ATMOSPHERIC MODERNISM: RARE MATTER AND DYNAMIC SELF-WORLD THRESHOLDS by Rohanna Green A thesis submitted in conformity with the requirements for the graduate degree of Doctor of Philosophy Graduate Department of English University of Toronto © Copyright by Rohanna Green 2011 Atmospheric Modernism: Rare Matter and Dynamic Self-World Thresholds Doctor of Philosophy, 2011 Rohanna Green Department of English, University of Toronto Abstract Defining rarity as a relative quality in matter roughly opposite to density, this dissertation focusses on the way material qualities of molecular gases, such as semi- opacity, permeation, and blending, inform modernist representations of embodied spatial experience. In modernist writing, rare matter—including air, fog, smoke, and haze— functions as an active component of the sensory environment, filling up the negative space that sets off subjects from objects, and characters from settings. Representing matter across the full range of the rarity-density spectrum allows modernist writers to challenge the ontological status of such boundaries, and to develop dynamic spatial models of the self-world threshold. The Introduction defines rare matter and examines its function as a sensory medium that can alternately define and blur subject/object boundaries. Interpreting dynamic thresholds as products of authorial activism, I argue that modernist narratives disrupt the normative constructions of the self-world boundary that prevailed in biomedical discourse around the turn of the century. Chapter 1, seeking to expand the scope of modernist object studies to include rare matter, analyzes illustrated books about London to demonstrate the increased cultural visibility of the atmosphere in the modernist period. Visual and verbal gestalt effects, modelled on the hermeneutic oscillation between looking at and looking through the fog, foreground the materiality of ii the atmosphere that fills up three-dimensional space, pressing up against the thresholds of the body and disrupting fixed distinctions between subjects and their surroundings. Chapter 2 shows how D. H. Lawrence harnesses the properties of rare matter to construct dynamic representations of the self-world boundary. In his early novels and his criticism, the oscillation between self-diffusion and self-differentiation expresses characters’ psychological responsiveness to changing interpersonal and ontological pressures. Chapter 3 demonstrates how Virginia Woolf takes advantage of rare attributes like permeation, fluid motion, and variable particle spacing to model process-oriented communities that incorporate dynamic shifts between social autonomy and collective identity. The Conclusion examines rare imagery in modernist scenes of narration, arguing that dynamic self-world thresholds help to articulate a responsive form of reader-text interaction that allows for the alternation of independent and collaborative reading practices. iii Acknowledgements I am grateful for the opportunity to have spent several years reading broadly in the field of literary studies, and learning gradually to find my way as a writer and researcher. Encountering the voices of courageous authors, both contemporary and historical, has enriched my relationship with the world around me, often in ways I cannot describe. Although the research process offered useful space for quiet reflection, this project really took shape through innumerable conversations with colleagues, mentors, friends, and family members. My supervisor, Melba Cuddy-Keane, showed me what it means to collaborate with integrity, to speak with confidence, and to chase even the rarest intuitions onto the page. My committee members ―Sarah Wilson, Cannon Schmitt, and Alan Bewell ―each challenged me to reconsider assumptions, make bolder connections, and look for big ideas in my mountain of details. Thoughtful comments and questions from the additional members of my defense committee―Mark Morrisson, Michael Cobb, and Deidre Lynch ―helped me to articulate future directions for the project. Teaching mentors (particularly Nick Mount and Daniel Justice), along with all of the students in my classes and tutorials, helped me to connect my work to the real-life questions that make literature thrive in our classrooms and communities. Ted Bishop, who supervised my M.A. project, helped to focus my interest on materiality and literature at a formative moment in my graduate education. The Modernist Reading and Research Group and the Modernist Keywords Project provided supportive intellectual communities for collaborative learning and scholarship. Peer feedback meetings with Kim Fairbrother Canton and Kelly Minerva, combining strong coffee with equally stimulating conversation, helped me to stay on track and to unravel several key conceptual problems. iv For the financial assistance that allowed me to complete this research, I would like to acknowledge the following publicly-funded institutions: the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, the Ontario Graduate Scholarship Program, and the University of Toronto. Most of all, I would like to thank my friends and family for helping me live the good life and still fulfill this rather unwieldy commitment. Among the many people who got me started and kept me going are Matthew and Sadie Rotstein, Elizabeth and Donald Gibson, all of my aunts, uncles, and cousins, Donald Sells, Elizabeth Dickens, Kelly Minerva, Chris Hicklin, Kit Dobson, Aubrey Hanson, Sean Carrie, the Chapman’s Homer softball team, the Manning House crew, the Sunday night poker people, the girls’ breakfast club, the old McGill Daily crowd with its marvellous Toronto additions, the folks at the Rising Sun School of T’ai Chi Ch’uan, and Edith Varga from Hart House, who taught me how to stretch so I could study without neck pain. This project is the most recent in a series of madcap adventures that began when I was very young; it is dedicated to the Gibson Green family ―Mom, Dad, Eli and Zoey ― who have been my teachers from the very beginning. v Table of Contents Abstract ............................................................................................................................... ii Acknowledgements ............................................................................................................ iv Table of Contents ............................................................................................................... vi List of Figures .................................................................................................................... ix Introduction ..........................................................................................................................1 1. What is Rare Matter? ....................................................................................................4 2. Rare Matter and Dynamic Threshold Imagery ...........................................................10 3. Freedom of Perception: Dynamic Self-World Thresholds as Modernist Social Activism .....................................................................................................................13 4. Dissertation Chapter Structure ....................................................................................18 Chapter 1. Something in the Air: Incorporating Rare Materiality into Modernist Studies ........................................................................................................................23 1. “The New Element”: Rare Imagery in Transition ......................................................23 2. Extending Modernist Object Studies Across the Rarity-Density Spectrum ...............30 3. “Let the Science be as Vague as its Subject”: Rare Matter in Studies of Modernist Vagueness .................................................................................................40 4. “Foggy City”: Foregrounding Rare Matter in Illustrated Texts about London, 1898-1938 ...................................................................................................................50 5. Interpreting Ford’s London: The Multistability of Rare Images ................................74 vi 6. “Suddenly Space Exists”: Fog and the Narration of Three-Dimensional Urban Space ...............................................................................................................79 7. “Seeing Nothing”: Foregrounding Atmospheric Immersion Through Deliberate Gestalt Shifts ..............................................................................................................84 Chapter 2. “Herself Melted Out Like Scent”: Body Thresholds and Self-World Relationships in D. H. Lawrence’s Essays and Early Novels ....................................90 1. Lawrence’s Dynamic Approach to Self-World Relationships ....................................90 2. Essays I: Rare Matter and the Dynamics of Immersion in an Infinite Material Universe ......................................................................................................................97 3. Essays II: The Rarity-Density Spectrum in Dynamic Models of Self-World Thresholds ................................................................................................................108 4. Rare Imagery and the Destabilization of Self-World Thresholds in Sons and Lovers ........................................................................................................120 5. Paul’s Development Toward Dynamic Self-World Relationships in Sons and Lovers