132 COMMODITY GOTHICISM COMMODITY GOTHICI would-be consumers Jacobs, W. & Jones, G. (1985) The Comic Book and bodily corruption, as wonderful than ‘table-turning’ ever was,” is also example of such invocations. Hen Heroes. New York: Crown. of the products of slavery find themselves thoroughly uncanny (Marx 1992: 31). And directly eicts commodities’ refu McCue, G. S. & Bloom, C. (1993) DarkKnights: The consuming enslaved bodies instead. Such indeed, as “critics as diverse as Jacques Derrida, “mirror” one another, by depictir New Comics in Context. London: Pluto Press. visions may well attain their most crystallized Chris Baldick, and Terry Eagleton,” point out figure who stands frozen, half-turn Pearson, R. E. & Uricchio, W. teds.) (1991) The form within what Timothy Morton has since this turn to the Gothic seems “central” to modiste’s glass. What stands refle York: Routledge. Many Lives of the Batman. New termed the “blood sugar’ topos” (Morton Marx’s thinking as a whole (Smith 2005: 39). mirror before her is not just her identity: The super- Round, 1. (2005) fragmented 2000: 172—3): that is, the Gothic scenario Where Marx’s fetishized table merely “stands rately dressed form; it is the emaci hero condition. International Journal ofComic Art whereby slave-produced sugar, once stirred on its head” (Marx 1992: 31), however, objects of the needlewoman who seems tc 7(2), 358—69. into a cup of tea, transforms itself (back) into in the commodity Gothic mode turn on their while laboring over the ball-go Sabin, R. (1996) Comics, Comix and Graphic Novels. all-too literal embodiment of its own consumers. In this, they London: Phaidon. a bloody, take the already would-be consumer has just put c brutal histories of origin. uncanny process of commodity fetishization 2003: 150, Wafldey 1981: 36—54). If Marx’s 1867 account of “the fetishism of one step further, in part by taking it a half step Punch cartoon of 1848, the pattern Commodities and the Secret Thereof’ (Marx back. What if objects, while retaining the tran smock, depicted in close-up, reveal. 1992: 31) postdates visions of “blood sugar,” scendent claims of commodities, attempted to eningly low going rate for ten hot Commodity Gothicism however, that work remains indispensible to resist, and perhaps avenge, their subjection interspersed with images of del understanding such visions’ force, not least as to abstraction, by laying bare the now-hidden, (Lootens 2003: 151; Walldey 1981: TRICIA LOOTENS key points of origin for the “post-Romantic “grotesque idea” of their own now-occluded these half-reversals are, moreove] Gothic imagination” (Smith 2005: 39). for in material, even corporeal origins? This is the draw power from earlier work. I In its most intense forms, the commodity Marx’s terms, even before blood sugar enters fear that creates blood sugar; and it is a fear child’s smock cartoon is named Gothic represents a sinister variant on what the teacup in the scenario above, that sugar that animates commodity Gothicism through the greatest of all object-heirs to b Elaine freedgood has influentially termed the has already undergone transformation into a out the nineteenth century and beyond. the subject, that is, of Thomas Hc “ideas in things.” As Freedgood conceives them, commodity. Like its counterpart, that now- With its Crystal Palace, department stores, successful “Song of the Shirt.” Ir those material objects that fill Victorian novels legendary “plain, homely, bodily form” of a and explosive development of advertising, ballad, the fabric of clothing comes are frightening enough in their own right: for table to which Marx’s account of fetishism so mid-Victorianism stakes clear and immediate its wearer, as if he were suddenly famously turns (Marx 1992: 13), such sugar has claims as a highpoint ofthe commodity Gothic. dying sweated laborers’ skin: “It i stockpiled in these things the knowledge that is undergone a process of abstraction. for by ren Certainly authors of the realist novel, and you’re wearing out, I But humar on the grisly specifics of conflicts and bears dering objects commodities — by replacing Dickens in particular, have provided particu lives!” (Hood 1970: 305). conquests that a culture can neither regularly their use value with exchange value — we put larly rich resources for investigations, both of Intensely Victorian though the acknowledge nor permanently destroy if it is out of sight both “the useful character of the the commodity Gothic and commodity fetish Gothic may be, however, many going to be able to count on its own history to in of labour embodied in them, and ism in general know itself and realize a future. (freedgood various kinds (see freedgood 2006, especially survives, like so much else that is of that labour” (Marx 1992: 138—58, 2006: 2) the concrete forms and Smith 2005). Still, the invocation well beyond the end of the nineteen 5). Now reduced to the status of a “mirror” of of commodities’ uncanny, often vengeful half- When, for example, Walter Benj am (Marx 1992: 24), the sugar has reversals As the commodity Gothic perceives them, abstract value of fetishization accepts no generic that the: “bourgeois interior of the a commodity. Still, however, such objects go one step further. Not lost something by becoming limits (Lootens 2003); and boundary crossings sixties to the nineties, with its gigar object’s perspective, content with containing ideas, they develop, or in another sense (from an may be particularly important here. Consider, overrun by carving, its sunless cor taken on new power. for threaten to develop, ideas of their own; and one might say), it has also example, the mid-century trope of the the palm tree stands [...J provide table, blood sugar, these ideas tend toward the possibility of For like Marx’s legendary genteel woman adorning herself in poisoned housing only for corpses,” his ass become “something wreaking historical vengeance at once through once commodified, has finery. Wfflcie Collins’ moonstone, in the novel “the bourgeois living space [...] ti (Marx 1992: 31). It has assumed of that and against the process of commodification transcendent” name; the maddening diamond neck nameless murder” (Benjamin 19 “the whole world of com lace itself. “a social relation” to of George Eliot’s (1876) Daniel Deronda transLation) looks beyond Dickens the ranks of those (Eliot As Charlotte Sussman’s Consuming Anxiet modities”; it has joined 1995: 358—9): these haunted, haunting criticism of John Ruskin, who read can appear as “inde objects ies dramatically demonstrates, the commodity human productions that and others like them may wield an surfaces of late-Victorian furniture with life,” even Gothic clearly predates the work of Marx pendent beings endowed impact whose force resonates, in part, through they had been by the effort “to bai “producers instead of (Sussman 2000: 110—29). Within the early anti seeming to “rule” their juxtaposition with even more explicit invoca fection” through mechanical i 1992: 24, 32, 35). slavery writing that Sussman studies, com being ruled by them” (Marx tions of commodities as things with vengeful as material accusations revealing a Marx’s suggestion modity Gothic fantasies repeatedly give shape Comic though it may be, ideas of their own (see VICTORIAN GOTHIC). aesthetics whose values acted t commodified, “evolves out Punch’s to powerful rhetorical invocations of the con that a table, once 1863 cartoon “The Haunted Lady, or expression, to check exertion, to pai ideas, far more fluence of commodification with cannibalism of its wooden brain grotesque ‘The Ghost’ in the Looking-Glass” offers one ity” (Ruskin 1904: 204). At the 133 COMMODITY GOTHIC1SM COMMODITY GOTHICISM Here, the artist example of such invocatiofl5. ‘able-tUrnirg’ ever was,” is also refusal fully to vV. & Jones, G. (1985) The Comic Book and bodily corruption, as would-be consumers wonderful than directly enacts commodities’ (Marx 1992: 31). And depicting a female New York: Crown. of the products of slavery find themselves thorougllY uncanny “mirror” one another, by as Jacques Derrida, halfturfled toward a 3. S. & Bloom, C. (1993) Dark Knights: The consuming enslaved bodies instead. Such as “critics as diverse who stands frozen, indeed, point out figure reflected in the omics in Context. London: Pluto Press. Baldick, and Terry Eagleton” glass. What stands visions may well attain their most crystallized Chris “central” to modiste’s elabo R. I. & Uricchio, W. (eds.) (1991) The the Gothic seems her is not just her own form within what Timothy Morton has since I this turn to 39). mirror before .ives of the Botman. New York: Routledge. whole (Smith 2005: is the emaciated corpse termed the cblood sugar’ topos” (Morton Marx’s thinking as a rately dressed form; it (2005) fragmented identity: The super table merely “stands seems to have died 2000: is, Gothic Marx’s fetishized needlewoman who ndition. International Journal ofComic Art 172—3): that the scenario Where objects of the that the (Marx 1992: 31), however, over the ball-gown 8—69. whereby slave-produced sugar, once stirred on its head” their while laboring Gothic mode turn on has just put on (Lootens 1996) Comics, Comix and Graphic Novels. into a cup of tea, transforms itself (back) into in the comm0dY would-be consumer they take the already 36—54). In a related Phaidon. a bloody, all-too literal embodiment of its own consumers. In this, 2003: 150, Waildey 1981: commoditY fetishiZation the pattern of a child’s brutal histories of origin. uncanny process of Punch cartoon of 1848, taking it a half step reveals the fright If Marx’s 1867 account of “the fetishism of step further, in part by depicted in close-up, one retaining the tran smock, hours’ sewing, What if objects while low going rate for ten Commodities and the Secret Thereof’ (Marx back.