I hesitate to write anything because it is sure to be full of mistakes; I have to remind myself that that is the point. So here we go... My inititial posts will likely focus on works from the classes I'm currently taking but as (or rather if) the blog takes off we should have a broad selection of comments on a wide swath of the reading list even if people who contribute stick to what they are working on in class. So I thought I would generate my own prompt (based on an example I found on the Cal Poly mock ma exam question page) and outline a response to it:
Perform a
psychoanalytical reading that weaves together the novellas Heart of Darkness by
Joseph Conrad and Waiting for the Barbarians by J. M. Coetzee.
I. Marlow's development in
HofD follows a Lacanian pattern.
A. At home in England he
experiences Lacan's "Imaginary" consciousness in which Victorian assumptions make up a secure
and unfallen reality.
B. As he travels to the
heart of the Congo and begins to become aware of difference and otherness as he enters the
Symbolic realm.
C. Of course, in Lacan, the
major determinant of having entered the Symbolic order is the acquisition of language,
something that Marlowe has long since done, but perhaps read allegorically, Marlowe's
experience of a strange incongruence of language and reality as he travels deeper into the
Congo could signify a journey through the Symbolic toward the Real.
D. Finally, Kurtz's famous
line, "The horror! The horror!" could signify entry into the Real
order in which "all words
cease and all categories fail and the object (which is not an object anymore) becomes an object
of anxiety par excellence." (Lacan)
E. The Real threatens to
break open the illusion of our social reality brought about by the symbolisation of our imaginary desires.
Consequently, language becomes an exercise in repression as shown when
Marlowe massages the facts of Kurtz's story when he relates them to the Intended. Language
facilitates the conscious structuring of the Imaginary order by the Symbolic whereas the Real is
opposed to the Imaginary and unattainable through the Symbolic, hence the need for Marlowe
to use language to repress the Real.
II. Coetzee's Magistrate in
Waiting for the Barbarians is blinded by his repression of guilt over his treatment of the barbarian
girl.
A. The magistrate wants a
guilt-free life of simple pleasure. The guilt he feels for using the barbarian girl threatens to
disturb his repose therefore he must deny her beauty and humanity in order to keep
the guilt in the dark of the unconscious mind; consequently, he is unable to see her when he
tries to imagine her.
B. The magistrate gains the
ability to see the barbarian girl after he has resisted the Empire and been imprisoned. His guilt
has been expiated at least partially because he admits openly the dehumanizing nature of
colonialism and his own part in the crime.
III. Language is repression
and is used by the Empire to maintain an imperial version of reality
A. The Empire rounds up
"barbarians" for torture. Joll has "enemy" writen on their
backs. Friend/enemy or us/them binary is foundation of colonialism. The need to
symbolically designate enemies indicates an anxiety similar to what Marlowe
experienced when he says that reality fades and the inner truth is hidden.
B. When language in the
symbolic order is taxed to the point of a break in reality, repression requires an increase in violence since violence is a symbolic and repressive gesture. It
maintains and justifies through dehumanization the social dichotomy and squelches the guilt that threatening to become conscious.
C. The attempts of the Magistrate to
decipher the language of violence through the scars on the girl's body illustrate the notion of language as repression.
IV. My argument
A. Both HofD and WFtheB
recall Lacan's notion of the Symbolic order and the role language plays in it.
The social reality brought about by the discourses that justified and
perpetuated colonialism is seen falling apart in both novellas, a feaure of the
text that calls langauge itself into question for being inherently unreliable
in communicating a "true" reality.
B. Language is a form of
repression in which narrative can be used to evade the heart of darkness
or what Lacan would call the Real even as it can express the guilt that blinds
us thereby allowing us to see. It cannot, however, attain the truth.
C. Darkness is the inability to see. Failing to see another human being means failing to understand that individual and failing to establish any sort of sympathetic communion with him or her. Both Conrad and Coetzee explore blindness as an inescapable experience of the human condition.
Well, I think I spent way too much time working on this but if you have any feedback, ideas, or comments please post away.
Until next time,
John
