Searching for Stability

Beloved is a tale of outcasts being outcast by even outcasts. First there's Sethe, a black who lives in a home cursed by her dead baby that others (even other blacks) won't go near. It was once Baby Sugg's house, and once she dies, everybody abandons the place. Denver goes to school when she's seven, but stops going once Nelson Lord makes it clear that she's being avoided by the others with his questions. Paul D voluntarily enters the home, but before he gets there he finds help from some rogue Cherokee who refused to go with their brethren to Oklahoma, and they're sick with small pox. Because Paul D arrives, even Denver feels abandoned until the arrival of Beloved, the incarnation of the baby ghost that Paul D yells out of 124. Paul D eventually gets moved out toward the shed, where he sleeps out in the cold, unwilling to sleep in the house.

This pattern of abandonment and out-casting in Beloved is obviously a recurring theme, but I think the point Toni Morrison is making goes deeper. Halfway through the novel, we see several times where others are welcomed, too. Paul D is welcomed into 124, Beloved is welcomed, and even Sethe herself is welcomed into 124 by Baby Suggs, where she stays well after Baby Suggs dies.

Throughout the book, we've seen the phrase "Love nothing." Indeed, it seems that every time somebody is let in, something bad happens to that character. "However many times Baby tried to deny it, Sethe knew the trouble at 124 started when she jumped off the wagon." The recurrence of pushing others away either results in the characters becoming better or else having no effect. When Paul D is with the Cherokee, he ends up being the last of the buffalo men, and when he realizes that he takes off for the North under the chief's directions. When Denver shuts herself off from Paul D and Sethe, Beloved shows up. When Sethe runs off without Halle, she finds others to care for her.

I'm struggling to find something that will link this book together for me, or cause me to say, 'o, that's what this book is about!' I'm struggling to find solid themes, but the patterns of abandonment and welcoming-in I keep finding have to mean something. Perhaps I'll figure this out later tonight.

Here's something, though: the characters and their searches for stability. "Why now, with Paul D instead of the ghost, was she breaking up? getting scared? needing Baby? The worst was over, wasn't it? She had already got through, hadn't she? With the ghost in 124 she could bear, do, solve anything." Perhaps the reason for all of this is that with things constantly changing, she needed something steady. That baby's ghost, causing mischief even, had been that steady ground. Paul D comes in and messes everything up; the baby's gone, and Paul D, being human, makes life spontaneous and unsteady for Sethe again.

For my final creative project, I'm going to give Count Dracula a Facebook account. The idea was given at the beginning of the class, and it has seemed interesting to me ever since. I will incorporate all major characters as they interact with the Vampire through Wall Posts and status updates. Each of the major characters - Quincey, Mina, Lucy, the Count, Van Helsing, Seward, Jonathon, and Arthur - will also have their own pages, complete with their own status updates, wall posts, and profiles.

This project will rely heavily on the idea that though the characters were written to exist in another time, they speak, live, and post in our own, and therefore the ideas and thoughts and even interactions will be bent to fit not just their time but our own digital age. In other words answering the question: what would the characters of Dracula be like in the year 2009? It also works well as a method for exploring each character's motivations and interactions with each other.

Steamed Rice

Interview with the Vampire takes the romanticism of the vampire we found in Dracula and turns it around, changing the perspective from that of those hunting the vampire to the vampire itself, even while using the first-person to tell the story. Along with the parallels to Dracula's narrative style, Interview with the Vampire takes the veiled eroticism in Dracula and exploits it, heightening it to a fever pitch that cannot be ignored. Perhaps this is borne of necessity, as its told as the vampire sees it rather than how a Victorian man or woman should see it, but I think that most of it is Anne Rice making sure the reader knows how sexual the vampire is.

The sexuality of the vampire is first immediately apparent when Anne Rice writes, "and he lay down beside me on the steps, he movement so graceful and so personal that at once it made me think of a lover." Of course, they're both men, which is something the late-Victorian Stoker could never reconcile in his novel: the feeding of a male vampire on a male victim. It is, of course, an extremely sexual maneuver to penetrate one with the extended canine so prominent in vampires of literature, and it is a bit of a risk for a man to feed on a man in such a manner. Anne Rice continues the play of sexual content with "I remember that the movement of his lips raised the hair all over my body, sent a shock of sensation through my body that was not unlike the pleasure of passion." Again, we see two male lovers, locked in a sort of blood-bonding ritual that removes the metaphor of sex in previous vampire novels and exposes it, bringing it to the fore; Anne Rice does not even make an attempt at hiding it. She extends the sexuality, this time in more double-entendre form than anything, in "his teeth withdraw with such a keenness that the two puncture wounds seemed enormous, lined with pain."

Directly after Lestat drains Louis, Lestat needs to give blood back to Louis in order for Louis to fully become the vampire. So Lestat feeds Louis, "I drank, sucking the blood out of the holes, experiencing for the first time since infancy the special pleasure of sucking nourishment, the body focused with the mind upon one vital source." The reader is left with nowhere left for the imagination to go, the sexuality of the deed has come to completion in vulgar clarity with Lestat replacing Louis's mother. Freud would undoubtedly have something to say about how the man wishes to swap fluids with his mother or some such, and I think it's come to its full realization here. Of course, if the reader is dim-witted enough to be left with any cluelessness about whether or not the vampire's birth is a blatantly sexual act, Anne Rice makes sure to put the two in a coffin together. I can just imagine her clapping her hands together and saying, 'there! That should do it!'

I'm finding the overtly sexual tones distasteful and overwrought. Dracula included very little of this; there it was intellectual, with implied sexuality. Here we find it being overtly sexual without remorse, but I guess that's what sells the book in the first place.

Superstition

Dr. Seward, psychiatrist and the overseer of an entire asylum for the mentally ill, looks to Van Helsing for direction and instruction (even if Van Helsing is Seward's mentor, there is something to be said there). There is a cross that Jonathon Harker is offered; he takes it only out of sympathy for an old woman. After his stay in the Castle, he escapes and falls into a fit. He is then nursed back to health by nuns in a convent as he runs from the castle of Count Dracula. Both he and Mina are then wed by Catholics and seem to be growing more fond of Catholic devises, thereby abandoning their secular leanings for something mystical and certainly more superstitious.

Then there is Dracula; a centuries-old vampire set loose in the enlightened, science-driven London. Dracula, who is defeated by superstitions and religious rights that the 'modern man' has since left behind. Dracula is capable of doing the damage he does because of the doubt of others. Could it be that Dracula by Bram Stoker is a call for moderation? Is a middle ground between the abandonment of religion and the total digestion of science called for?

We have for support in the matter Van Helsing, a man dedicated to both science and superstition. Seward writes, in a letter to Arthur, "I am in doubt, and so have done the best thing I know of; I have written to my old friend and master, Professor Van Helsing, of Amsterdam, who knows as much about obscure diseases as anyone in the world." In this glib we see proof that Van Helsing is the professor and master of Dr. Seward. We also see that Seward is in doubt; doubt being a word commonly used to describe one's faith or belief in the supernatural. It is obvious that Seward here is not doubting his faith in God, but rather that he is not thinking of the supernatural at all. He determines that since the disease is not physical, "I have come to the conclusion that it must be mental." Never does he think - and all of modern science does this - that the condition could be something from outside of their books of medicine.

Yet it is Van Helsing, the mentor of Seward, that realizes Lucy's condition is far more dreadful than something that can be found in medical journals. "Van Helsing had a way of going on his own road, no matter who remonstrated." The reason I enjoy Dracula so much is that Van Helsing is not simply a man of science, but also a man of God, and spreads that to others. In fact, it is only after his visit to Mina that she first uses the name of God in the novel (as far as I'm aware - I could be wrong).

The conclusion can only be a need to temper science and religion; not giving too much sway to either is certainly the way to defeat our own demons.

The First Chapter

As I begin to read through Dracula I am finding - even in the beginnings of the first chapter - that there are two things the reader will find that will vastly impact the story in the later pages. These factors of setting will work against Jonathon Harker once he arrives with the Count, and work for the overall narrative work. The first important thing would be the isolation of the Count and that of Castle Dracula; the second will be the Count's far-reaching influence.

We see in the first chapter that although Jonathon starts out in good time, "the further East you go the more unpunctual the trains." We also find that Jonathon, doing some study before accepting his position, "was not able to light on any map or work giving the exact locality of the Castle Dracula." Once Jonathon boards Dracula's coach, he finds himself falling into more hilly and rough country, without roads in good repair. This combination of mountainous terrain, late trains, unknown location, and roads in disrepair will place Dracula in solitude, and force Jonathon into that solitude with him, cutting off any chance of escape. Of course this is precisely what Dracula wants.

Meanwhile, still in the first chapter, we see portents of doom for poor Mr. Harker as he meets with the landlord, who had evidently received a letter from the Count, which paid for Jonathon's room and board. It also made the entire town uneasy, and we find that they pity Jonathon. The landlord's wife gives him a crucifix, and the town tries to ward off the evil spirits. What we are seeing is Dracula's influence and reputation spreading into the town of Bistritz. This is not only fear, but Dracula's ability to influence situations from afar. It further adds to the isolation of the Count and therefore, Jonathon, and prevents the townsfolk from taking action when they could be helping Jonathon to rid Transylvania of Dracula.

This is the setting for Bram Stoker's Dracula: isolation in a realm where you don't have any control - a contrast to Wuthering Heights and Frankenstein, where each dealt with the main characters having control and dealing with the consequences of their poor choices. In Wuthering Heights it was Heathcliff, and in Frankenstein, naturally it was Victor.

Yikes. Spivak.

Where do I go with Spivak? This is mostly over my head reading, which is not something I usually (or have ever, the truth be told) say, but I'm going to try to read into his work and try to form something useful that I can take from the piece. If my understanding of it lacks any utility, then maybe I'll at least find something coherent to write about from Spivak. The fault, I'm sure, lay upon myself and my own limited understanding of the period, the vocabulary (which I slowly rectify), and my unfamiliarity of the other works he quotes, rather than any deficiency with Spivak's writing.

Spivak begins by saying "It should not be possible to read nineteenth-century British literature without remembering that imperialism, understood as England's social mission, was a crucial part of the cultural representation of England to the English." He also says that writers played a role in that, and that these facts are ignored. If we were to only look at these facts, "we would produce a narrative, in literary history, of the 'worlding' of what is now called 'the Third World.'"

Spivak continues, later, by declaring the point of his essay, which is that "the discursive field of imperialism does not produce unquestioned ideological correlatives for the narrative structuring of the book." As he says in other words, even though a reader could certainly read Frankenstein from an Imperialist viewpoint, the book does not go without questioning the English belief that imperialism is a moral imperative.

Referencing Frankenstein's episode with the female creature that he destroys, Spivak shows a relationship between it and racism as "the dark side of imperialism understood as social mission." As I see it, Spivak shows us that Mary Shelley is relating Victor to England's overinflated sense of duty in conquest. Frankenstein refuses to create the female counterpart to his primary creation because the new creature could very well end up with a taste for children, despite having created the first creature and having nothing to do with it, causing it to thirst for vengeance. Victor's conquest was that of natural law, just as England and Europe conquered, say, Africa. England believed themselves capable of taking on the responsibilities of those people, and failed.

To use Africa as the example, we should note that after that conquest, the Europeans ravaged the landscape, forcing the people there into reliance on the care of its masters. With imperialism, the English believed that they were doing the people in favor, providing them with the means of advancement and evolution, for they believed the inhabitants of those lands to be a lesser race. This is the darks side of imperialism that Spivak relates.

In Frankenstein we see the same thing occurring. Frankenstein rushes into the creation of the beast, for he believed it could be done. When he saw what he had done, he has no more sense of responsibility for the thing, but rather runs from it. This irresponsibility causes the creature to turn on him, and furthermore it causes the creature's miserable state of being. This could easily be said of some of the places conquered in the name of imperialism. Once the English were there, the conquered places were ignored, which (after the time of Shelley's writing, of course) lead to their withdrawal and even today we see the ramifications of misplaced civic duty and the birth of racism toward the believed "lesser races."

Where Does Clerval Fit In?

The men in Mary Shelley's Frankenstein undoubtedly have some issues. They're too involved with work, being one of them. Walton seems to love his sister so much, yet leaves her behind in order to seek fame and the North Pole. Victor Frankenstein says, in raising the monster, "I had worked hard for nearly two years, for the sole purpose of infusing life into an inanimate body. For this I had deprived myself of rest and health. I had desired it with an ardor that far exceeded moderation..." We see that Victor's passion to raise this creature from death made him neglect everything, and the four years prior, we know that he neglected his family in Sweden, not even sparing time in order to send them a single letter. Victor's father knows this ambition as well, putting off his marriage for as long as possible until he saw that his bride had no visible means of supporting herself. Also, his father demands that Victor write home, else "I regard any interruption in your correspondence as a proof that your other duties are equally neglected." Amongst their other qualities, blind ambition and scientific curiosity are those we see Mary Shelley give the men time and time again.

The women, however, seem to carry no fault. They are loyal, loving, and nurture beyond what they really should. Self-sacrificing comes to mind. Beyond that, the women - especially Elizabeth - are described as beautiful, or at least a picture of loveliness comes to mind. They are, so to speak, perfect women.

Then enters Clerval. He's a good friend of Victors, and when Victor falls ill for many months, it is Clerval who takes care of him. Specifically, we find that Clerval is Victor's nurturer, which Shelley has thus far reserved for the females of the story. Yet we also find that Clerval, going to Inglostadt to study, has the scientific passions of the men. Yet, Clerval has the ambition to see Victor through to health, ignoring his own need to study to see his friend get better.

This makes me wonder: where does Clerval fit in within the story of Frankenstein? He takes the characteristics of both the men and the women as the ambitious nurturer.