NOTES –
Renata Wasserman’s course (August 2006)
FRANKENSTEIN:
It was proposed that Victor is the scientist
while Walton is romantic. However, it depends of how you understand Romanticism.
If you think of the sublime, Victor Frankenstein is the one who goes for the
sublime (his quest is Napoleonic), while Walton can be seen as a “classical”
figure. In this sense Victor is romantic. And Walton x Frankenstein (double)
GOTHIC X BAROQUE:
English renascence is a bit baroque, Shakespeare
was alive during the Baroque, he does not obey the classical rules, he is
excessive, packs in too many discourses. French classicism (Carvel, Racine) do
not like Shakespeare excesses. // Cloning as a bad word (Mobile cloning, credit
card cloning, etc)
DRACULA:
John
Polidori wrote The Vampyre the first
story of that sort. Sheridan Le Fanu writes Carmilla: references to
homosexuality, fear of giving yourself up to strong feelings; she seduces a
girl but, eventually, gets caught in the end.
Bram
Stoker’s Dracula deals with unbelievable things, structurally complex it is a
genre which needs validation. This validation is shown in the narrative in
things as short-hand writing (indicative of business – like language) and it is
still linked to the women work-force in the job market. Type writers,
telegraphs, etc are also indicatives of this making of the “truth”, validation.
This come in the sense of making or creating records, people work: contracts,
solicitors, and business. The novel is put together in a way that nobody (no
narrator) takes responsibility for it. The novel ends up with Mina’s account,
which could mean that all the documents weren’t true.
MODERN X MEDIEVAL (Associated with
foreign lands)
First
time a novel measures up England to the continental countries (unlike the
gothic novelists). It takes a Catholic man to take care of a catholic threat
(primitiveness).
There
is a super imposed sexuality in the females, at the time, critics did not
acknowledge the sexuality in the novel or either did not want to talk about it.
Whether one or the other, as far as Victorian Society goes, it was a way of
having your kicks and not having to mention it, which might explain the success
of this book.
The
Catholic witch-doctor is necessary to cure the savage/primitive in the realm of
the city. Stage accents are used to depict different nationalities.
Characters
in Dracula are always around a dinner table. Oral pleasure associated
with the society, characters stuck in oral phase? Dracula does both the orally
the phallic. Lucy gets symbolic raped (stake) and the body is mutilated.
Dracula invades England, buys property there.
He gets there on a Russian vessel and he is described as having an aquiline
nose, there are heaps of gold in his room, he is associated with the Jew.
History rectifies the novel, play (thrill by). Jew echoes the question of the
blood/Christ/church.
Jonathan
introduces Dracula to paper money, the new economics. Dracula bleeds money. 2
scenes: going down the wall with black cape flowing behind him (?) and a scene
where he is among old type gold coins from all over the world. (L’Argent – E. Zola). But Dracula is not
the old Jew banker he’s a transitional type of financer, (but also the
foreigner and aristocrat), who must be stopped before he learns, everything. (Prejudice
xenophobia. Fiction slightly out of control. Violence in the books, Dracula
guards the frontiers of the orient (greater evil) against the contamination
(fear of contamination).
H.Ibsen → Ghost
Characteristics of English Modernity:
Frames: (Dracula)
England → other countries
Protestantism → Catholicism
Science → Superstition
Invasion of non-modernity into Modern England
the solution is to attack this “antiquity” with its own weapon (Van Helsing).
Dracula is the invader from the past. In Frankenstein the scientific
development brings fear of the future. (Frankenstein trying to create life,
while women are supposed to). Only entities, like the church or women, have the
legal right to create (Gothic x Religion) 19th century trying to be
naturalistic/scientific but still co-opting withhold costumes, such as going to
church. Romanticism had a direct relationship with God, did not need to go to
an establishment (church).
Jan
Watt decides the novel begins in the 18th century in England.
Bakhtin mentions the Alexandrian Greek novel. And there’s the Spanish Model. Is
there such a thing as a gothic novel? Todorov indecidability.
Theodor Storm – Germany x Denmark (Shimmel Rider)
- dam, burial, imposture, all sidedishes of the gothic. Natural elements –
destructive power of nature, gothic landscape hostile relation, sublime which
is however valued in the sense human beings do not control nature, impulse for
domination, hubris in trying to dominate nature. Cautionary tale. Acknowledge
the power of nature “appropriate” → co-opt, adapt, “bourgeoisie order” → not in
good use.
The
Bourgeois order tames the gothic, reasonable because most of us prefer order,
fictional control although acknowledging the power of nature.
Difference
between Terror x Horror:
Horror frequently involves bodily fluids.
Dostoyevsky and Poe, examples of psychological terror.
Psychosomatic disease.
Ø Gothic
Architecture: Caves / towers / castles preferred
settings
Nodal Moments (gothic moments)
Property money – who is the real owner of the castle?
Circulation of money where does the money come from?
Contract – Emily in Udolpho
Devil – Sign and seal is necessary for selling the
soul.
Write in bold ongoing issues (capitalism – Dracula)
Takes place in the borders of something:
Ø Human
x Mechanical
Ø Human
x Animal (The Fly)
Ø Life
X death
DER
SANDMANN:
This text has been lead as a defense of the
Enlightment .
There is
a character called “Clara”, a fireplace in the centre of the room (Lar >
Lareira), which is the “good” Fire and fire in the father’s office, “bad” fire
(shift in the fire’s meaning). Nathaniel moves away from Clara (Luminous) attracted
by knowledge. Cappolla
(cientist/magician)and the fear of the eyes [huge eyes in dolls in many horror
films]. Power of the eyes, windows of the soul, Oedipus guided by the little
girl.
While in
Dracula water and earth are important the theme here is fire. Alquimist (Faust)
unnatural Nature, pursuit of knowledge and its dangers (Adam/Eve), Marlowe
Faust (Helen of Troy) Prometheus > fire technicality.
Der Sandmann would be
more suited for a psychological reading, as it may expand the world we
apprehend with our senses, learn about Nature and extend our perceptions.
Der Sandmann materializes.
Sublime:
What is taking the place of the natural Sublime in these texts? There is little
or no natural scenes.
* Debasement of the term unheimlich, as in awesome elimination of romanticism? (Problematic
reading)
Mother – double – Maid
Clara – Olimpia
THE FALL
OF THE HOUSE OF USHER
Poe’s
fear of claustrophobia? (only mention this psychological aspects of the author if
you have concrete evidence and make a point of it or people can say: so what?).
In the
house of usher the house’s description makes it look like a face: things hanging
from (the roof), crack (nose), empty eyes socket (windows), door (mouth), tarn
(secluded lake) no way in or out.
The lake
closed in itself, suggesting one genetic line of family branch, the fact that
she falls on her brother suggests incest as a theme. Isolation, even
the burial is in the house. Narrator is a catalyst of the situation. Reflection
of the house in the lake. Nothing gets out of the house.
Fragments,
mirrors, house collapses (implosion) / pictures / stories imbedded / books
mentioned/ poem in the middle (head, eye, reason). Things in the story
coalesce, come together. Constricting, repetition.
[Flannery
O’ Connor - southern writer “A good man is hard to find”. She’s Catholic, clean
style “Good country people”, a story about a mechanical leg and lack of love.
Woman is a philosopher embusted by a salesman on the top of a roof, she’s
needy.]
*Poe’s Berenice > Vagina Dentada. Fear of
women having teeth in usual places.
* Poe’s
detective story > Purloined letter
and Golden Bug. (helper sidekick:
Sancho Panza)
THE CASK
OF AMONTILHADO (1846)
Poe does
not obey the construction of characters as we know it, dispenses cause and
effect (don’t know where it comes from and don’t see the consequences) Placed
in the present. Accumulate signifiers, Poe likes the grosse. Psychic
material, it is interested in exorcising rather than Passing on Wisdom, desire
for impunity, absolute power, no jester.
Some themes raised in the course:
* The Mob (Revolution) The Monk’s final cleasing and lack of control.
*Psychic
* Man x woman
* Science
