A Mother (A)Rosa: Anaϊs Nin and Reconceiving Subjective Birth Jessica Leonie Gilbey Doctor of Philosophy - Humanities and Communication Arts 2015 University of Western Sydney Statement of Authentication The work presented in this thesis is, to the best of my knowledge and belief, original except as acknowledged in the text. I hereby declare that I have not submitted this material, either in full or in part, for a degree at this or any other institution. X Dedications: For my Mother, Rose, who gave me Everything and imbued it with love & in wonder, love, and gratitude to my Whole Other World, Gareth. Acknowledgements: This thesis would not have been possible without Dr. Tracy Olverson, whose dedicated mentorship, unending support, and consistent encouragement inspired me to reclaim my project, and who I will forever admire for her fierce, brilliant strength. I am in utter gratitude to my supervisors, Prof. Anthony Uhlmann and Dr. Lorraine Sim. Your tireless advice, help, and counsel are sincerely appreciated. Thanks to my awesome friends and colleagues: Dr. Liesel Senn and Dr. Gavin Smith. You both showed me that this ambitious task could be surmounted and that colleagues could also become intimate friends. I am indebted to Gareth, who both offered and endured more than can be put into words. To my favourite people/my family: especially Mum, Dad, Luke, Meredith, Diana, Prayrika, Amanda, and Gary. Thank you for loyally loving me, even when I was unlovable. I won’t forget to mention Dr Peter Kirkpatrick, who kindled my fire for the academy. Abstract ......................................................................................................................... iv Introduction .................................................................................................................... 1 Where Nin sits currently ............................................................................................ 2 Where she should sit ................................................................................................ 11 Significant research .................................................................................................. 12 On Nin and Feminine Identity/Maternity/French Feminism: .............................. 12 Chapter Summaries .................................................................................................. 15 1. The Womb ............................................................................................................... 18 Anaϊs and her Mother ............................................................................................... 18 Marian-Maternal Influences..................................................................................... 26 A Procreative Miracle .............................................................................................. 32 Re-tracing the interstices.......................................................................................... 36 Maternity as coherent symbolism ............................................................................ 41 Pre-conception: Preparing the Womb. ..................................................................... 43 Circular Womb......................................................................................................... 46 June & Henry ........................................................................................................... 48 A Potent(ial) beginning ........................................................................................ 48 Womb of Male Fantasy ........................................................................................ 51 To Create, Within the Mystery, a Space Severed from Man’s Myth .................. 56 Wonder-ful Womb ............................................................................................... 57 Touch and Transubstantiation: Sensuous Rooms .................................................... 63 i Houseboats ........................................................................................................... 76 Conclusion ............................................................................................................... 78 2. Umbilical.................................................................................................................. 80 From Form to Content: The Deceptive Method ...................................................... 80 The “Inevitable Power of the Body”: “Leapings of sensuousness” ..................... 88 Using Her Body: A Spider’s Dance ..................................................................... 91 The Purging of the Tarantella .............................................................................. 99 The Undutiful Daughter: Nin, Modernism and a Psychoanalysis of her Own .. 102 “My first vision of earth was water-veiled…”: Tracing Back to Birth, Before the Patriarch ......................................................................................................................... 106 Passionate Blood Experience ............................................................................. 110 The Family Romance: An external journey ....................................................... 111 Allendy ............................................................................................................... 133 Incest/Father: The Divided Self ......................................................................... 134 Rank ................................................................................................................... 139 Conclusion ............................................................................................................. 143 3. Spilling Blood and The Birth of Self ..................................................................... 144 On being the Womb: Rebirth Through Self ........................................................... 144 Abortion ............................................................................................................. 144 Nin & Subjectivity : A Woman’s Way .................................................................. 149 Re-entering the Myth Through the Diary: The “personified creation” .................. 150 ii Replicating Behaviours .......................................................................................... 162 Self-Sacrificing Mother versus Self-Birth ............................................................. 166 Life/Re-birth Through Loss ................................................................................... 173 Death of Parents ................................................................................................. 173 On Being the Womb: Reconceiving the Mother .................................................... 179 Circular Transgression: Toward Subjective Birth ................................................. 181 Creating a New World: A New Kind of Human Being ..................................... 182 The Mother Prostitute ............................................................................................ 186 The Diary as her Greatest Birth: Charges of Deception .................................... 190 Conclusion ................................................................................................................. 198 The tensions in the work ........................................................................................ 199 A motherhood beyond biological motherhood ...................................................... 200 What next? ............................................................................................................. 201 Bibliography .............................................................................................................. 202 iii Abstract Informed by feminist interpretations of birth and maternity, this thesis offers a re-reading and scholarly reappraisal of Anaϊs Nin’s recently published diaries, supplemented by other evidence from her fiction. Maternity offers a site of ambivalence that has always been problematic to feminists. It became particularly unfashionable during the second wave of feminism, due to the female biological potential being exploited as a reason to subjugate women and limit their participation in non-domestic spheres. However, as Luce Irigaray considers sexual difference “one of the major philosophical issues … in our time” maternity is an unavoidable example of sexual difference that requires exploration and re-consideration. The cultural coding of maternity is a live political issue and therefore worthy of close philosophical scrutiny. This issue is particularly relevant to a critical reappraisal of the work of Anaϊs Nin, who can offer interesting and provocative contributions to the discussion. Within a literary context, accounts of motherhood from the perspective of the mother are less than typical, yet this is the space within which a diverse maternal imaginary might be represented as fundamental, rather than marginal. In what Luce Irigaray refers to as the phallogocentric order, the Western literary, and in turn, philosophical, psychoanalytical, linguistic, and cultural tradition has only one history, built on the paradigmatic father-son relationship, or Oedipal drama, and necessitating symbolic and psychic matricide. As Alison Stone writes, “in the West, the self has often been understood in opposition to the maternal body.” This is a cultural model of production that would seek