George Eliot, which is but a pen name for Mary Anne Evans, an English novelist and one of the leading writers of the Victorian era, also stands as a great representative of literary Realism for her ability to portray life as it is and not as we wish it were. Now, it is understood that the fact that Eliot is female does not necessarily mean her texts will be feminist. However, by accurately depicting the rural society of the time, she also managed to, directly and/or indirectly, expose the dichotomy of Victorian morality in regards to women, their place in society, their education, and their way of dealing with patriarchal oppression. The first and most evident manifestation of double standards can be seen in the fact that the Mr. Tulliver decides to send Tom to a “good” school. He chooses to send Tom, not Maggie, not only because their gender demands so, but because he cares so much about appearances that even though Maggie is notably smarter, he will not undergo the embarrassment of not sending his male child to get a proper education. Mr. Tulliver explains rather clearly (while apologizing to Mr. Riley for Maggie’s brilliant remarks), that if Maggie were a boy, she would definitely be able to stand up for herself , but unfortunately, a man never knows where his brains will run to, meaning that Maggie being smart is not just an embarrassing truth but “an uncommon puzzlin’ thing.” Poor Mr. Tulliver! Having a smart daughter must have definitely been a living nightmare. Fortunately, Maggie had an attic to go hide every now and then. This leads to my next observation, Elliot was bold enough to accurately depict what in feminist theory is known as “mad woman in the attic” (the infant version, that is). In this attic, which was “Maggie’s favorite retreat,” she “fretted out all of her ill-humors, and talked aloud to the worm-eaten floor and the worm-eaten shelves…and kept a fetish which she punished for all her misfortunes.” Unable to speak up her smart mind and to express her emotions publicly, Maggie would refuge in an attic, and there, she would release of her stress and anxieties in ways only a highly oppressed and repressed individual could possible understand. Expelling “every other form of consciousness,” she would sob passionately until she could cry anymore. Show a boy crying his guts out in an attic and I’ll tell you this is not a feminist text. Perhaps the most shocking demonstration of the feminist/realist perspective of this text is Maggie’s interpretation of picture Mr. Riley asked her to comment on. It was the image of a woman in the water, being drowned in order to see if she was a witch or not. If she makes it, she is a witch, and ends up killed for being a witch. If she drowns, she is not a witch, but, lucky her, she goes to heaven. Again, we have a reference to the good/bad woman dichotomy and her typical loss-loss circumstances. Having a nine-year-old child display the complexities of the Victorian society she lived in, in such an explicit way, is more than just realism. It is blunt feminism.
George Eliot, which is but a pen name for Mary Anne Evans, an English novelist and one of the leading writers of the Victorian era, also stands as a great representative of literary Realism for her ability to portray life as it is and not as we wish it were. Now, it is understood that the fact that Eliot is female does not necessarily mean her texts will be feminist. However, by accurately depicting the rural society of the time, she also managed to, directly and/or indirectly, expose the dichotomy of Victorian morality in regards to women, their place in society, their education, and their way of dealing with patriarchal oppression.
ResponderEliminarThe first and most evident manifestation of double standards can be seen in the fact that the Mr. Tulliver decides to send Tom to a “good” school. He chooses to send Tom, not Maggie, not only because their gender demands so, but because he cares so much about appearances that even though Maggie is notably smarter, he will not undergo the embarrassment of not sending his male child to get a proper education. Mr. Tulliver explains rather clearly (while apologizing to Mr. Riley for Maggie’s brilliant remarks), that if Maggie were a boy, she would definitely be able to stand up for herself , but unfortunately, a man never knows where his brains will run to, meaning that Maggie being smart is not just an embarrassing truth but “an uncommon puzzlin’ thing.” Poor Mr. Tulliver! Having a smart daughter must have definitely been a living nightmare. Fortunately, Maggie had an attic to go hide every now and then.
This leads to my next observation, Elliot was bold enough to accurately depict what in feminist theory is known as “mad woman in the attic” (the infant version, that is). In this attic, which was “Maggie’s favorite retreat,” she “fretted out all of her ill-humors, and talked aloud to the worm-eaten floor and the worm-eaten shelves…and kept a fetish which she punished for all her misfortunes.” Unable to speak up her smart mind and to express her emotions publicly, Maggie would refuge in an attic, and there, she would release of her stress and anxieties in ways only a highly oppressed and repressed individual could possible understand. Expelling “every other form of consciousness,” she would sob passionately until she could cry anymore. Show a boy crying his guts out in an attic and I’ll tell you this is not a feminist text.
Perhaps the most shocking demonstration of the feminist/realist perspective of this text is Maggie’s interpretation of picture Mr. Riley asked her to comment on. It was the image of a woman in the water, being drowned in order to see if she was a witch or not. If she makes it, she is a witch, and ends up killed for being a witch. If she drowns, she is not a witch, but, lucky her, she goes to heaven. Again, we have a reference to the good/bad woman dichotomy and her typical loss-loss circumstances. Having a nine-year-old child display the complexities of the Victorian society she lived in, in such an explicit way, is more than just realism. It is blunt feminism.