were the only choices a woman had? Or are they just discussing the only two extremes that society offered women to be? And, connecting back to literature, are the authors claiming that these were the only female figures to be found in literature back in the 19th century? Or are they just examining specific archetypes? Or, if we are connecting this to the discussion of female authors directly, are the authors claiming that these were the ways that oddballs like female writers were generally seen, and were they so alienated because they refused the delicate invalid role and became the "mad woman" by writing and gaining too much knowledge?
From the text they make it sound like this was all that women had, when in fact there are several heroines from novels at that time that weren't super evil and crazy or suffering and fragile. I'm just raising the question of specificity for potential debate. I wasn't really certain myself, so I just threw it out there. Quotes are from page 456.
Towards the end of the essay, when the authors are elaborating on the "socially conditioned epidemic of the female illness", they gives the two extremes of the negatively portrayed female condition in literature. First off, there is the "angel in the house of literature", or the heroine that is generally portrayed as either being chronically ill, some form of a hypochondriac, or is just the helpless sweetheart that loses her marbles. This heroine, this angel, does not suffer "just from fear and trembling but from literal and figurative sicknesses onto death". Is is an idealized role for women in literature in which they are pure and sweet and the ultimate example of femininity but they also suffer from some kind of illness.
Then, soon after that, the two authors mention the other extreme, the Evil Queen to the angelic Snow White. This extreme of womanhood seems sprung from too much mental exertion. They say, "the despair of the monster-woman is also real, undeniable, and infectious. The Queen's mad tarantella is plainly unhealthy and metaphorically the result of too much storytelling".
So here we have the authors making a claim that both the angelic and the monster visions of literary and socially conditioned womanhood are the only options that a patriarchal society offered women, especially in the 19th century. They claim that women were conditioned to believe that these were their options for public opinion, the suffering saint or the crazy woman, but are they saying that these two opposing visions were the only choices a woman had? Or are they just discussing the only two extremes that society offered women to be? And, connecting back to literature, are the authors claiming that these were the only female figures to be found in literature back in the 19th century? Or are they just examining specific archetypes? Or, if we are connecting this to the discussion of female authors directly, are the authors claiming that these were the ways that oddballs like female writers were generally seen, and were they so alienated because they refused the delicate invalid role and became the "mad woman" by writing and gaining too much knowledge?
From the text they make it sound like this was all that women had, when in fact there are several heroines from novels at that time that weren't super evil and crazy or suffering and fragile. I'm just raising the question of specificity for potential debate. I wasn't really certain myself, so I just threw it out there. Quotes are from page 456.
January 24, 2012
Agency and the Author as Sacred King
The instant the concept of passing on power or agency through death appeared in Barthes and Foucault, my mind did a little dance and shouted, "Hey, everybody! It's the Sacred King!" For those unfamiliar with the term, the folkloric/mythopoetic construct of the Sacred King Cycle involves a god-king, often intimately connected with the cycles and well-being of the land (as in King Arthur: "the king and the land are one"), who dies and is reborn. The concept of the Sacred or Divine King was first examined in-depth in James G. Frazer's anthropological work The Golden Bough. The whole thing is twelve enormous volumes long; I myself own an abridgment which is enormous in itself.
When the Sacred King archetype is manifest in the form of the Dying God or the Hanged God (think Tarot's Hanged Man), he is able to be reborn into his own form. However, when the Sacred King is a human god-king, the spirit of the Sacred King, or the power of the land, is passed from the current Sacred King to a new man when the King dies. However, "The man-god must be killed as soon as he shews symptoms that his powers are beginning to fail, and his soul must be transferred to a vigorous successor before it has been seriously impaired by the threatened decay" (Frazer, 228). It is important to kill the Divine King before he dies a natural death, so that the kingship can be transferred in its full power to the new king. If the King dies a natural death, his people also risk losing the spirit of the Sacred King to the Underworld or Afterlife.
Now, what does this have to do with Barthes and Foucault? In their theoretical articles, the writer plays the role of the Sacred King. Foucault writes that "writing has become lined to sacrifice, even to the sacrifice of life" and discusses the close relationship in the collective mind of writing with death (905). He cites the act of writing as having the "right to kill, to be its author's murderer" (905). Barthes echoes this notion, saying that "as soon as a fact is narrated no longer with a view to acting directly on reality but intransitively... this disconnection occurs, the voice loses its origin, the author enters into his own death, writing begins" (875).
What is the purpose of this author-death? Barthes writes that after the author is dead, or "removed" from the work, "the claim to decipher a text becomes futile" (877). Essentially, the text becomes meaningless. To give that text meaning again, the text must be given to the reader, in whose reference frame the text takes on new meaning and the symbols can be interpreted. "The reader is the space on which all the quotations that make up a writing are inscribed without any of them being lost; a text's unity lies not in its origin but in its destination" (877). Here the power of the text and its interpretation is being transferred from the author to the reader, as the right of the Sacred King is transferred between the old king and the new. Foucault and Barthes argue there is a transference of power through the discourse of the texts. If the author is the Sacred King, he passes his agency to the reader through his text, and it is no longer the author but the reader who gives the work meaning. Like the cultures who kill their god-kings are attempting to preserve the life of their land and keep the spirit of the Sacred King immortal, and like the gods who are killed or sacrifice themselves and thus transcend the boundaries of life and death to become psychopomps, the relationship between author and reader exists "to keep death outside the circle of life" (Foucault, 905).
This is the citation for my copy of The Golden Bough.
Frazer, James G. The Golden Bough: A New Abridgement. Ed. Robert Fraser. 1890. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1994. Print.
When the Sacred King archetype is manifest in the form of the Dying God or the Hanged God (think Tarot's Hanged Man), he is able to be reborn into his own form. However, when the Sacred King is a human god-king, the spirit of the Sacred King, or the power of the land, is passed from the current Sacred King to a new man when the King dies. However, "The man-god must be killed as soon as he shews symptoms that his powers are beginning to fail, and his soul must be transferred to a vigorous successor before it has been seriously impaired by the threatened decay" (Frazer, 228). It is important to kill the Divine King before he dies a natural death, so that the kingship can be transferred in its full power to the new king. If the King dies a natural death, his people also risk losing the spirit of the Sacred King to the Underworld or Afterlife.
Now, what does this have to do with Barthes and Foucault? In their theoretical articles, the writer plays the role of the Sacred King. Foucault writes that "writing has become lined to sacrifice, even to the sacrifice of life" and discusses the close relationship in the collective mind of writing with death (905). He cites the act of writing as having the "right to kill, to be its author's murderer" (905). Barthes echoes this notion, saying that "as soon as a fact is narrated no longer with a view to acting directly on reality but intransitively... this disconnection occurs, the voice loses its origin, the author enters into his own death, writing begins" (875).
What is the purpose of this author-death? Barthes writes that after the author is dead, or "removed" from the work, "the claim to decipher a text becomes futile" (877). Essentially, the text becomes meaningless. To give that text meaning again, the text must be given to the reader, in whose reference frame the text takes on new meaning and the symbols can be interpreted. "The reader is the space on which all the quotations that make up a writing are inscribed without any of them being lost; a text's unity lies not in its origin but in its destination" (877). Here the power of the text and its interpretation is being transferred from the author to the reader, as the right of the Sacred King is transferred between the old king and the new. Foucault and Barthes argue there is a transference of power through the discourse of the texts. If the author is the Sacred King, he passes his agency to the reader through his text, and it is no longer the author but the reader who gives the work meaning. Like the cultures who kill their god-kings are attempting to preserve the life of their land and keep the spirit of the Sacred King immortal, and like the gods who are killed or sacrifice themselves and thus transcend the boundaries of life and death to become psychopomps, the relationship between author and reader exists "to keep death outside the circle of life" (Foucault, 905).
This is the citation for my copy of The Golden Bough.
Frazer, James G. The Golden Bough: A New Abridgement. Ed. Robert Fraser. 1890. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1994. Print.
Author-Function and Author Agency
I left Foucault's article with a very basic sense of what author-function meant. My understanding was that was this dehumanized extension of the physical author. I understand that its purpose is discursive, but before I can unpack what that entails, I need to back up. Where does the agency of the author-function come from? Ong actually brought this question to my attention when he mentioned offhandedly that authors are "under the insistent urging of editors and publishers" (10).
Just as Foucault asks if notes, drafts, deleted materials, and published materials all make up an author's work. I want to know if the author, editors, publishers, peer reviewers, etc all make up the author-function (not the physical people but their effect on the text). If the author-function is a "result of a complex operation which constructs a certain rational being that we call author" (909), than couldn't the editors, publishers, peer reviewers, etc be a part of that complex operation? I feel they are because they alter the text in one way or another. Are they cancelled out of the author-function when non-published pieces like drafts and deleted passages are included in the author's work since these pieces reflect text untouched by publishers, editors, etc.?
I guess it boils down to which has more agency: original (unpublished) text from an author or forces like editors and publishers? I'm hard pressed for an answer since Foucault removed the human element from "author". Did that mean that he removed the human element from the text?
(There is a good possibility that I'm completely missing what this term means and therefore my questions make no sense...)
Just as Foucault asks if notes, drafts, deleted materials, and published materials all make up an author's work. I want to know if the author, editors, publishers, peer reviewers, etc all make up the author-function (not the physical people but their effect on the text). If the author-function is a "result of a complex operation which constructs a certain rational being that we call author" (909), than couldn't the editors, publishers, peer reviewers, etc be a part of that complex operation? I feel they are because they alter the text in one way or another. Are they cancelled out of the author-function when non-published pieces like drafts and deleted passages are included in the author's work since these pieces reflect text untouched by publishers, editors, etc.?
I guess it boils down to which has more agency: original (unpublished) text from an author or forces like editors and publishers? I'm hard pressed for an answer since Foucault removed the human element from "author". Did that mean that he removed the human element from the text?
(There is a good possibility that I'm completely missing what this term means and therefore my questions make no sense...)
January 23, 2012
Oh, Foucault. Why so Concrete?
On page 905 of "What is an Author?", Foucault questions what makes up an author's work. He asks whether "rough drafts" and "deleted passages" qualify. As usual, he doesn't answer these questions. The lack of answer didn't bother me, it was the fact that the questions were asked at all. The entire paragraph I'm referring to (last full paragraph on 905) leads me to believe that Foucault saw an author's work as something concrete and definitive. Was that the accepted assumption of the time? It was jarring for me, because I see text just like any other art form in that it has no definitive conception or conclusion. Basically, my perception of an author's work is more fluid than Foucault's. I began to see some foundation for his questions when, on 913, he brings up "the great danger with which fiction threatens our world". If Foucault was solely referring to non-fiction writing earlier in the piece, I can see more reason for this questions. If there is a solid factual answer offered in a text, than I can see why he would wonder what all constituted as 'work' and therefore would attribute to the solid factual answer. This doesn't completely convince me that the question are necessary though.
Along the same lines, I want to look at Saint Jerome's four criteria for determining a singular author (909). Briefly: 1) the author has a "constant level of value", 2) the author must not contradict himself, 3) the author must maintain a singular style, and 4) the author functions in his time. I found the same fault here as I did with Foucault's questions on an author's work. Initially, I directly applied these four criteria to a human author. They seem ridiculous because authors are like all humans in that they change their mind (number 2), their style evolves or they explore different styles (number 3), and that they don't have complete control over how someone values their work (number 1). I had to go back and reapply these criteria to the author-function instead. I guess only including the similar pieces to compose an author's work would make applying that work to a discourse easier (?). I'm not convinced of this though, because Foucault goes on to discuss how the author-function evolves and changes. If an author's work, which makes up the author-function, is comprised only of pieces which are homogenous, doesn't that skew how the author-function is perceived/used?
Along the same lines, I want to look at Saint Jerome's four criteria for determining a singular author (909). Briefly: 1) the author has a "constant level of value", 2) the author must not contradict himself, 3) the author must maintain a singular style, and 4) the author functions in his time. I found the same fault here as I did with Foucault's questions on an author's work. Initially, I directly applied these four criteria to a human author. They seem ridiculous because authors are like all humans in that they change their mind (number 2), their style evolves or they explore different styles (number 3), and that they don't have complete control over how someone values their work (number 1). I had to go back and reapply these criteria to the author-function instead. I guess only including the similar pieces to compose an author's work would make applying that work to a discourse easier (?). I'm not convinced of this though, because Foucault goes on to discuss how the author-function evolves and changes. If an author's work, which makes up the author-function, is comprised only of pieces which are homogenous, doesn't that skew how the author-function is perceived/used?
The Power of Choice in "Nicomachean Ethics"
While reading Aristotle’s “Nicomachean Ethics,” I found the paragraphs on page 129 that refer to the power
of choice to be important in illuminating the differentiae between humans, such
as myself, and lower-life forms, such as pigs. Aristotle states on ii.4-5 “The
irrational animals do not exercise choice, but they do feel desire, and also
passion. Also a man of defective self-restraint acts from desire but not from
choice: and on the contrary a self-restrained man acts from choice and not from
desire. Again, desire can run counter to choice, but not desire to desire.” I
found this to be particularly valuable pieces of knowledge, especially for
situations that deal with the morality of someone’s character. The fact that
human beings have the ability to make choices based on our volition is a
powerful tool that we share for seeking out and creating ‘good’ in the world. While Aristotle notes that there are men who
are defective in their ability to let desire conquer their ability to make ‘good
choices’, he also points out that that the effectiveness of one’s ability to
maintain their ability to make choices is based on the amount of restraint one
has over his character. In line five he seems to be saying that while our choices
can give us the freedom to escape the imprisonment of our desires, our desires
alone will never be shifted from their own nature. Therefore, man’s superiority
over animal comes from his ability to restrain his actions from being enslaved
by desires via his power of choice.
We can see how this power of ‘choice’,
when combined with our ‘wish’, is beneficial to our own ‘good’ in part ii.9. Aristotle
states “We wish rather for ends than for means, but choose the means to our
end; for example, we wish to be healthy, but choose things to make us healthy;
we wish to be happy, and that is the word we use in this connexion, but it
would not be proper to say that we choose to be happy; since, speaking
generally, choice seems to be concerned with things within our own control.” Aristotle
seems to be saying that as humans, we use our ability to wish, to establish an
end that we hope to achieve. If our wish is for good, as it should be, than
this end will be one of happiness and/or healthiness. Achieving this end;
however, requires a means. This is where the power of choice is vital to
helping us achieve our ‘wish.’ Since we cannot simply choose an end result of
happiness or good health, we must make the choices that will provides a means
for these ends.
Aristotle’s ideas show how as
superior beings, we have the ability to choose the means that will lead us to happiness
and good health. Aristotle shows that by having good moral character by
practicing self-restraint, we have the ability to create ‘good’ ends.
The Author's Death for Agency
It seems to me that Barthes wants to take the author out of the work in order for the work to have agency in itself. The presence of the author steals the agency away from the work. According to Barthes, "to give a text an Author is to impose a limit on that text" (877). Therefore the Author holds the agency until it is removed. With the author present, the book, text, or other work is largely defined by that author. The ultimate critical interpretation lies within the author and not the work itself. With the removal of the author the text then then contains a multitude of critical interpretations within itself. Without the author the text then has the agency.
Or does it? I don't see how the text or the author have any meaning or interpretation outside of the agency held by the reader. Wouldn't the reader's own perception shape the meaning of the texts? I'm not sure how Barthes can justify saying "the reader is without history, biography, psychology; he is simply that someone who holds together in a single field all the traces by which the written text is constituted" (877). I don't see how this is at all true. The text is constituted of language which ultimately contains the meaning of the text. But doesn't the reader have agency of language as well precisely due to his history, biography and psychology? I might say "I have to get up early tomorrow at 8:30" whereas you might say "I get to sleep in till 8:30." I might say it's cold out when it's 45 degrees and you might say it's warm out when it's 45 degrees. These factors depend usually on what temperature you are most comfortable with (unless you're just trying to sound tough) and what kind of schedule you keep in your day-to-day life. In other words the variation in interpretation of words like "early" and "cold" depend entirely on the reader's history, biology, and psychology. So why wouldn't the reader still have agency over language, the author, and the text? And why does Barthes say the reader is without those traits? Why does the fate of the author and the text matter at all outside the reader?
Or does it? I don't see how the text or the author have any meaning or interpretation outside of the agency held by the reader. Wouldn't the reader's own perception shape the meaning of the texts? I'm not sure how Barthes can justify saying "the reader is without history, biography, psychology; he is simply that someone who holds together in a single field all the traces by which the written text is constituted" (877). I don't see how this is at all true. The text is constituted of language which ultimately contains the meaning of the text. But doesn't the reader have agency of language as well precisely due to his history, biography and psychology? I might say "I have to get up early tomorrow at 8:30" whereas you might say "I get to sleep in till 8:30." I might say it's cold out when it's 45 degrees and you might say it's warm out when it's 45 degrees. These factors depend usually on what temperature you are most comfortable with (unless you're just trying to sound tough) and what kind of schedule you keep in your day-to-day life. In other words the variation in interpretation of words like "early" and "cold" depend entirely on the reader's history, biology, and psychology. So why wouldn't the reader still have agency over language, the author, and the text? And why does Barthes say the reader is without those traits? Why does the fate of the author and the text matter at all outside the reader?
Fake audience? Ooooh Nooo!
Unlike On Rhetoric, I enjoyed Ong's text about the audience. Not that I agreed with everything he wrote, but it all resonated with me. I thought one of his best concept's was the idea of the audience as "fictionalized." Me draws a parallel between the audience of an orator and explains that because "For the speaker, the audience is in front of him. For the writer, the audience is simply further away, in time or space or both" (10). First I like the idea of readership in space. I imagine a librarian floating around in the black (Firefly reference). But back to the text. He makes an excellent point. Because the orator has an audience in front of him, that audience becomes what he defines as a "Collective"; in which everyone experiences everything the orator says at once.
Writing doesn't have that same effect because the author has his readers experiencing his writing at different points in time with or without other people experiencing with them. He describes how "The audience immediately fragments. It is no longer a unit. Each individual retires into his microcosm...The speaker has to gather them into a collective once more" (11). In other words, when one reads, they read separately from everyone else, thereby separating from the rest of the collective. Here's where I feel Ong loses me because I sense a rift in his argument.
When Obama spoke at my school, that was in front of an audience. I was a member of that audience. When he spoke about healthcare, I recall people cheering, but not me (I'm not a fan of the plan. I'll admit it). Does that separate me from the collective the same way in which a reader has a separate experience from other readers reading the same book? I could argue that we all think of our own volition, therefore, the experience we each have during an oral presentation varies from the person next to us. That dissolves the collectively mentally because we're no longer a unit. Does that make sense? So back to whether or not the audience is real. It's either not real at all in both scenarios or real in both without a collective. I'll elaborate in class, but I'm going to miss my bus if I keep typing.
Writing doesn't have that same effect because the author has his readers experiencing his writing at different points in time with or without other people experiencing with them. He describes how "The audience immediately fragments. It is no longer a unit. Each individual retires into his microcosm...The speaker has to gather them into a collective once more" (11). In other words, when one reads, they read separately from everyone else, thereby separating from the rest of the collective. Here's where I feel Ong loses me because I sense a rift in his argument.
When Obama spoke at my school, that was in front of an audience. I was a member of that audience. When he spoke about healthcare, I recall people cheering, but not me (I'm not a fan of the plan. I'll admit it). Does that separate me from the collective the same way in which a reader has a separate experience from other readers reading the same book? I could argue that we all think of our own volition, therefore, the experience we each have during an oral presentation varies from the person next to us. That dissolves the collectively mentally because we're no longer a unit. Does that make sense? So back to whether or not the audience is real. It's either not real at all in both scenarios or real in both without a collective. I'll elaborate in class, but I'm going to miss my bus if I keep typing.
The Broader Author
I don't think we talked much about Foucault's attempt to expand his definition of the author beyond novels in class. So here's my interpretation.
Towards the end of Foucault's essay he makes an effort to broaden his definition of the Author. He explains that an author can be more than an author of books; he says that "one can be an author of a theory, tradition, or discipline in which other books and authors will find a place" (910). He goes on to explain that there exists a class of authors which he calls "founders of discursivity" (911). What he means by the this is that these authors created something that is capable of being discursive, that is, there are numerous things to be learned via logical argument from the author's original work. When I picture discursivity I picture lines of thought coming from the original subject which all seek the logical, yet unobtainable, end of that subject.
Foucault uses Marx and Freud as examples. Marx wrote the Communist Manifesto which can be, and has been, discussed since its inception. Freud wrote on the topic of psychoanalysis which has been developed and iterated since then. Marx and Freud are rare and unique in this respect. Foucault compares them to Ann Radcliffe, the creator of the Gothic novel. He explains that Radcliffe is not a "founder of discursivity" because the Gothic novel is limited in its possible discourse. There isn't much of a logical progression to the discourse of the Gothic novel; it is only imitated in its themes.
He also compares Marx and Freud to influential scientists like Galileo. Foucault explains that Galileo would not be considered a "founder of discursivity" because he did not invent cosmology as Freud invented psychoanalysis and Marx invented Marxism. Rather, cosmology itself would be the subject of discourse and Galileo would only be engaging in that discourse. Future developments in cosmology would change the validity of Galileo's original work on cosmology. God would be considered the "founder of discursivity" in respect to cosmology, not Galileo. This is not so with Freud since every development made after his original work on psychoanalysis must refer back to his work and be compatible with his work. "Re-examination of Galileo's text may well change our knowledge of the history of mechanics, but it will never be able to change mechanics itself. On the other hand, re-examining Freud's texts modifies psychoanalysis itself" (912).
Towards the end of Foucault's essay he makes an effort to broaden his definition of the Author. He explains that an author can be more than an author of books; he says that "one can be an author of a theory, tradition, or discipline in which other books and authors will find a place" (910). He goes on to explain that there exists a class of authors which he calls "founders of discursivity" (911). What he means by the this is that these authors created something that is capable of being discursive, that is, there are numerous things to be learned via logical argument from the author's original work. When I picture discursivity I picture lines of thought coming from the original subject which all seek the logical, yet unobtainable, end of that subject.
Foucault uses Marx and Freud as examples. Marx wrote the Communist Manifesto which can be, and has been, discussed since its inception. Freud wrote on the topic of psychoanalysis which has been developed and iterated since then. Marx and Freud are rare and unique in this respect. Foucault compares them to Ann Radcliffe, the creator of the Gothic novel. He explains that Radcliffe is not a "founder of discursivity" because the Gothic novel is limited in its possible discourse. There isn't much of a logical progression to the discourse of the Gothic novel; it is only imitated in its themes.
He also compares Marx and Freud to influential scientists like Galileo. Foucault explains that Galileo would not be considered a "founder of discursivity" because he did not invent cosmology as Freud invented psychoanalysis and Marx invented Marxism. Rather, cosmology itself would be the subject of discourse and Galileo would only be engaging in that discourse. Future developments in cosmology would change the validity of Galileo's original work on cosmology. God would be considered the "founder of discursivity" in respect to cosmology, not Galileo. This is not so with Freud since every development made after his original work on psychoanalysis must refer back to his work and be compatible with his work. "Re-examination of Galileo's text may well change our knowledge of the history of mechanics, but it will never be able to change mechanics itself. On the other hand, re-examining Freud's texts modifies psychoanalysis itself" (912).
Author Function and the Audience Fiction
After reading Ong's essay on the author's audience, I was wondering if it had any implications on our understanding of the author-function. Foucault wrote "The author-function is therefore characteristic of the mode of existence, circulation, and functioning of certain discourses within society"(908). Foucault's essay details a variety of issues about the author-function but I think his analysis on the purpose of writing is a helpful piece in trying to connect Ong and Foucault. He writes about writing "it is rather a question of creating a space into which the writing subject constantly disappears"(905). What he means is that in the act of writing, the written works seems to take on a life of its own and it exists externally of the author. The author, then, is merely a descriptor of any written work in question.
In his essay, The Writer's Audience Is Always a Fiction, Walter Ong discusses the notion that an author's audience is not some collective that responds and engages with the author as he writes a piece. Rather, "the writer must construct in his imagination, clearly or vaguely, an audience cast in some of sort of role"(12). Additionally, the audience must fictionalize itself, Ong says, in order to fulfill the role the writer has fictionalized for them(12). It would seem that Ong is expanding the role of the author to not only include one whose name is a descriptor of their written work, but also one who interacts with an audience by fictionalizing them and creating a role for them to inhabit while reading a work.
Do you think this stands? Does Ong expand our notion of the role of the author or is he simply trying to discuss the author-audience relationship?
In his essay, The Writer's Audience Is Always a Fiction, Walter Ong discusses the notion that an author's audience is not some collective that responds and engages with the author as he writes a piece. Rather, "the writer must construct in his imagination, clearly or vaguely, an audience cast in some of sort of role"(12). Additionally, the audience must fictionalize itself, Ong says, in order to fulfill the role the writer has fictionalized for them(12). It would seem that Ong is expanding the role of the author to not only include one whose name is a descriptor of their written work, but also one who interacts with an audience by fictionalizing them and creating a role for them to inhabit while reading a work.
Do you think this stands? Does Ong expand our notion of the role of the author or is he simply trying to discuss the author-audience relationship?