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Abject Utopianism and Psychic Space: an Exploration of a Psychological Process Toward Utopia in the Work of Samuel R

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Abject Utopianism and Psychic Space: an Exploration of a Psychological Process Toward Utopia in the Work of Samuel R ABJECT UTOPIANISM AND PSYCHIC SPACE: AN EXPLORATION OF A PSYCHOLOGICAL PROCESS TOWARD UTOPIA IN THE WORK OF SAMUEL R. DELANY AND JULIA KRISTEVA A Dissertation Submitted to the Committee on Graduate Studies in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the Faculty of Arts and Science TRENT UNIVERSITY Peterborough, Ontario, Canada (c) Copyright by Cameron Alexander James Ellis 2014 Cultural Studies Ph.D. Graduate Program September 2014 ABSTRACT Abject Utopianism and Psychic Space: An Exploration of a Psychological Process Toward Utopia in the Work of Samuel R. Delany and Julia Kristeva Cameron Alexander James Ellis This dissertation utilizes the psychoanalytic theories of French psychoanalyst Julia Kristeva as a lens through which to read the novels of American author Samuel R. Delany. I argue that concepts proper to Kristeva’s work—namely abjection and/or the abject—can provide a way to think what it might mean to be utopian in the 21st century. Delany’s novels are received historically, which is to say his work speaks from a certain historical and cultural viewpoint that is not that of today; however, I claim that his novels are exceptional for their attempts to portray other ways of being in the world. Delany’s novels, though, contain bodies, psychologies, and sexualities that are considered abject with respect to contemporary morality. Nonetheless, this dissertation argues that such manifestations of abject lived experience provide the groundwork for the possibility of thinking utopianism differently today. Throughout, what I am working toward is a notion that I call Abject Utopianism: Rather than direct attention toward those sites that closely, yet imperfectly, approximate the ideal, one should commit one’s attention to those sights that others avoid, abscond, or turn their nose up at in disgust, for those are the sites of hope for a better world today. ii PREFACE Samuel R. Delany, a contemporary American author, literary/cultural critic, and Queer theorist, is one of the most famous contributors to science fiction literature in the twentieth century. Delany’s work includes many theoretical essays, novels, and autobiographies related to science fiction and queer living. His 1976 novel Trouble on Triton: An Ambiguous Heterotopia, has been crucial to informing literary critic Tom Moylan’s idea of the ‘critical utopia.’ This latter concept can be understood as the paradigm for understanding the contemporary utopian imagination. Julia Kristeva, a contemporary French psychoanalyst, literary/cultural critic, and author, is one of the paradigmatic figures of what is known in North America as contemporary French feminism. Kristeva’s work includes novels, theoretical essays in the fields of semiotics and linguistics, and autobiographical prose related to the phenomenon of borderline subjectivity or liminal states of consciousness. Her 1980 book Pouvoirs de l’horreur (Powers of Horror), revolutionized psychoanalytic theory and practice through her introduction of the concept of l’abjection (abjection) and its relationship to the constitution of modern subjectivity. To date, the work of these two great thinkers has not been brought together in any systematic scholarly manner. This dissertation is intended to remedy this lack. The critical discussion of Delany’s and Kristeva’s thought that follows is organized around the concept of utopia, which is to say a no place that is simultaneously some, presumably good, place. As a point of departure, I privilege the literary critic and utopian theorist iii Fredric Jameson’s proclamation that “It seems to be easier for us today to imagine the thoroughgoing deterioration of the earth and of nature than the breakdown of late capitalism” and that “perhaps this is due to some weakness in our imaginations” (Jameson, 1996, xii). The argument developed and defended in this dissertation is that the “weakness in our imagination” is the all but complete foreclosure of what Kristeva calls “psychic space,” and that a possible utopia today might be the reconstitution of a healthy living psychic space. The concept of psychic space is an ambiguous psychoanalytic concept like utopia; it is a no place but also a space that must be recognized without being reified. A corollary to this argument is that, in keeping with Kristeva’s theory of subjectivity, such a reconstitution of psychic space necessitates a passage through abjection, a psychic-somatic process of separation that is characterized by feelings and emotions of pain and disgust. Section 1 of the dissertation provides a review of some of the literary and cultural theory regarding utopia, the utopian imagination; special emphasis is given to the status of both under late capitalism. For purposes of thinking about the utopian imagination or a utopian psyche, I ground my interpretive stance within the psychoanalytic context of Freud’s allegory of the fraternal clan’s murder of the father in Totem and Taboo. By rooting my investigation in this Freudian narrative I associate the desire for a better way of living—utopia—with visceral and psychological disruption, somewhere at the interface of love, murder, and desire. Section 2 introduces key concepts from Kristeva’s oeuvre that will consistently be referred to throughout the dissertation, including: abjection, jouissance, psychic space, and the sacred. iv Section 3 provides an experimental reading of some of Delany’s novels not analyzed as much as those novels in sections 4, 5, 6, and 7. By focusing on the visceral qualities and aspects of Delany’s narrations I demonstrate how the concept of utopia and the affective nature of sensation—i.e., that which is on the fringe of language and the symbolic—can be brought together in these novels. As sections 1 and 2 set the theoretical groundwork for my investigation, section 3 sets the critical groundwork, especially for the subsequent literary analyses in later sections. Section 4 provides an analysis of Delany’s science fiction novel Trouble on Triton (1976). I argue in this section that Triton can be used to excavate an unorthodox interpretation of a utopian subjectivity; by applying Kristevan themes to Delany’s intentionally unlikeable anti-hero Bron Helstrom I claim that narcissism and a lacking social discourse on love can breed a strange utopian potential within unlikely subjects. Instead of unearthing a utopian potential through the examination of an inward turn (i.e., Bron’s narcissism), Section 5 finds traces of such a potential through the examination of an outward turn. I look to Delany’s Stars in My Pocket Like Grains of Sand (1984b) to demonstrate how Marq Dyeth’s relationship with Rat Korga—his perfect erotic object—can be used as a case study for understanding Kristeva’s notion of ‘love as a modern obscenity,’ but also how this ‘obscenity’ harbours within it utopian energy. Section 6 brings together three of Delany’s more pornographic novels (i.e., Hogg [1994b], The Mad Man [1994c], Through the Valley of the Nest of Spiders [2012a]) and one graphic novella (i.e., Bread and Wine [1999]) in order to show what abject utopianism might look like in process. Whereas the abject utopianism of both Bron and Marq is placed in terms of a fixed orientation, i.e., inner and outer respectively, the abject v utopianism of the characters—and the relationships they participate in—is more fluid and dynamic, thus keeping in step with Kristeva’s notion of psychic space as being an “open system.” The texts considered in this section are also aligned in such a way as to illustrate an arc or trajectory whereby abject utopianism begins quite abstract and theoretical (Hogg), but culminates in very concrete—average-everyday—material practice (Bread and Wine). In the 7th and final section I use Delany’s Dhalgren (1975) and some of Kristeva’s more recent work on the topic of forgiveness to show that one’s private interior psychic space is never completely co-opted by decadent social forces. By carefully considering the notion of forgiveness, I claim that the individual subject can compensate for the failed symbolic mechanisms of late capitalism in terms of a new articulation of psychic space. The reconstitution of psychic space, illustrated through references to Dhalgren, suggest that a psyche that forgives itself of violence and transgression sustains a utopian potential ‘inside’ its personal being, a potential that can never be destroyed by outer forces. A set of seven concluding points follows and brings the dissertation to a close. vi ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I want to extend my most sincere and humble thanks to my dissertation advisory committee, Dr. Veronica Hollinger, Dr. Charmaine Eddy, and Dr. Davide Panagia whose constructive criticism, insight, and patience have allowed me to grow as a scholar. A special acknowledgement to Veronica: I am so fortunate to have met and worked with such a brilliant scholar and wonderful advisor. I am indebted to the Faculty of the Cultural Studies PhD program at Trent University for seeing something in me worth investing in; Dr. Alan O’Connor and Dr. Jonathan Bordo for their direction and leadership with respect to the graduate program; Nancy Legate for being the glue that holds things together and for always being accessible; my colleagues and friends in the Cultural Studies PhD program and the Theory, Culture, and Politics MA program; and to my friends at the Society for Utopian Studies, especially Dr. Clint Jones. Dr. Michael Horton is hugely responsible for the trajectory I set myself on following secondary studies at Robert F. Hall C.C.S, his influence can never be overstated. To Michael Reist who without ever being a formal teacher for me taught me the spirit of education. Dr. John Russon for his support early on in my transition into graduate studies as well as his remarkable lectures on Hegel’s Phenomenology of Spirit; to the memory of the late Dr.
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