Interpreting Unhappy Women in Edith Wharton's Novels Min-Jung Lee

Florida State University Libraries Electronic Theses, Treatises and Dissertations The Graduate School 2008 Interpreting Unhappy Women in Edith Wharton's Novels Min-Jung Lee Follow this and additional works at the FSU Digital Library. For more information, please contact [email protected] FLORIDA STATE UNIVERSITY COLLEGE OF ARTS AND SCIENCES INTERPRETING UNHAPPY WOMEN IN EDITH WHARTON‟S NOVELS BY MIN-JUNG LEE A Dissertation submitted to the Department of English in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Degree Awarded: Fall Semester, 2008 The members of the Committee approve the Dissertation of Min-Jung Lee defended on October 29, 2008. ____________________________ Dennis Moore Professor Directing Dissertation ____________________________ Jennifer Koslow Outside Committee ____________________________ Ralph Berry Committee Member ____________________________ Jerrilyn McGregory Committee Member Approved: Ralph Berry, Chair, Department of English ii ACKNOWLEGMENTS I embarked on writing this dissertation with fear, excitement, and a realization of the discipline that was going to be needed. While there were difficulties and mistakes made along the way, there are many people whose help has been instrumental. Without the support and guidance of my major professor, Dennis Moore, completion of this dissertation would not be possible. I will always be indebted for his keen insight into my project. Prof. Ralph Berry provided a critical eye and also a generous heart during the early stage of this work and challenged me to make this project worthwhile. He was always aware of my weaknesses and strengths and guided me in making this dissertation into the one that I wanted it to be. I am also very grateful for the commentary and the warm heart of Prof. Jerrilyn McGregory. Historian, Prof. Jennifer Koslow, offered a very fresh view on women‟s issues related to my topic, which was very much appreciated. I also thank Prof. Helen Burke, Prof. David Johnson, Prof. Bruce Boehrer, and Prof. Hunt Hawkins for the support that made my graduate student career at Florida State University possible. For introducing literary studies to me, I am thankful to Prof. Moonsue Shin of Seoul National University, Prof. Hyejoon Yoon of Yeonse University, and Prof. Wookyu Ahn, a retired professor of Hankuk University of Foreign Studies. Special mention should be given to Prof. John Kim of Baekseok University for his unflagging encouragement and assistance during the final stage of this dissertation. When I l lost heart, John reminded me of a saying by Milan Kundera which I was forgetting: “God is laughing when He sees me thinking.” My friends, Joanna Beall, Matt Hobson, Michael Garriga, Erin Moore, Nikki Louis, Frank Giampietro, and Timothy Welch from the English department at FSU and Diane Foster from the Dirac Science Library at FSU were the ones who passionately read through the draft versions of the dissertation. Their honest responses always made me want to rethink about the issue and rewrite the drafts. Along the way, they never failed to provide me compassion and a cheerful spirit. Lastly, I thank my parents for their love, sacrifice, and prayers. Their faith in me has never wavered, and I am indebted to them eternally. iii TABLE OF CONTENTS Abstract…………………………………………………………………………….…..iv INTRODUCTION…………………………………………………………………….…1 1. NO DEFEAT: “SUPERHUMAN” MAY WELLAND IN THE AGE OF INNOCENCE………………………………………………………………………..17 2. NO EXIT: SOUL-SEEKING LILY BART IN THE HOUSE OF MIRTH………....40 3. NO LIMIT: ENERGETIC UNDINE SPRAGG IN THE CUSTOM OF THE COUNTRY…………………………………………………………………………..71 4. NO PAIN: SOULLESS PAULINE MANFORD IN THE TWILIGHT SLEEP…...100 5. NO FEAR: COURAGEOUS ELLEN OLENSKA IN THE AGE OF INNOCENCE… ………………………………………………………………………………………...124 CONCLUSION……………………………………………………………………….154 BIBLOGRAPHY……………………………………………………………………...161 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH…………………………………………….……………173 iv ABSTRACT There is nothing new under the sun in human experiences of inevitable disappointment, suffering, and pain derived from imperfect human nature and the reality of human life. This dissertation analyzes female characters that suffer from sorrow, pain, and tribulation in these novels by Edith Wharton: The Age of Innocence (1920), The House of Mirth (1905), The Custom of the Country (1913) and Twilight Sleep (1927). Female characters that I discuss belong to a group of upper-class in New York, ranged from post-Civil War era to post-World War I. I focus on how they cope with complications and endure unhappiness resulting from their limited positions in society and the inadequacy of their marriages. This dissertation aims to explore the social, cultural, and psychological conditions that lead Wharton‟s female characters toward a new consciousness and to examine how human psychology develops based on the principles of the analytical psychology of Carl Jung and his followers rather than the approach we associate with Sigmund Freud. As feminist scholars have pointed out, Freud‟s theory does not hold for girls because boys‟ and girls‟ Oedipal complexes are not symmetrical. A girl does not simply transfer her affection from mother to father and give up her tender feelings for her mother. Instead, the bond is more likely to be sustained, and the relation to her father is added to it. Girls often come to define themselves more in relation to others, rather than as separate and isolated. The impact of feminist scholarship since the 1970s has restored Wharton‟s works to the American canon. Having shifted from the external factors to the psychological domain, Wharton‟s unhappy female characters represent the oppression of what Jung identifies as the Feminine, not of women. The problem lies in the lack of relationship between a woman‟s ego and her archetypes—both Feminine and Masculine. This study demonstrates how the character‟s life is shaped by the suppression and distortion, and later, the implosive and explosive power of her evolving Feminine consciousness. Wharton's characters embody her philosophy that paradox is the essence of living, particularly the paradox in the human psyche. Although one longs for harmony, peace and resolution, experiences teach one that it is conflict and failure that stimulate one‟s growth and evolution to another stage in life. v INTRODUCTION The Feminine in Distress: Edith Wharton‟s Women in a Liminal Position Remember the ladies, and be more generous and favourable to them than your ancestors…. Regard us then as beings placed by providence under your protection and in immitation of the supreme being make use of that power only for our happiness. --Letter from Abigail Adams to John Adams, March 31, 1776 This dissertation analyzes Edith Wharton‟s novels set in New York society as it was undergoing changes during the transitional period from the post-Civil War to the post-World War I era. Wharton‟s novels center on authentically human women characters who seek their happiness through marriage and family. However, in spite of each character‟s strenuous struggle, none of the characters attain the happiness they pursue. Instead of happiness, women characters in Wharton‟s novels have to cope with complications and endure unhappiness resulting from the inadequacy of their respective marriages and from their limited positions in society. This dissertation aims to explore the social, cultural, and psychological conditions that lead Wharton‟s female characters toward a new consciousness and to examine how human psychology develops based on the principles of the analytical psychology of Carl Jung and his followers. Happiness has been major concern in American literature dating as far back as “The Declaration of Independence.” Thomas Jefferson manifested “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness” as inalienable rights. Jefferson argued that in order to gain “inalienable rights,” colonists needed to separate from their parent country and to rebel against the tyrannical authority of the British crown.1 The Enlightenment ideal influenced the political system and promoted the idea of an autonomous individualism. During the age of Enlightenment, philosophers abandoned the doctrine of creation and substituted a state of nature. In this primeval state, individuals are the only ultimate reality; social bonds are created by the choices individuals make. French philosopher Pierre Manent sums up the basic principle of modern liberalism: “No individual can have an obligation to which he has not consented” (35). Jefferson wanted America to replace patriarchal hierarchy with a true consent that is according to John Milton “a love fitly dispos‟d to mutual help and comfort of life” (qtd. in Armstrong and Tennenhouse 168). Locke in the Two Treatises of 1 Government had introduced the idea that “reason” provides the basis of individual rights and the source of political power. A child acquires the right of self-government when he acquires rationality through education. Locke, however, emphasized that rationality came only to men. On the other hand, women are subjected to the authority of their fathers and husbands. Locke first conceived a household modeled on the state, a miniature kingdom. In The Imaginary Puritan, Nancy Armstrong and Leonard Tennenhouse develop the idea from Locke, pointing out that “only in America could private property provide the basis for an individuated kingdom where each individual reigned supreme” (24). In this sense, Armstrong and Tennenhouse think that conceiving a nuclear family as the new family unit is a landmark in

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