Space and Place in Wilson's Our Nig

Larisa and I talk a lot about spatial analysis, and I guess I was thinking about it while I was reading Our Nig, because I found myself tracking descriptions of the space, trying to make meaning of the setting. There’s a lot going on in the novel; overall depictions and conceptions of “home” are challenged, and race and sexuality most certainly complicate a woman’s role in the domestic sphere. Mag Smith, Frado’s mother, lives in a home “contaminated by the publicity of her fall,” directly connecting domestic space with a woman’s virtue. Frado, codified in the novel as black, is held captive in the home (it would be interesting to read this novel as a captivity narrative…) and finds freedom in outside spaces: the barn, the woodpile, the hill with the sheep. Characters, too, are described in terms of space; Jack is Frado’s “shelter” (67). But I’m going to resist delving into those topics in favor for a chance to explore Frado’s little room at the Bellmont estate, beginning with the kitchen.

The kitchen is one of Frado’s primary work spaces, and thus also a place of much punishment—a rawhide is “always at hand in the kitchen” (30). It’s described as a space occupied by all members of the household, and characters are constantly entering and exiting while Frado toils. Mrs. Bellmont, especially, marks the kitchen as a space to conduct “housekeeping” and harshly monitor Frado: "It is impossible to give an impression of the manifest enjoyment of Mrs. B in these kitchen scenes. It was her favorite exercise to enter the apartment nosily, vociferate orders, give a few sudden blows to quicken Nig’s pace, then return to the sitting room with such a satisfied expression, congratulating herself upon her thorough house-keeping qualities” (66). The kitchen is the setting of most of Frado’s brutal beatings, is where Frado must eat her small ration of food (until James intervenes), and is rarely (if ever) described in pleasant terms.

The one place in the house that Frado is, theoretically, safe from abuse is in her own little apartment, described in one scene as a safe haven: “But there was one little spot seldom penetrated by her mistress’ watchful eyes: this was her room, uninviting and comfortless; but to herself a safe retreat. Here she would listen to the pleadings of a Savior, and try to penetrate the veil of doubt and sin which clouded her soul, and long to cast off the fetters of sin, and rise to the communion of saints” (87). Though “uninviting and comfortless,” Frado’s tiny room is a safe retreat as Frado attempts to “rise to the communion of saints.” Interestingly, then, initial descriptions of Frado’s room are far more ominous—the “L chamber,” as Mrs. Bellmont calls it, hardly seems fit for a child. According to Jack, Frado would “be afraid to go through that dark passage, and she can’t climb the ladder safely” (26). Nevertheless, he escorts her to the little room and “opened the door which connected with her room by a dark, unfinished passage-way” (27). Obviously, Frado’s little room isn’t a place people visit, nor do they ever plan to visit. It is simply “an unfinished chamber over the kitchen, the roof slanting nearly to the floor” and only a “small half window furnished light and air” (27). On her first night there, the “hot sun had penetrated the room, and it was a long time before a cooling breeze reduced the temperature so that she could sleep” (28). If you haven’t noticed yet, Frado’s “safe haven” is often discussed in terms of penetration. The hot, abusive sun penetrated her room making it too warm to sleep. And Mrs. Bellmont seldom penetrated her room, though we can assume she was there sometimes since “seldom” is not “never.” In fact, the only person we ever see there with Frado is Jack. The language of penetration conjures obvious sexual imagery, and it’s no coincidence that it appears so many times in the bedroom of an (for all intents and purposes) enslaved woman. If readers needed any more spatial clues, the L-chamber is located directly over the kitchen, which is the primary site of Frado’s abuse; though secluded, the L-chamber is never separate from the house and never truly safe.

Of course, once Frado decides to peruse a religious relationship, Wilson’s use of penetration describes Frado’s desire to “penetrate the veil of doubt and sin which clouded her soul.” Here is where I think the novel begins to mimic the captivity/conversion narrative genre—Frado begins to sort through the abusive experiences of her captivity and use them as moral fodder for her conversion. Her reclamation of the word “penetrate” indicates that any untold sexual abuse is part of that conversion and atonement.

Thoughts on Sexuality and The Hermaphrodite

This book, The Hermaphrodite, has been an unusual text for me to read. I honestly have not read anything like it before. And like I told Amanda in our tête-à-tête this week, I did not enjoy reading this book but I did like that it made me think about my beliefs about gender and how gender is constructed in our society. This has been especially interesting to me since I have also been reading about gender in my feminist theory class, especially Simone de Beauvoir and Julia Kristeva. Their questions about what defines a woman caused me to think differently about this text. For example, Beauvoir states, "One is not born a woman, one becomes one." So if we follow this argument when looking at Laurence, we can say that even if he has biological female parts, because he was chosen to be a man and continues to live as a man, even if he has female breasts and beautiful "female" hair, he is not a women because he chooses not to become one. The other idea I found interesting from Kristeva is her belief that we are not just one distinct sexual identity and that there are as many identities as there are people. This argument would also support a reading of Laurence as an intersexed person who is a sexual object to both women and men. What is troubling for me about this novel is that Laurence is so tortured and tormented. I kept wishing for a happy ending for him, that he could feel some peace. So, while I am still not sure what I think about this novel, my compassion for an intersexed person have increased.

Also, something interesting Amanda and I also discussed was that there was little discussion of Laurence's physical experience when he was playing the part of Cecilia. We see Berto help him into his disguise and then we see him take the clothes off, but there is not discussion of the in between times. So I wondered how he felt about having to wear such clothes. Did he feel bound and constricted? Did he feel some freedom to unbind his chest (since we assumed he was binding his breasts while he was away at school)? And even though we see them doing a dance and burning the clothes once he becomes Laurence again, we never get much discussion of the constriction the clothes would have been. Well, those are just my first few thoughts. I really need to think about this book more. It is so very interesting and complex.

Domesticity in Our Nig by Harriet Wilson

Even though this is the second time that I have read Our Nig, I was horrified anew at the inhumanity of the Bellmont family. Not only the physical beatings, but the silencing of Frado caused me to cringe again and again. As I was reading it and consequently talking with Amanda about it, I kept wondering, "Why are we reading this book?" (specially after reading The Lamplighter)."What meaning can I make of this supposed sentimental novel?" It wasn't until I read Lois Leveen's article (provided by Dr. Gaul) that I really began to see Wilson's novel as a response to and a commentary on white domesticity in nineteenth-century America. Leveen's spatial analysis of Frado's entrapment and "Mrs. Bellmont's sitting-room racism" (575)is fascinating.

Before reading the article, I clearly saw Mrs. B and Mary as evil, and Mr. B as complicit in their cruelty. However, I was inclined to see Aunt Abby, Jane, Jack, and James as Frado's "friends" who helped her make the best of a bad situation. But Leveen's article helped me to see that they really were not Frado's friends--they were just as guilty as Mrs. B, Mary, and Mr. B in imprisoning Frado in their house. Even though they didn't abuse her, they never helped her escape and even used her as a screen to deflect Mrs. B's abuse off of themselves. I don't need to reiterate all Leveen's points here, but I do want to say that she helped me to see a different face of domesticity than those I have been reading about, especially when looking at The Lamplighter. Gerty's life is similar to Frado's--both are orphaned/abandoned and both find new caretakers. But because Frado is a mulatta and Gerty is white, Frado's entry into domestic spaces is a descent into domestic hell and Gerty's is into a domestic heaven. Gerty finds friendship, love, and acceptance in domestic space. Frado finds none of these. She is entirely trapped and tortured in the spaces because of her skin color and status as indentured servant (not "help" as Gerty would be). Even when Frado finishes her indenture and can physically leave the Bellmont's house, she still does not have her own domestic space and must work for other people. When she is abandoned by her husband, this is further evidence that she cannot enter into the domestic space that white women can. She is forever shut out of domesticity because of her skin color. So, while this posting may not make much sense, and is in no way as thorough of an analysis as Leveen's, I hope this blog does evidence that my thoughts and perceptions about domesticity have been expanded by reading both the primary and secondary text.

19th C. Women in Theater

Check it out!

Theater Review | 'In the Next Room (or the vibrator play)'

A Quaint Treatment for Women Wronged

By CHARLES ISHERWOOD

Published: February 18, 2009

Sarah Ruhl’s spirited and stimulating new comedy is a fanciful but compassionate consideration of the treatment, and the mistreatment, of women in the late 19th century.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/18/theater/reviews/18vibr.html

Fuller's Woman in the Nineteenth Century

I’ve been doing a lot of reading this week, but rather than address all of the texts, I think I’ll stick to one: Margaret Fuller’s Woman in the Nineteenth Century (1845). Inspired by (and including large parts of) her essay, “The Great Lawsuit: Man versus Men, Woman versus Women” published in The Dial in 1843, Woman in the Nineteenth Century explores at greater length issues of marriage, religious and intellectual freedom, and the true desires of women. Fuller directly addresses her readers, often pinpointing and chastising her male audience, other times appealing to her female readers (especially young women). These addresses have received much critical attention, making Fuller a favorite among Women’s Rhetoric and performance studies scholars (see Sandra Gustafson’s “Choosing a Medium” for a good rhetorical analysis of Fuller’s sentimental performativity in relation to the Feminist movement). There are moments, however, that Fuller addresses neither men nor women specifically and merely targets the individual reader, uniting the desires of each gender in her refusal to address them separately. I found these moments some of the most interesting, mainly because it’s hard to know who Fuller expects to affect change; the agency is difficult to determine, projecting responsibility onto both men and women.

In a particular passage, which I plan to discuss here, Fuller assess the desires of women, laying bare typical assumptions about female wants and needs: “It is not the transient breath of poetic incense that women want; each can receive that from a lover” (38). Interestingly, the social narrative detailing women’s wants hasn’t changed much since Fuller’s 1845 composition. If you google “what women want,” you’ll end up with some pretty unsavory results. Our contemporary definition of the “transient breath of poetic incense” is a little more graphic than depictions in the 19th Century, to be sure, but the idea that women gain fulfillment from men remains true in contemporary projections of female desire. Most images of feminine beauty and desire are the products of a hetero-normative, masculine driven ideas; a lover’s “poetic incense” is a direct manifestation of the dominant patriarchal culture. But thankfully, Fuller is clarifying for reader that these profusions of romantic love aren’t on her list of feminine desires. In fact, she marks these things as easily accessible—“each can receive that from a lover”—and because they can be so easily attained, they’re no longer desirable. Fuller goes on to say that if a woman does want these things she “needs but to becomes a coquette, a shrew, or a good cook, to be sure of that,” adeptly showing all presumed feminine desires in their true light: as socially constructed negative stereotypes. Except for the “good cook,” which I found puzzling. It’s almost as though Fuller takes a prized feminine role (the culinary domestic) and groups it with socially despised feminine behaviors (a coquette and shrew) to point out that these negative feminine roles developed from the same masculine desires that demonize them.

Women also don’t want economic gain, fame, or societal positions: “It is not money, nor notoriety, nor the badges of authority that men have appropriated to themselves.” Fuller continues saying, “If demands, made in their behalf, lay stress on any of these particulars, those who make them have not searched deeply into the need.” It is this particular line that made me pause for a moment. I initially thought that Fuller must be referring to white men, highlighting them as not only the societal group most out of touch with true feminine desires but also the group with the most power and thus capable of advocating for women’s rights. But as I re-read the passage, I realized that it’s not exactly clear, which is noteworthy given Fuller’s tendency to directly address her intended audience. It seems that women, too, could be mistaken about their desires; advocating for all American women of the time period, female activists working for women’s rights to positions of power or fair wages have misplaced their efforts. According to Fuller, there’s something more important—more desirable: “It is for that which is the birthright of every being capable to receive it, -- the freedom, the religious, the intelligent freedom of the universe, to use its means; to learn its secret as far as nature had enabled them, with God along for their guide and their judge” (38). Fuller believes that freedom transcends social constructions and cultural markers of equality. “Every being capable to receive it” should be able to tap into the power of the universe. It’s obvious that, at this point, Fuller’s discussion of women’s rights/desires had transformed into a discussion of the true desires of humanity. Or what should be the true desires of humanity, according to Fuller. The fact that she simply addresses her audience in general (rather than distinguishing between her male and female readers) take on a new importance here: if we continue to think in terms of “man” and “woman,” separating their rights and desires, then we hinder the development of human rights. A preoccupation with gendered differences distorts the larger mission. Of course, Fuller goes on to debate the inequitable power dynamics of marriage and criticizes institution for oppressing women, so it’s not like she’s blind to gendered oppression. Her focus on human rights to universal freedom seems like a long-term goal.

Interestingly, Fuller’s argument that a focus on gender distracts us from larger goals is common today among those who wish to ditch feminism in favor or “humanism.” And those transitioning from Women’s Studies to Gender Studies seem to use similar logic. I understand the need to advocate for universal human rights, but large-scale social movements cannot happen in one fell swoop. We have to break up the work into manageable pieces, working together and yet separately. Moreover, the decision to ignore women’s rights in lieu of human rights assumes that women have achieved all their universal, global, social, and individual desires. And we all know that’s not the case. It seems like rather than focusing on one or the other, we must focus on both.

More on Philip and Domestic Spaces by Larisa

The reading for this class is getting more interesting all the time! I am really loving the focus on sentimental and domestic novels that we have had the past few weeks. In this posting I would like to respond to some comments from Dr. Gaul about my last post about The Lamplighter . Here are her comments to my last posting:
I wonder if you could go a little further with your ideas?  Why do you think Gertrude has to leave the house and go to the summer house to meet Philip?  How is his placement in that space (and in a series of hotels throughout the novel) significant to his character's development? Were you meaning to suggest that Philip becomes domesticated when he enters Emily's space?  Why do you think he builds a new home for them at the end of the novel?

First of all, I have been doing a lot of reading about houses and the use of domestic spaces, but have not found anything that discusses the purpose and function of a summer house, so I will just have to analyze that space based on my reading of the text. The summer house at first seems to be a place solely for lovers to meet. So Gertrude and Philips affectionate conversation there was initially confusing because I knew from early on in the novel that he was her missing father. Cummins description of Philip and the “youthful fire of his eyes” (258) immediately convinced me that he was Gertrude’s father since Cummins had just described “the deep brilliancy of her large dark eyes” (258) and frequently used the descriptor of fire to describer Gertrude’s temperament. Consequently, all the lover-like scenes between Gertrude and Philip never convinced me that there was a romance there. And when Gertrude remarked that Emily had never met Philip, I knew that something was a foot! (I am too well read in the sentimental genre to not spot these clues!)

When we first meet Philip, he is in the hotel’s breakfast hall (257), when we see him again it is on a steamboat where he is mysteriously lurking in shadows before introducing himself to Gertrude (266). Then later he is on a mossy rock (270). He keeps popping up like a stalker in a 21st century TV show on Lifetime. And yet he isn’t a stalker--we know that because he is always in scenes of nature and always ready to aid Gertrude. He isn’t like Mr. Bruce, who we first meet as a snake in the grass; he never did anything to help Gertrude. He was only an annoyance. Philip, on the other hand, is frequently pictured in natural scenes. For example, when they meet on that Sunday morning and she cries for his pain, he uses nature to illustrate his painful experiences (277). After that he flits in and out of indoor spaces, but never stays inside for very long. He is continually on the edge of the groups, unsure of his welcome. It is not until he meets with Gertrude in the summer house, a domestic space that is both inside and outside, that he accepts the invitation to fully return to domesticity as a father and lover/husband. When Gertrude takes his hand and he willingly goes with her to Emily, his return to his former home and former love indicates his return to domesticity. He stops moving around, popping in and out of scenes, and becomes a solid fixture in the family that Gertrude has created for herself as our sentimental heroine. And because Philip is finally domesticated by Emily, he is able to really settle down and build a house. This new house is also a sign of renewal and reconciliation with the family he left and the mistakes he has made--he is the Prodigal who has returned home. Cummins describes it eloquently this way: “And is the long-wandering, much-suffering, and deeply-sorrowing exile happy now? He is; but his peace springs not from his beautiful home, his wide possessions, an honorable repute among his fellow-men, or even the love of the gentle Emily. All these are blessings that he well knows how to prize; but his world-tried soul has found a deeper anchor yet,--a surer refuge from the tempest and the storm; for, through the power of a living faith, he has laid hold on eternal life” (421). Like Gertrude, Philip has been re-claimed and rescued, and found his way back into domesticity, but also into the arms of a heavenly father through his reconciliations with Emily, Mr. Graham, and Gertrude. This final scene of domesticity is punctuated with a beautiful sunset that reminds us that the once-wild Philip is now inside looking out and a firm fixture of domesticity.

Iola Leroy and the Politics of Race in the Sentimental Novel

I’ve been doing a lot of reading this week, and sometimes I have no idea how I’ll process all the information. Basically, I feel like a sponge. As I talk to more people who have gone through the exam process, I am finding that this feeling is common, but I often wonder how I’ll ever retain all the material! Whew. And now that I’ve gotten that out of my system, please bear with me while I work through some of the critical, secondary material I’ve been wresting with over the past week. I’ve been reading Karen Weyler’s Intricate Relations: Sexual and Economic Desire in American Fiction and Caroline Levander’s Cradle of Liberty: Race, the Child, and National Belonging from Thomas Jefferson to W.E.B. Du Bois. I’d like to condense and discuss the major arguments in each of these texts, and then maybe I’ll even have a little discussion of Iola Leroy.

Weyler’s Intricate Relations was compelling and interesting, merging ideas of sexuality and economics. I found one of the most compelling descriptions of the book (and its title) on the back of the book (I love it when this happens): “In 1799, the novelist Charles Brockden Brown used the evocative phrase ‘intricate relations’ to describe the complex imbrications of sexual and economic relations in the early republic. Exploring these relationships, he argued, is the chief job of the ‘moral historian,’ a label that most novelists of the era embraced.” But Weyler doesn’t relegate her study to novels—she explores a wealth of social documents and narratives, eventually coming back to the novel as a space where, she argues, all these narrative converge to create a sexual and economic narrative of morality. One of the most interesting points, to me at least, was her discussion of a “fall” in early society. A woman “fell” sexually, saved only by a timely marriage. To “fall” as a man, however, was to fall economically, and the salvation for this transgression was a well-calculated marriage. We talked last semester about how, especially in the early parts of the nineteenth century, that marriage was more of an economic relation between men rather than a union between two people in love. As novels worked to revise this dynamic (a process which we addressed in class yesterday), the dynamics of economics and sexuality must also evolve and adapt. We can see this revision in The Lamplighter (and other “women’s fiction”): the heroine supports herself (at least some of the time), the marriage is between two people who love each other (though the man is clearly the primary bread-winner), and “sexual” scenes are played out between platonic characters, placing the agency in an internal, personal, and safe relationship rather than in a potentially “economic” one like marriage.

Changing venues just a bit, I’d like to talk briefly about Caroline Levander’s Cradle of Liberty. Given my recent interest in young girls and Girl’s Studies, I was pleased to find out that Levander’s text is all about literary representations of children in writing of the early national period. She argues that, rather than focusing on adult subjects, beginning an analysis of “a U.S. liberal endeavor with the child . . . provides a unique opportunity to chart liberalism’s inner workings—to see how the child, by simultaneously representing the promise of autonomy and the reality of dependence, both shapes and constantly threatens to disrupt liberalism’s two relational antipodes” (3). She takes this a step further, though, and thinks about how the child works to establish race as a critical element of national formation. She begins buy exploring the ways authors use the child to portray the “self,” a term she reads as an unadulterated, uncorrupted version of identity. Levander then extends this reading to child-centered narratives discussing race, analyzing how these two discourses operate as one: “To the extent that the child represents the liberal-democratic state, it takes on and perpetuates the racial meanings inhering in that social entity. Analysis of the child therefore does not simply index who suffers from racism (and is therefore equated with the child) but, more fundamentally, reveals racial domination to be a system—like patriarchy—that underpins and enabled liberal-democratic societies” (14). She doesn’t look at actual children, but rather at representations of children in American Literature, linking her analysis to contemporary uses of children (in many social texts) to display the natural, intrinsic “self” of a nation.

Ok, and now on to Frances Harper’s Iola Leroy. How’s that for a smooth transition? Let’s see if I can make some connections. One of the first things I’d like to say about this novel is that it is very clearly using the format of a sentimental novel, even sometimes subverting the conventions of the genre for its own rhetorical purposes. As a side note, this process of subverting genres is called “disembedding” a genre (I learned this from Melanie Kill) and is an interesting way into a textual analysis—genre theorists argue that one always “disembeds” for a purpose, usually to question the status quo. Of course, one could argue that authors of sentimental novels are already writing to subvert societal standards, making texts like Iola Leroy especially rich for analysis. In a full-length study, it might be fun to analyze the reasons the novel originally developed as a genre and then trace all subsequent progressions to Iola Leroy, but for today I think I’ll just look at it with other, traditional sentimental novels.

Iola Leroy follows the life of a young woman, Iola, who is the daughter of a wealthy white man and a black woman. At the beginning of the novel, readers find out that Iola’s father loved her mother (who could, and did, pass as white), freed her, married her, and refused to let his children know that they had any black blood. Iola and her brother (Harry) grew up in a slave owning family, thinking they were white. Sadly, Iola’s father dies, the mother’s freedom and marriage are proven false, and Iola and her mother are sold into slavery. It is at this point that the novel takes on the format of a sentimental story. Iola loses everything and is harassed by evil masters, though she never gives into moral or sexual corruption. Thankfully, slavery is abolished and Iola is freed, at which point she sets about gathering her family back together, which is very much a coming of age journey. She is employed as a teacher, able to earn a living helping others. Her moral struggle, however, is the point I find most intriguing.

In The Lamplighter, we watch Gerty learn to harness and control her bad temper. When she does, she becomes an almost angelic representation of the true woman (unless duty calls). Iola Leroy’s struggle, however, is directly impacted by racial politics. As a woman who could, and had for years, passed as white, Iola makes a choice to live as a black woman. She struggles to find work, encounters supreme disrespect, and declines marriage proposals based on race (more on this later). She overcomes these obstacles with the same unflappable dignity that we see in Gerty. Interestingly, Iola is always described as a “true woman,” so much so that white men, even after learning of her black blood, want to marry her. She declines, citing social stereotypes and prejudices as her reasoning. I think, however, that we could also think of her refusal to marry a white man (even though they could both live together as a “white” couple) is another way of revising the power dynamics of marriage in literary texts. Harper uses the unequal power dynamics inherent in racial tensions of the times and applies them to marriage. She makes it very obvious that, despite appearances—even though everything looks good on the surface—that the institution of marriage is inherently flawed. Of course, the novel still ends in marriage, but Harper does extensive work to make it equitable and digestible.

Iola and Dr. Latimer (her soon-to-be husband) were unified in “their desire to help their race”; their “hearts beat in loving unison” for this common cause and “one grand and noble purpose was giving tone and color to their lives and strengthening the bonds of affection between them” (266). Dr. Latimer, we find out, could also pass as white but chose to live as a black man, unwilling to ignore his people and their plight. They were united in a common cause: “Between their lives were no impending barriers, no inclination impelling one way and duty compelling another. Kindred hopes and tastes had knit their hearts; grand and noble purposes were lighting up their lives; and they esteemed it a blessed privilege to stand on the threshold of a new era and labor for those who had passed from the old oligarchy of slavery into the new commonwealth of freedom” (271). Dr. Latimer and Iola are united in a common cause, working to help former slaves transition into a new realm of freedom. There are no “barriers” or “compulsions” to keep them from the “commonwealth of freedom.” Harper’s use of anti-slavery rhetoric in her discussion of marriage is telling, for using a language of freedom to describe an (sometimes) oppressive social institution draws an obvious parallel between the two. But Dr. Latimer and Iola are revising the narrative, united in “one grand and noble purpose,” working to end oppression on a variety of levels.

Domestic Spaces in The Lamplighter Blog #4 by Larisa

This week I have done little reading. I have mostly been looking for sources about Marion Harland and fortunately have found a few articles and many primary texts that I hope to use for my mid-semester project. The reading I have done has been about domestic spaces and domesticity, from Clifford Edward Clark, Jr.’s The American Family Home 1800-1960. His ideas have caused me to think differently and see domestic spaces differently in novels. A few ideas that I was aware of before was the importance of domestic space, especially for women to fulfill their roles as wives and mothers. But I had not really analyzed how the house and the space was feminized until reading Clark’s ideas and listened to discussions in Dr. Gaul’s class last week about The Lamplighter. Many of the students pointed out that Gerty’s models of domesticity were closely intertwined with inside spaces. These women follow the prescribed ideals of True Womanhood that Barbara Welter points out, such as piety, purity, domesticity, and submission. For instance, Mrs. Sullivan is never seen outside her home. We do see Emily Graham outside the home, but she is rarely in an outside space, and we see that she is more comfortable inside--such as the house, a church, a private room in a hotel, or retiring in the ladies’ lounge. Patty Pace is often seen outside and in other people’s domestic spaces, but she is not really a true mentor to Gerty. She is merely a foil to Gerty who shows us what Gerty could become if she puts off domesticity and marriage until it is too late.

Using these ideas and insights gained from class discussion, I looked again at the reconciliation scene between Gertrude, Phillip Amory, and Emily Graham in The Lamplighter. She first learns about her father’s identity while reading his letters in her own domestic space, her private room. And when she finishes reading his letters, she flies out of the house, into the out of doors where she is very comfortable, but then enters another domestic space, the summer house. It is in that space, a typical meeting space for lovers, that Gertrude and her father profess their love and acceptance of each other as child and parent. Then the scene shifts back into the house where Emily is waiting for Phillip. Interestingly, she does not come outside, but waits in her female space for him to enter. Gertrude describes Emily as waiting, weeping, longing, and praying for Phillip--all characteristics of the true woman. The narrator reminds us that Emily is a girl still, who had “retained much of the freshness and all the loveliness of her girlhood” (394). So it is in the domestic space that this true woman reconciles with her lover--a reconciliation that seems almost a religious experience as Phillip is forgiven and restored to the family he lost. When he parts from Emily, he leaves her in the room. Then Gertrude enters and she and Emily say a prayer together: "Emily, who, kneeling by the sofa, with clasped hands, uplifted face, and with her white garments sweeping the floor, looked the very impersonation of purity and prayer. Throwing one arm around her neck, Gertrude knelt on the floor beside her, and together they sent up to the throne of God the incense of thanksgiving and praise!” (401). The narrator leaves us in no doubt that Emily and Gertrude are True Women and that their domestic space is what Clark calls a “family altar…more venerable than any altar in the cathedral” (29). True to the tenets of the cult of domesticity, it is the women, not the man in the family that participates in religious ritual.

Reading Clark’s ideas and thinking about the cult of domesticity has also led me to see familiar texts in a new light. For example, last night I watched the last half of the new Masterpiece Theatre version of Sense & Sensibility. I have read the book many times, seen different movie versions, but what struck me this time was the importance of the houses and the domestic spaces in the film. One of the sisters, Elinor, paints a watercolor of their former mansion and hangs it on the wall of their new little cottage when they move in. The painting seems to be all that they have left of their former wealth and seems to remind them of that constantly as it hangs over the fireplace in the main parlor. Anyone walking into the room would immediately see the painting. But at the film’s end, Eleanor has painted a watercolor of the little cottage. She removes the other painting and hangs the new one over the fireplace. While this act seemed unimportant to me the first time I saw the film, it now takes on new significance after my reading about domestic spaces. Clark points out that in the 19th century, people began to identify themselves with their homes and often had photographs taken outside the home, with the home a central figure in the picture. While Eleanor did not paint her family in the picture, this acceptance of the new and smaller domestic space is signified by the new painting. What else is interesting is that while the sisters are often shown in outdoor spaces, at the film’s conclusion, we see both sisters married--Marianne is carried by her husband over the threshold into her new house and Eleanor is seen happily watching her new husband feed their chickens in their yard. Both women are now married and tied to a domestic space. All these connections I missed before, but now I am seeing them!

I just found this publicity photo online and interestingly, the women are pictured with the cottage in the background. Many other shots have this same background. It is interesting to see them with the cottage, which is not where they start or where they finish in the film's action.
http://www.videodetective.com/photos/1275/Sense5.jpg

Sentimental Persuasion: The Minister's Wooing

I'm planing to write about Stowe's The Minister's Wooing, but before I begin my exploration of that text, I'd like to share some thoughts I had during Friday's class discussion of The Lamplighter. The students were doing a fantastic job of working through the performative functions of sentimentality, really latching on to it's persuasive nature: the characters care, they are sympathetic and cry, we become sympathetic, care about the same issues, and cry along with them. As they were talking, I was thinking about how the novel, through Gerty and Emily's early relationship models this behavior for readers. As a young child, Gerty is swayed easily by Emily's tears. The moment Emily is saddened by Gerty's behavior, she regulates her mischief. If Emily cares deeply about something, Gerty also cares. Gerty is sympathetic to Emily's feelings and ideas and grows into a refined young woman by altering her behavior to suit Emily's kin, concerned desires. Modeling this good behavior-- complete with a positive outcome-- may be a method of letting readers know how they should respond to the text's sympathetic scenarios. Young readers, like young Gerty, require instruction, which the book provides and models as a method of ensuring the appropriate and desired reader response. In this way (and I'm sure there are others), sympathy can be use as a rhetorical device of persuasion. Just some thoughts-- now on to The Minister's Wooing.

I've spent the majority of this week reading Stowe's The Minister's Wooing and thinking about how it connects to our previous discussions sentimental novels and intimate female relationships. It's a romance novel, that follows the marriage of Mary Scudder. Quick (very quick) plot summary: Mary deeply religious is in love with her childhood friend James, he leaves for 3 years at sea and is thought dead after a shipwreck. Mary, at the urging of her mother, becomes engaged to the stringent minister. A week before the wedding, James reappears, alive and well. Mary, however, is determined to marry the minister because it's God's will, even though she doesn't love him. It's a long novel, so there's a lot to discuss. The mother/daughter relationship is infuriating and worthy of much discussion. Also, Aaron Burr plays the role of the would-be rake, if he wasn't thwarted and converted by Mary's goodness. And a French character becomes Mary's best friend and confidant, trying at every turn to thwart Mary's engagement to the minister. But for the sake of brevity, I'll stick to one discussion that interests me most: Stowe's style and use of sentimentality.

It seems that Stowe's mission in The Minister's Wooing is to satirize Calvinism, addressing in particular predestination. Interestingly, though, she rarely directly mentions predestination as an open topic in the novel. Her commentary is more acutely felt in her portrayal of her characters as they wrestle with individual actions and religious agency. As characters fall in love with non-believers, they must come to terms with loving someone, believing they are wholly good, and yet knowing that their beliefs will sentence them to an eternity of doom. Stowe, in stroke of genius, allows readers to see all internal conflicts and doubts. In all of their hesitant humanity, it's easy to identify and sympathize with the characters. Even the minister wavers in his conviction. I even found myself identifying with their internal struggles, loving the characters, and was eventually unwilling to believe that the romantic lead was destined for hellfire and damnation. Their humanity was sympathetic, which I thought was a compelling and rhetorically effective usage of sympathy. Of course, Stowe is known for her usage of humanity as a persuasive device. Uncle Tom's Cabin uses the same appeal to audience humanity, though the plot doesn't revolve around a marriage and so doesn't seem as (what I would term) traditionally sentimental. I'm going to keep thinking through this, especially as I continue to read Wyeler's Intricate Relations and will probably post more on this idea soon.