Delineation of Women in the Selected Works of Edgar Allan Poe
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Crushing the Clichés: Delineation of Women in the Selected Works of Edgar Allan Poe Researcher Supervisor Noshaba Ejaz Sohail Ahmad Saeed (Assistant Professor) IN THE PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF MASTER OF PHILOSOPHY IN ENGLISH LITERATURE Session: 2011-2013 DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH The Islamia University of Bahawalpur ix Table of Contents Chapter One Introduction ................................................................................................... 1 1.1 Theoretical frame work of study: .............................................................................. 3 1.1.1 Patriarchy: ........................................................................................................... 6 1.1.2 Sex, Gender and Sex Roles: ............................................................................... 6 1.1.3 Sexual Objectification: ....................................................................................... 9 1.1.4 French Feminism: ............................................................................................. 12 1.2 Chapter Schema: ..................................................................................................... 16 Chapter Two Literature Review ........................................................................................ 17 2.1 Introduction ......................................................................................................... 17 2.2 Nineteenth Century Concepts about Women: ................................................... 17 2.4 Women in Poe’s Work: ....................................................................................... 24 Chapter Three Portrayal of Women .................................................................................. 30 3.2 Madeline Usher: ...................................................................................................... 37 3.3 “Ligeia”: .................................................................................................................. 40 3.4 “Morella”:................................................................................................................ 45 3.5 “The Spectacles”: .................................................................................................... 49 3.6 The Detective Stories and Images of Helpless Maidens: ........................................ 52 3.7 “The Oval Portrait”: ................................................................................................ 56 3.8 Women in Poe’s Poetry: .......................................................................................... 59 3.8.1 Never Ending Mourning in Poetry: .................................................................. 64 Chapter Four Conclusion .................................................................................................. 71 1 Chapter One Introduction Edgar Allan Poe in Nineteenth Century proposed his renowned theory that the death of beautiful women is unquestionably the most poetic topic in the world (Poe165). Therefore, in many of his literary works, women seem to be attractive but at the same time the passive victims who are either already dead or killed off in the beginning of his tales and poems. However, the aim of this study is to argue that Poe’s compositions offer more variations in the delineation of women than “the beautiful, dead women” (Poe 165). Unfortunately, the variations in the characters and the active roles played by the women depicted in Poe’s works mostly remain unnoticed. Therefore, it is significant to have a look at the variety of women that Poe really presents in front of his readers, especially in his prose. Moreover, it is also interesting to investigate the representation of his famous dead, beautiful women seeing that she might not be so passive and victimized as she may seem at first sight. The women in Poe’s fiction while animate are not presented as the physical entities rather they are monolithic; beautifully carved like a perfect statue but do not have any feelings and emotions of their own, it is just the narrator who defines and describes her. It has been argued by several critics that Poe never truly wrote about the women , instead he used them just as the objects or a decoration pieces who have no other task then settling in the corner; their beauties have been praised by the narrators and are just presented as the sources of inspiration. 2 They in the first reading seem to be the stone women who merely play the role of the emotional catalyst for their partners. Though they are actually the cause of all the action in the story or poem yet they are not given voices of their own. In most of the works by Poe a ravishing woman dies in order to expatiate the experience of the narrator. Ladies in Poe’s fiction have been continuously judged by the narrator and it is just his point of view and feelings about them. They need not to tell their own stories. The female characters are usually killed off so quickly as if they have always been fated to die quietly, taking their part of the stories as a secret buried with them in their graves. However, these women have a quality to live beyond their graves either physically or as the ones who always hover in the narrators’ minds. They reappear after their deaths and avenge all the pain they suffered while alive. The portrayal of female in various poems and short stories by Poe shows the impact of women on his narrators’ life. It is always a woman who dies herself as well as the cause of any other character’s death. For instance: The Fall of the House of Usher” and “Ligeia”. There is never ending mourning present in Poe’s literary works. His narrators always mourn on the death of beautiful women in their lives. One such example is of his famous poem “The Raven” which describes the death of the beautiful woman and whose narrator drives himself insane with the torment over the loss of his lover. Poe writes in his “The Philosophy of Composition” that the experience of beauty in all its melancholy extremity is “the death… of a beautiful woman” and, appropriately, “equally it is beyond doubt that the lips best suited for such topic are those of bereaved lover” (165). 3 It is always woman who dies but the account and influence of her death is the source of inspiration for the narrator to tell his story. Kenneth Silverman believes that in his tales Poe “nourishes himself on a young woman’s death, in the sense that art was for him a form of mourning, a re-visitation of his past and of what he has lost, as if trying to make them right, since nothing could, he returned to the subject of the one and the only supreme beloved again and again” (qtd. in Weeks 149). J. Gerald Kennedy argues in his New Essays on Poe’s Major Tales that ‘condition and consequences’ of death of women in Poe’s poetry and prose reveal his own ‘conflicted response’ to the death of women (113).Kennedy locates more positive image of women in Poe’s poetry, Poe “repeatedly expresses the notion that woman’s love was for him the essential source of bliss, security, and life itself (114). Poe’s literary compositions have a series of incidents that deal with the mourning and never ending remembrance of the beautiful women lost. However, the women delineated in his works are never the representatives of the weaker sex; they are intellectually and spiritually strong women as in case of the Dark Ladies. Madame Lalande in “The spectacles” is intelligent, full of life and the one who does not die rather she overpowers the narrator while animate, unlike the Dark Ladies. The researcher has used some key concepts of Feminist Theory in the study. 1.1 Theoretical frame work of study: The researcher aims to devise a model for the Feminist analysis of Poe’s literary texts. The purpose of this chapter is to shed light on the previous research work done in the 4 field of Feminism, and to determine how the present study is different in comparison. It also deals with the basic theoretical issues and their advancement through history. Feminism is a collection of ideologies and movements which aim to establish and define the equal political, social and economic rights for women. From these Feminist movements emerged the Feminist theory that aims to understand the nature of gender inequality, by examining women’s social roles and experiences; in order to respond to the issues such as social constructions of sex and gender. Feminist theory attempts to develop a comprehensive account of the subordination of women, and is a requirement for the development of effective strategies to liberate women; as it identifies the underlying causes of women’s subordination. Rosemarie Tong suggests that feminist theory attempts to describe women’s oppression, to explain its causes and consequences, and to prescribe strategies for women’s liberation. In Women Do Theory Jane Flax also suggests that this theory is a systematic, analytical approach to everyday experiences. Flax argues that everybody does this unconsciously, and that to theorize is to bring this unconscious process to a conscious level so that it can be developed and defined (Flax 21). The basic purpose of the feminist theory is to understand the power discrepancy between men and women, and to understand women’s oppression. It deals with the issues like how the subjugation of women actually evolved and the changes that occurred over the time; and to derive the strategies to overcome this oppression. According to the historians of modern western