VIEWPOINT:
POINT PARK UNIVERSITY
UNDERGRADUATE RESEARCH JOURNAL
SPRING 2012
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INTRODUCTION
BY ROBERT ALEXANDER, DIRECTOR, UNIVERSITY WRITING PROGRAM
Here is a second issue of Viewpoint, the Undergraduate Research Anthology of Point
Park University. Many thanks to the authors, their instructors, the Managing Editors (Cathy
Houghton and Matt Ussia), and the Editorial Board for creating this second collection.
The research paper, most instructors agree, is a demanding genre that requires sustained
attention to a limited, focused problem. The essays in this publication are successful because
in the first paragraphs each writer maintains this limited focus, and establishes a clear thesis, a
context, and a pre-summary of main ideas, as well as thorough, specific development of main
ideas. This firm grasp of global writing issues enables each writer to concentrate, as well, on
finer details, such as grammar and clear style.
The writers apply their skills to a variety of subjects. The first paper advocates courses
in media literacy, a subject of conversation for many years among many Point Park
instructors. Discussion of curricular issues would provide additional good research subjects.
In addition, three essays focus on different aspects of nineteenth century British culture.
Virginia Reinhart’s study of Jane Austen connects early nineteenth century dance and
literature. Hannah Rigg’s reading of Charles Dickens’ Hard Times (1854) explores mid-century
problems of gender and industrialization, while Samuel Polito’s reading of Jude the Obscure
(1895) brings us to the end of the period.
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A twentieth and twenty-first century preoccupation, identity formation, is the topic of
Names in Song of Solomon (1977). Robert Dorenberg shows that for Toni Morrison, in this
novel, names, informal and formal, express a drive to assert individuality against a majority
culture that seeks to extinguish African-American identity.
In Ecclesiastes 12:12, Kohelleth gloomily observes, “..of making many books there is
no end,” but reading the following pages, enjoyable as well as informative, encourages a more
optimistic view of publication. Work on the third issue now begins: instructors in all
disciplines, assign research papers and submit the best results to the Editorial Board of
Viewpoint.
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EDITORIAL BOARD
ROBERT ALEXANDER
SCHOOL OF ARTS AND SCIENCES, HUMANITIES
MIKE BOTTA
SCHOOL OF ARTS AND SCIENCES, CRIMINAL JUSTICE
STANLEY DENTON
SCHOOL OF ARTS AND SCIENCES, EDUCATION
DIANE KRILL
SCHOOL OF ARTS AND SCIENCES, NSET
ROBERT LEWIS
SCHOOL OF ARTS AND SCIENCES, HUMANITIES
ELAINE LUTHER
SCHOOL OF BUSINESS
MATTHEW OPDYKE
SCHOOL OF ARTS AND SCIENCES, NSET
SARAH PERRIER
SCHOOL OF ARTS AND SCIENCES, HUMANITIES
P.K. WESTON
SCHOOL OF ARTS AND SCIENCES, HUMANITIES
MANAGING EDITORS
CATHERINE HOUGHTON
PROGRAM FOR ACADEMIC SUCCESS
MATTHEW USSIA
PROGRAM FOR ACADEMIC SUCCESS
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
I CAN SEE CLEARLY NOW: YOUTH MEDIA LITERACY ................................................ 1-12
JOAN HERRINGER
INSTRUCTOR: DR. MEGAN WARD
GENDER ROLES, MACHINES, AND IMAGINATION IN HARD TIMES .............................. 13-23
HANNAH RIGGS
INSTRUCTOR: DR. MEGAN WARD
LEAVING IT ALL BEHIND OR NOTHING YOU WANT AND EVERYTHING
YOU DON’T NEED: THOMAS HARDY ON RELATIONSHIPS BOTH VICTORIAN
AND OTHERWISE IN JUDE THE OBSCURE ..................................................................... 24-33
SAMUEL POLITO
INSTRUCTOR: DR. MEGAN WARD
WOMEN AND DANCE IN LITERATURE: AN ANALYSIS OF JANE AUSTEN’S
PRIDE AND PREJUDICE ................................................................................................ 34-43
VIRGINIA REINART
INSTRUCTOR: PROFESSOR RONALD HUTSON
NAMES AS HISTORY AND IDENTITY IN TONI MORRISON’S SONG OF SOLOMON .......... 44-53
ROBERT DORENBERG
INSTRUCTOR: DR. P.K. WESTON
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I CAN SEE CLEARLY NOW: YOUTH MEDIA LITERACY
JOAN HERRINGER
It is well known that media influences can play a crucial role in negatively affecting a
youth’s self esteem. Simply turning on the television, listening to pop music, or spending
time on the internet subjects youth to negative influences from the media, especially when it
comes to body image. Teaching students to be media literate would help them learn to
better interpret these media influences. Scholars have often addressed this important link
between teaching youth media literacy and eliminating issues of negative self esteem, but I
feel they have failed at explaining why it is a school’s responsibility to teach media literacy
and how media literacy classes should be most effectively taught. In order for media literacy
courses to be successful, the curriculum should be based on analyzing media along with
practical application, tailoring instructional material to specific age groups, and making sure
the classroom examples are relevant to the students’ lives. Using a combination of these
strategies will create interesting, worthwhile lessons in which students will be invested in
learning. With invested learners, a generation that is more critically aware of the media will
come about.
Growing up in the United States generally means a lifestyle highly dependent on
technology. Everything we do, from working at jobs, studying for school, or simply taking
part in a leisure activity, has been transformed to require the use of technology. This
dependency is just as prevalent in our youth. The U.S. Department of Education states that
most children “watch television three to five hours a day” and the U.S. Department of
Commerce adds that, “more than 60 percent of families with children have Internet access at
home” (Minkel 30). These statistics point out how the large majority of American children
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have readily available technology in their lives. Having this access to technology can be an
awesome thing; it allows for incredibly fast, reliable information and millions of connections
to the outside world. However, not all of this easily accessible information and images on
TV or the internet create a positive influence. Being able to navigate through the staggering
amount of information available can be difficult, especially for children. This is where the
need exists for developing skills to critically think about the media.
Living in our highly technological environment, which is often drenched with
negative influences found in media, places new demands on the curriculum of schools. Our
evolving environment has created the need to integrate media literacy classes into our
education system. This responsibility lies within schools because schools are the surest way
to reach the largest amount of children. In a perfect world, parents would be the most
sensible choice to teach a child how to avoid media’s harmful influences, but this is not
reality. Brian Stonehill, the author of the article “Media Literacy Means Better, Smarter TV
Viewing,” says how parents, “don’t spend any time learning the ‘best‘ or the ‘right’ way to do
the one thing [. . .] children likely spend more time doing than either reading or sitting in
school--that is, watching TV” (Stonehill 18). This insight is brutally honest, yet so true.
Parents should be concerned about what images are influencing their children, but many
may not have the skills to effectively help. Because not all children have parents with the
ability to teach them how to be media literate, the responsibility of teaching this skill lies with
the schools.
The first step for schools understanding how to teach media literacy lies in analyzing
and discussing media within the classroom. In the Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy
the definition of media literacy revolves around this idea of analyzing. It describes media
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literacy as the ability to “analyze relations among media, audiences, information, and power”
(Gainer 364). This definition goes along then with the ideas of Greg Michie, an author from
Teacher Magazine. He believes, “kids growing up in the media-drenched, commercially
saturated [world]” need to have the “ability to question, analyze, and understand the barrage
of messages that [bombard] them” (Michie 38). Through both this academic journal and this
working teacher’s opinion, the idea of analyzing is key to teaching media literacy. Without
classroom practice at dissecting media influences, students will never learn how to do so on
their own. Although I definitely agree that analyzing media is the first step towards
understanding it, it is not the only approach needed to effectively reach students.
Teaching media literacy must incorporate not only analysis of the media but the
experience of producing different types of media as well. Elizabeth Thoman, the founder
and executive director of the Center for Media Literacy, believes, “media literacy is best
taught as a combination of production and analysis.” (Trotter 30). She also states the
specific “type of work students produce--video, story-boards, journal writing, Web pages, or
radio--is less important than the approach” (Trotter 30). I agree with Thoman’s idea that a
media literacy class should incorporate both production and analysis. Not only should a
class consist of lecture and discussion about the influence of specific types of media, but
should also have students make media themselves. By doing this, students have the
opportunity to learn about the topic through discussion and then are able to practically apply
the ideas they learned through production. Through incorporating a production piece within
a media literacy class, students have a hands-on opportunity to create. This is a much more
fun way of learning and will result in a greater interest, and a greater insight, in the subject
being taught.
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A specific example of hands-on media literacy learning can be found in Andrew
Trotter’s article “The Screen Set.” In this article Trotter examines a high school’s use of a
television production class to teach a version of media literacy. Donna Learmont, a video
teacher from a school district in Detroit, sees a television studio “as a laboratory for teaching
her students how to read the symbols and messages encoded in television, film, and other
visual media” (Trotter 31). Working with TV cameras offers students the opportunity to try
on different roles and learn the ins and outs of being TV producers, camera operators, or
editors. They learn first hand how the media world is targeting them. Obviously, not all age
groups are responsible enough to handle an expensive, gadget filled television studio as their
classroom. This is why the age you introduce certain methods of teaching becomes
important for optimum success in learning media literacy.
Keeping students interested in learning media literacy also requires schools to aim
their curriculum towards each specific age group. Because students at different ages have
different interests, the material and the way it is presented must be specifically geared
towards that age group. Greg Michie, a middle school media studies teacher as well as an
author from Teacher Magazine, understands this concept well. He explains how he knew he
“had to find things for [his class] to do--things that were relevant [and] things that would
interest them” (Michie 38). Michie based his assignments on what was popular and cutting
edge for his class of middle schoolers. One of his most successful assignments centered on
pop music which “was surely the medium [his students] connected with most passionately”
(Michie 39). He decided to have his students bring in their favorite pop song lyrics to
decode the real meaning. The lesson was a hit; the kids not only did the homework, but they
did it with enthusiasm. Using topics which are relevant and popular within an age group
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allows students to feel more connected to what they are learning; therefore, they will be
more inclined to understand the lesson being taught.
I saw the effects of teaching without using relevant, age appropriate examples first
hand when volunteering with the YWCA. In my experience I worked as a mentor for a
group of adolescent girls around the age of fifteen who formed a youth leadership council
for the YWCA. As I watched our sessions, it became clearly obvious that girls would
become bored, uninterested, and in some cases, stop listening to our group leader altogether
whenever the focus of conversation turned towards a subject not relatable to them. Yet,
when the conversation included the pop singer Beyoncé, each girl seemed to perk up and
suddenly be much more interested in joining the discussion. It was easy to tell that by using
popular role models as examples in group discussion, the girls were more inclined to speak
up and care about what was going on. Perhaps if the YWCA had provided more of this type
of discussion, the girls would have been more invested and the program an overall bigger
success.
Steps must be made to help teach the youth how to critically think about the media.
If these steps are not taken, the youth will continue to be overwhelmed by the negative
messages being sent to them. It is the responsibility of school systems to take on the act of
teaching students to become critical viewers of the media. In order for a school’s efforts at
teaching media literacy to be successful, they need to teach by using discussion and hands-on
production along with age appropriate material and relevant examples from the students’
daily lives. With these strategies in the classroom, students will be fully interested and
invested in learning. If younger generations are more skilled at recognizing the influences of
the media, they stand a better chance of avoiding the potential negative effects of the media.
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Perhaps stronger mental health and high self esteem will be the benefit. Looking at the
bigger picture, we can understand that through teaching media literacy to the youth now, a
brighter future for not only them, but the rest of society, exists.
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Works Cited
Gainer, Jesse S. "Critical Media Literacy in Middle School: Exploring the Politics of
Representation." Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy 53.5 (2010): 364-373.
Academic Search Complete. EBSCO. Web. 3 Apr. 2010.
Michie, Greg, and Glynis Sweeny. "Tuning in." Teacher Magazine 9.5 (1998): 38. Academic
Search Complete. EBSCO. Web. 3 Apr. 2010.
Minkel, Walter. "Media Literacy--Part of the Curriculum?" School Library Journal 48.4
(2002): 31. Academic Search Complete. EBSCO. Web. 3 Apr. 2010.
Stonehill, Brian. "Media Literacy Means Better, Smarter TV Viewing." Christian Science
Monitor 26 July 1996: 18. Academic Search Complete. EBSCO. Web. 3 Apr. 2010.
Trotter, Andrew. "The Screen set." Education Week 16.24 (1997): 30. Academic Search
Complete. EBSCO. Web. 3 Apr. 2010.
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GENDER ROLES, MACHINES, AND IMAGINATION
IN HARD TIMES
HANNAH RIGGS
Hard Times by Charles Dickens is a novel that explores many dichotomies such as
machines versus humans, reason versus emotion, and fact versus imagination. Most
interestingly though, all these conflicting concepts are interrelated. Throughout the story, the
reader is forced to reflect on whether or not humans imitate machines, and if they do, what
types of people are they? Are they rational and straightforward, or emotional and
imaginative? Others have found these fascinating questions as well, since there are several
articles that also question the relationship between the characters of Hard Times and these
characteristics. In general, the characters that imitate machines and are rational, are men, and
the more human, imaginative ones are women. In this way, the novel also causes readers to
think about how these questions relate to the expected gender roles in Victorian society.
However, more interestingly, the novel gives a take on how men and women should act in
relation to these conflicting qualities. Ultimately the novel supports the idea that women
should stay within their expected gender roles, and that the women who do this are very
human, emotional, and imaginative. However, the message about men is more complex. The
novel does not claim that rational, unemotional men that act like machines should behave
like this, but rather, that they will, in fact, be happier if they have the same qualities as the
women of the novel.
In the Victorian era, women were expected to have lives that revolved around their
families and dedicate their lives to serving them. They could correctly fulfill this duty by
being kind, nurturing, modest, selfless, and most of all, a doting wife and loving mother who
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takes care of all the household duties. There were negative traits attributed to women as well:
they were thought to be more emotional, irrational, and even hysterical compared to men,
and thus, less fit than men for work in the public sector. The women in the novel who have
these traits, positive and negative, are also portrayed as acting in a human way: open with
their emotions and fanciful, as expected of women. In this way, these traits are identified as
feminine qualities in the novel. Women who act in this way are rewarded, and those who do
not are punished. There are a number of women who live this role, and so support the idea
that women should behave in this manner.
One of these characters is named Cecilia Jupe, “Sissy” for short. Sissy is introduced
as a young girl in school in the midst of getting disciplined by a teacher when she cannot
define a horse in factual terms, and instead, claims that she would “fancy” to carpet a room
with representations of flowers. The teacher exclaims to Sissy: “you must must discard the
word Fancy altogether. You have nothing to do with it. You are not to have, in any object of
use or ornament, what would be a contradiction in fact. You don't walk upon flowers in fact;
you cannot be allowed to walk upon flowers in carpet... This is fact” (Dickens 16 – 17).
Upon hearing this declaration, the young Sissy is described as “frightened by the matter-offact prospect the world afforded” (Dickens 17). This event is key to Sissy's role as a woman
because it reveals her mindset and way of life: that she is fanciful, imaginative, and
unsatisfied with a world governed by facts.
Later on, her teacher, Thomas Gradgrind, takes her to live with his family because
she has been abandoned by her father. The Gradgrind household is a place where facts,
rationale, and machine-like discipline is the only acceptable way of life. Once there, Sissy
becomes the one feminine force in the Gradgrind family. Sissy helps Mrs. Gradgrind care for
the children and the household, and remains steadfastly kind, compassionate, loving, and
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helpful. She nurses a character named Louisa back to health when Louisa falls ill and has the
utmost faith and forgiveness for her when no one else is sure what to do. Throughout the
book Sissy is rewarded for having these stereotypical feminine qualities. For example, in her
youth she is blessed with beauty and the admiration of others. The end of the novel tells of
“happy Sissy's happy children” (Dickens 292) which shows she ultimately receives the most
important gift that a woman can obtain: a happy family. An article entitled “From Fact to
Fantasy in Victorian Fiction: Dickens's Hard Times and MacDonald's Phantastes” by John
Pennington agrees when it says that “Sissy, fruitfully married with children... has a
satisfactory and productive life” (Pennigton 3).
A character that is similarly feminine is Mrs. Pegler. At the end of the book, the
readers discover that Mrs. Pegler's son, Mr. Josiah Bounderby, has paid her to never talk of,
or to, him again. However, she so selflessly loves her son that instead of being angry, she
passionately exclaims: “it's right... that I should keep down in my own part, and I have no
doubts that if I was here I should do a many unbefitting things, and I am well contented, and
I can keep my pride in my Josiah to myself, and I can love for love's own sake!”(Dickens
258). This moment displays Mrs. Pegler as the epitome of the forgiving, dedicated mother
who will love her son unconditionally. She also travels to the town in which her son lives
and eagerly watches him from afar to make sure he is doing well. Throughout the novel she
is presented as excitable, easily made nervous, constantly imagining what her son is like, and
overall the opposite of a machine. In these ways, Mrs. Pegler is a further example of a very
human woman happily fulfilling her feminine duties.
A character with a similar story is named Rachael. Rachael's extremely feminine and
human qualities are revealed to readers when her friend Stephen finds her in his house
tending to his sick wife. When Stephen steps into the house, he finds that “quiet and peace
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were there. Rachael was there, sitting by the bed. She turned her head, and the light of her
face shone in upon the midnight of his mind” (Dickens 88). These lines show the magical
power of a woman's presence and how such a presence could help his wife while he, a man,
did not have this ability. In addition to having a healing touch, Rachael is a tireless
homemaker: she sweeps the hearth, tends the fire, organizes his house, and gives his wife
some of her fresh, laundered clothes to wear. Although she loves Stephen and cannot be
with him because he is married, she is selfless enough to care for his ailing wife. As she
fulfills all these duties “her own eyes were filled” with tears, completing her portrait as a selfsacrificing and emotional woman (Dickens 89). Even though Rachael does not have a
husband and family of her own, she still fulfills her “Angel of the House” role as a woman.
It is clear that Rachael is as far from machine-like as possible because she is forgiving,
emotional, and compassionate, once again proving that acting human and acting feminine
are synonymous.
Besides there being characters that prove this theory of human nature by example,
there are also females who show that characters lacking feminine qualities are the ones
whose lives imitate machines. Consider, for example, Louisa. Louisa is brought up in the
rational, mechanical Gradgrind household. Her machine-like way of living becomes
especially evident when her father, Mr. Thomas Gradgrind, tells her that Mr. Bounderby
wishes to marry her. When she is told this news, she does not become emotional, but
instead, she only weighs the facts of the situation and decides that she will accept since the
pros outweigh the cons. From the moment of her engagement onwards “she was impassive,
proud and cold” (Dickens 108).
It is soon clear that this attitude is not making Louisa happy. After her father
presents the proposal, “she was impelled to throw herself upon [her father's] breast, and give
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him the pent-up confidences of her heart” (Dickens 105). Immediately after, she compares
herself to the chimneys of Coketown, towering products of industrialization that represent
discipline and seriousness. Louisa uses them as a metaphor for her own internal strife: “there
seems to be nothing there but languid and monotonous smoke. Yet when the night comes,
Fire bursts out, Father!” (Dickens 105). One article titled “'Melancholy Mad Elephants':
Affect and the Animal Machine in Hard Times” by Tamara Ketabgian comments on these
very same lines: “most critics view the machine's hidden, bursting fire as an allusion to
Louisa's own concealed and neglected passions” (Ketabgian 19).
As the story continues, Louisa becomes even less feminine and even more
automaton-like. Although she marries Mr. Bounderby, she is not an ideal Victorian wife to
him. She is not dedicated to his needs, is not very responsive when he talks to her, and is
overall quite serious with him and life in general. Finally, the pressure of her unhappy
lifestyle breaks her down, and she flees to the house of her father where her emotions finally
flood out of her. The event of her finally letting her emotional, feminine side out is
comparable to a machine exploding, breaking down, and finally being rendered useless. In
this way, she is transformed from a machine to a human, and from having masculine traits to
feminine ones. Ketabgian's article supports this idea: “Louisa's breakdown supports the
maxim that '[a]ll closely imprisoned forces rend and destroy,' while invoking a distinctly
industrial rhetoric of hidden affective power. Her collapse thus serves some of the
spectacular functions of a boiler explosion... However, it strategically relocates these forces
within a domestic space and within the contained pathology of one woman” (Ketabgian 19).
This transformation ultimately leads her to happiness, which shows the novel's
approval of Louisa's transformation. In particular, it shows the approval of a woman being
emotional, and letting her true feelings out. The article agrees that if people “cannot 'vent'
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their feelings in a moderate fashion --- through Fancy and recreational pleasure --- these
urges will explode” as Louisa did when she was deprived of these opportunities (Ketabgian
20). After Louisa's “explosion” she is initially depressed, but she eventually gains her
strength back and is rewarded with the true sympathy and love of her father, the friendship
of Sissy, and peace of mind. Her feminine, motherly side also emerges. Although she does
not have children of her own, she is loved by Sissy's children and her life is described as “all
children loving her; she, grown learned in childish lore; thinking no innocent and pretty
fancy ever to be despised; trying hard to know her humbler fellow-creatures, and to beautify
their lives of machinery and reality with those imaginative graces and delights without which
the heart of infancy will wither up” (Dickens 292). This description shows how by losing her
fact-obsessed, machine life, Louisa develops into a caring, feminine woman.
Just as the transformation of Louisa's character is complex and and changes
throughout the novel, so do the characters of the men. The ideal gender role of Victorian
men encompassed being rational, reasonable, stoic, working in the public world, and overall
taking on the opposite role from women. Due to these ideal traits, one would expect that
Hard Times would promote the idea that men should act as machines. However, while many
men start out living up to their gender-specific expectations, they are in the end rewarded
when they act in a more feminine fashion.
One man who shows this is Mr. Gradgrind. Mr. Gradgrind is the epitome of a
masculine machine-like man for the majority of the tale. His introduction to the readers
basically sums up his philosophy of life: “Thomas Gradgrind, sir. A man of realities. A man
of facts and calculations.... ready to weigh and measure any parcel of human nature, and tell
you exactly what it comes to. It is a mere question of figures, a case of simple arithmetic”
(Dickens 12). His life revolves around his job, and teaching others, especially his family, to
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live by the same principles. All this is carried out with an unfeeling, stoic mindset. One prime
example of this lack of emotion and dedication to his job occurs after his wife dies. After
learning of hear death he “buried her in a businesslike manner. He then returned with
promptitude to the national cinder-heap, and then resumed... his parliamentary duties”
(Dickens 205).
Mr. Gradgrind believes he is happy living in this world of facts, reason, and
machines, but the realization that his favorite daughter, Louisa, has been unhappy living
under these principles her entire life, abruptly changes all this. He begins to question his
philosophy of facts and reason and even admits himself to be wrong. He says emotionally
while watching Louisa wasting away in front of him that “there is a wisdom of the Head, and
that there is a wisdom of the Heart... I have supposed the head to be all-sufficient; how can I
venture this morning to say it is!” (Dickens 222). This moment begins his transformation
from a stoic machine into a compassionate person. Once this change occurs, Mr. Gradgrind
helps his son, Tom, escape from the police after he has committed a crime, showing a
newfound appreciation of unconditional, familial love and forgiveness, both undeniably
feminine traits. In order to help his son he also has to get help from carnival workers who he
earlier judges as immoral because they approve of the imagination. Mr. Gradgrind eventually
makes “his facts and figures subservient to Faith, Hope, and Charity” and does some good
to the world in this way (Dickens 291).
Mr. Gradgrind's colleague, Mr. Bounderby, also begins the tale with a similar
mentality, but he does not undergo such a transformation, and his tale ends quite differently.
When the novel introduces Bounderby, one of the first things said about him is that “he was
a rich man: banker, merchant, manufacturer, and what not. A big, loud man, with a stare,
and a metallic laugh” (Dickens 23). These lines indicate that Mr. Bounderby's defining
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masculine traits are that he is a strong, serious, working man. He is also Mr. Gradgrind's
closest friend; they share a common outlook which takes fact, reason, and the abolition of
fancy as the most important aspects of life.
These machine-like traits of Mr. Bounderby ultimately lead to his downfall. His wife
leaves him since she is so unhappy, his friends abandon him for they discover he has been
lying about his upbringing his entire life, and his one remaining ally, Mrs. Sparsit, becomes
fed up with him and insults him behind his back. Finally readers learn that after all this he is
to “forever nauseate all healthy stomachs with a vast amount of Bounderby balderdash and
bluster” and “was to die of a fit in the Coketown street” (Dickens 290). By not adopting
more emotional, imaginative, human, and feminine traits like Mr. Gradgrind, Mr. Bounderby
meets a sad end. Mr. Bounderby is “tainted by utilitarian fact-bound reasoning” (Pennigton
3).
Finally, a character named Stephen Blackpool presents a very interesting and
controversial case. Stephen is one of the few male characters who begins the novel having
very human and feminine traits. Stephen is trapped in an unhappy marriage with a
problematic woman, but is in love with his friend Rachael. He tries to obtain a divorce, so
that he may marry her. He is not just mechanically accepting the sad facts of his marriage in
the way that Louisa did when she was living as a machine. By trying to obtain a divorce and
marry Rachael, Stephen imagines and dreams of a better future, and reveals his emotional,
loving side. However, Ketabgian's article disagrees with these ideas. The article argues that
Stephen is quite machine-like: “throughout Hard Times, Stephen responds to a variety of
discouraging personal obstacles simply by redoubling his efforts to pursue a life devoted to
and modeled upon the steady rhythms of factory work” (Ketabgian 21). Although it is true
that Stephen is persistent despite failure, this can be seen as passion, desperation, and the
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hunger for triumph. This perspective leads one to look at Stephen with having human traits,
rather than automaton-like qualities.
Stephen is initially punished for not playing a more machine-like, masculine role. He
is ostracized by his coworkers, fired from his job, and accused of robbing a bank. This turn
of events initially contradicts the other characters' stories. However, by the end of the book
Stephen is exonerated from his accused crime and the entire town that had initially
ostracized him, bands together to save him from death. Although he does end up dying, he
dies as a man forgiven of all his alleged sins, and Rachael finally holds his hand as he is being
carried away. The connection with Rachael is clearly a reward and a blessing for him as his
final wish is for her to hold his hand. His death is also clearly not a punishment for it is
described as a peaceful, blessed event: “the star had shown him where to find the God of the
poor; and through humility, and sorrow, and forgiveness, he had gone to his Redeemer's
rest” (Dickens 269). Here, readers can see that through emotion, love, and feminine
qualities, Stephen is rewarded with peace and his final wish. One article reflects this
sentiment when it says that Hard Times “is trying to redeem imagination by finding a new
way of using it, by giving it a serious purpose so that it will no longer be separate from faith .
. . but rather allied with it” (Pennignton 201). The line about Stephen's death along with the
way Stephen led his life show a strong correlation between religion and faith, and living a life
filled with imagination, two things that the novel clearly promotes.
Hard Times presents complex ideas about the relationship between humans and
machines and how they relate to gender roles. At first glance, readers might expect that the
novel would promote men living mechanical, work-oriented lives, and women living in the
opposite manner. However, the novel ultimately shows that true happiness will come from
allowing emotions, imagination, and other stereotypically feminine qualities to flourish in all
Viewpoint 2.1 Spring 2012
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people, both female and male. In order to achieve this happiness, people must escape from
their purely machine-inspired lives.
Viewpoint 2.1 Spring 2012
22
Bibliography
Dickens, Charles. Hard Times. New York: Penguin Putnam, 1997.
Ketabgian, Tamara. "Melancholy Mad Elephants”: Affect and the Animal Machine in Hard
Times." (2003): 1-29. EBSCO Host. 10 Mar. 2010.
Pennington, John. "From Fact to Fantasy in Victorian Fiction: Dickens's Hard Times and
MacDonaid's Phantasies." (1997): 1-8. EBSCO Host. 10 Mar. 2010.
Viewpoint 2.1 Spring 2012
23
LEAVING IT ALL BEHIND OR NOTHING YOU WANT AND EVERYTHING
YOU DON’T NEED: THOMAS HARDY ON RELATIONSHIPS BOTH VICTORIAN
AND OTHERWISE IN JUDE THE OBSCURE
SAMUEL POLITO
By the last decade of the Nineteenth century, the attitudinal structure and outward
trappings of the Victorian era were beginning to decline and fall. The pillars of principles
and beliefs, upon which the Victorian era was built, were beginning to crumble beneath the
weight of the impending turn of the century. Contemporary authors both captured and
perpetuated this paradigm shift away from Victorianism. As with every artistic movement
and gradual change in culture, the participants in the transition out of Victorianism were
unaware of their role and it is only in retrospect that this transition can be properly
recognized and designated as such. Regardless, these authors, disillusioned with the writings
of the Victorian stalwarts, sought new interpretations for explaining the lives they led; lives
that were incongruous with the paradigm of Victorianism and explanations free from the
constraints of a Victorian mindset. In Jude the Obscure, Thomas Hardy challenges the
Victorian ideal of marriage, domestically and the roles of both women and men in both
these constructs and in relationships universally.
There is a distinct fin de siècle mentality in Jude the Obscure as, on a textual, plot level, it
differs dramatically from standard Victorian fare. The relationships between the characters
deviate from previously held societal norms of the former part of the century as well as
being deviant in their own right. Also, interpretation of the implicit subtext of Jude the
Obscure goes even further in separating it from conventional Victorianism in unprecedented,
Viewpoint 2.1 Spring 2012
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brazen ways. Some of these interpretations withstand cross-examination while others seem
to extrapolate too far.
In the culmination of all of these elements, Hardy most notably challenges the
theories of male and female roles in society and relationships set by, what had become
known as, the doctrine of separate spheres as proposed by Alfred Lord Tennyson and the
traditional, Victorian view of womanhood described by Coventry Patmore in her poem The
Angel in the House. Hardy inverts these two theories through the subversive lens of immoral
unions, nontraditional relationships, the unsanctity of marriage and possible homosexuality
as a way of showing their impractical and archaic application as modern England was exiting
the Victorian age. However, Hardy does not propose a replacement for the doctrine of
separate spheres and uses Jude the Obscure to point out the futility in human relationships and
unions whether one follow traditional Victorian guidelines or nontraditional ones.
Every relationship in Jude the Obscure fails to be sustained and, ultimately, ends in
complete separation or misery. Each of these relationships can be seen as embodying one or
more traditional Victorian ideal: that of marriage, the doctrine of separate spheres, the “angel
in the house” and possibly the eschewal of latent homosexuality. Jude the Obscure also reads
like a classic Greek tragedy in which every relationship was doomed to fail from its
inception. Jude foreshadows all the events of the novel in his musings on Sue Bridehead
when he says, “in a family like his own, where marriage usually meant a tragic sadness…a
tragic sadness might be intensified to a tragic horror” (Hardy 105). With this, Hardy asserts
the futility in any approach to human relationships—especially an approach based on the
doctrine of separate spheres—but, as displayed in the events of the novel, that humans still
try to engage in them in spite of known failure because of their humanity and that in and of
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itself is a noble pursuit of, as Hardy states in the preface, “the strongest passion known to
humanity” (Hardy vi).
Both women that Jude becomes romantically involved with, Arabella Donn and Sue
Bridehead, symbolically defy one or more Victorian concept of relationships. The first of
these relationships Jude enters into in the novel is with Arabella Donn. This is, in fact, the
first relationship Jude has ever been involved in and he is characterized as being a young,
impressionable boy of nineteen with little to no experience in life. Hardy intends for Jude’s
quick marriage to Arabella as an attack on the entire institution of marriage and its inherent
sanctity.
The relationship begins with the young impressionable Jude becoming smitten with
the, as he perceived, “nice-looking girl” (Hardy 44) of Arabella. In keeping with Jude
character of inexperience, Hardy notes that Jude had never, until this point, looked upon a
woman before as an object of sexual desire. Arabella, conversely, is not as naive as Jude and
openly, and heavily, flirts with him and only a few days after meeting him, declares her desire
to marry him. This contrast in their two characters is striking and one reviewer of the novel
goes as far as to call Arabella a “back-country slut” (Bonds). She is also subversive in her
motives towards young Jude and carries with her an air of deception, exemplified in
numerous manners. She and Jude spend a couple months engaging in implied pre-marital
sex which, if not a deliberate attack on the marital institution, at least undermines its inherent
sanctity.
Hardy relies on implication and insinuation to convey many of the finer, more
explicit details in the novel. Such is the case with the conception of Arabella and Jude’s child
and with the revealing of its conception. Once Jude infers Arabella’s recent maternity, he
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concludes marriage to be a “must” (64). The marriage is therefore, and henceforth, viewed
as not a sacred sacrament reserved for individuals serious about their desire to be, in the eyes
of God and the law, connected with each other but as a desperate attempt to correct a
misdeed and maintain and uphold the strict decorum of Victorian values. Immediately
afterward, however, the severe ramifications of entering into such a union are rapidly made
clear as Arabella’s façade of deceit comes crashing down.
This web of artifices, in turn, is symbolic of, and stands for, the institution of
marriage itself as a whole. First to crumble is Arabella’s visual façade. After her marriage to
Jude, she stops sucking in her cheeks to artificially create an aesthetically pleasing dimple.
Next, she reveals to Jude her “long tail of hair” (67) to be entirely artificial and detachable.
Hardy intends this fake persona Arabella had presented to Jude before the inception of
marriage to be seen as applying lipstick to a barrow-pig similar to the one whose
characteristic part had symbolically initiated Jude and Arabella’s relationship. Carried
further, these artificial devices reflect on the artifice of marriage itself and, as Arabella’s
entire character is seen as a deceitful forgery, so too is the institution of marriage; appealing
only to those who have not engaged in it with its flaws being revealed after they do much the
way Arabella physically appealed to Jude before he became intimately acquainted with her.
The culmination of these deceits in Arabella and Jude’s marriage comes to a climactic
catharsis when Arabella reveals that the “immediate reason for [their] marriage had proved
to be non-existent” (Hardy 71). Arabella had implicitly coerced Jude into entering this
tainted institution through outright deceit and false pretenses revealing, all at once, herself
and their marriage as a sham. Hardy also means for it to reflect on marriage to universally be
a sham. With this news, Jude is no longer an innocent, impressionable youth as he fully
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realizes the prison he has become entrapped in. He explicitly acknowledges that he is
confined inside this marriage and “caught in a gin that would cripple him…for the rest of a
lifetime” (Hardy 71). He equates marriage itself to be a death without the benefits of release
that natural mortality provides. Because of his disillusionment with marriage, he goes as far
as to contemplate suicide appropriate for someone in his degraded position. He halfheartedly attempts this before remembering drinking to be the preferred method of dealing
with such a situation. He muses on his realization of why other men drink; these men are
meant to be portrayed, of course, as married. Hardy is seldom explicitly direct in his
conveyance of meaning and symbolism, yet he is brazenly clear on Jude’s newfound concept
of marriage and his methods of coping with his new-found prison cell. Hardy almost
comically refers to the alcoholic consumption of disillusioned married men to be the
“stereotyped resource for the despairing worthless” (82). The institution of marriage, by
extension, is implied to be as equally worthless as the drunken, wallowing Jude. Jude never
officially escapes the marriage and is only relieved from his burden of Arabella when she
elects to leave him, and England, altogether. The two remain connected by marriage but
physically live separately, again undermining this rigidly upheld sacrament in Victorian
society.
Whereas his relationship with Arabella mostly conformed to the guidelines proposed
by the doctrine of separate spheres, Jude’s next relationship—that which he enters into with
Sue Bridehead—does not and, beyond simply defying it, almost completely inverts the
doctrine. Not only does their relationship display a lack of separate spheres, but Sue
Bridehead also destroys the Victorian image of women being domestic divinity as proposed
by Patmore’s “The Angel in the House” in both her relationship with Jude and Phillotson.
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The first description of Sue in the novel evokes the physical image of an angel with
Hardy describing her photograph as surrounded by “candlesticks on [the] mantle” and
wearing a hat that resembled “the rays of a halo” around her head (88). This none too subtle
description clearly alludes to Patmore’s poem and is meant to show Jude’s initial notions of
her; he clings to the archaic portrayal and ideal, which only sets up his philosophy to be later
shattered.
The doctrine of separate spheres states men are to work to sustain the household
and women are to remain confined to the household (Norton 992). In both her marriage to
Phillotson, and her non-marriage living situation with Jude, Sue works in the field of
academia alongside her respective companions as, if not an equal, at least a colleague and
assuredly within this male “sphere”. Sue has obtained an education, and educates others on
a collegiate level. This flies in the face of another dictum of the doctrine of separate spheres
that states only men should use and exercise their minds rationally while women are
confined to only obeying the emotions of their heart; a completely irrational organ unlike the
brain. Because of Sue’s education and occupation, she exercises her mind more thoroughly
than her emotions and is never portrayed as overly sensitive throughout the course of the
novel. Hardy portrays her, however, as a strong willed individual. As she systematically and
sequentially moves back and forth between relationships with Jude and Phillotson
respectively, she is portrayed as the partner who holds the authoritative position. To
supplement this, she implicitly has affairs when in each relationship, thus revealing a lack of
control over her actions by any outside party, most implicitly, her current partner. This
characterization of her subverts the remaining two pillars of the doctrine that state men are
to command women and wield the strong power in the house while women are to obey such
commands and be complacent in their domestically.
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The character of Sue, through all of her actions, inverts the doctrine of separate
spheres so completely and thoroughly as to make such a conclusion inescapable of notice.
Hardy’s disillusionment with the doctrine—along with the image of divine domestically—is
clear, however, he makes no claims that the eschewal, or even subversion, of such an
incorrect paradigm is a solution. Critics have perceived Sue’s character as the “new
feminist” who “does not merely defy law and convention [but puts] herself so far beyond
them” to become the “new woman, girl of the period” (Langland). Hardy’s goal in striking
such a contrast to mainstream thought was to portray a more realistic portrait of
contemporary England in which more and more individuals were not living lives in
accordance to either paradigm and that many had not been for some time prior. His
ultimate statement is that humans naturally do not fit into such a rubric and does not present
a rubric in which they do because no one had discovered one prior or since. Hardy was
aware of this and leaves Jude bereft of a happy ending not as a moral lesson, but to show the
nobility in the ultimate struggle of the human condition.
Two separate, radical, homoerotic theories have been proposed concerning the
relationships found in Jude the Obscure and, if either one be deemed acceptable, would further
distance the characters from Victorian ideals. Through these extrapolations of Hardy’s
implicit narrative, the characters, and by extension Hardy’s motives, become exponentially
more subversive in their comment on Victorian society.
The first theory, proposed by Jane Thomas in her dissertation “Thomas Hardy, Jude
the Obscure and Comradely Love”, concerns the relationship between Jude and Sue and is
the more reasonable of the two. It extrapolates from Sue’s androgynous characteristics that
she is, in fact, intended to be portrayed as a man. Supported by the fact that Sue
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momentarily cross-dresses, is described as boyish and is adamant about preserving a sexless
relationship with Jude, this theory seems to support the subversion of the doctrine of
spheres—physically and symbolically placing Sue within the male sphere—more so than the
paradigm of heterosexuality. However, Jude was written at a period in which the issues and
concerns surrounding homosexuality were become more a topic of accepted public
discussion. Contemporaries of Hardy included Walt Whitman and Oscar Wilde, the latter of
whose “buggery” trials coincided with the publication of Jude. Thomas also notes that a
review of Wilde’s Picture of Dorian Gray, written in 1891, “refers to Dorian as Ganymede-like”
(Thomas), Ganymede being a beautiful, male Greek character representing virility. Thomas
then points to a passage in Jude, published four years later, in which Sue is also described as
“boyish as a Ganymedes” (Thomas). It is logical to infer that Hardy is alluding to this
review in his description of Sue and means for her to be seen as a male character opposite
Jude. Regardless of intention, the presence of androgynous homosexuality and gender
confusion can easily be inferred and only displays further subversions on Hardy’s part of
Victorian society and ideals.
The other theory proposes a more radical conjecture. In his dissertation “Male
Relations in Thomas Hardy’s Jude The Obscure” Richard Dellamora asserts that Jude
possesses implicit, latent homosexual desires for Phillotson and positions himself with Sue,
and facilitates the relationship between Sue and Phillotson, in order to be close to Phillotson
without explicitly asserting himself upon Phillotson and arousing notice. According to
Dellamora, Jude, in doing so, “initiates a triangle familiar in male homosocial [sic] culture”.
This conjecture as to Jude’s character would again be strong evidence as to the subversion of
the doctrine of spheres as it would invert the doctrine more thoroughly than a heterosexual
or androgynous homosexual Sue Bridehead ever could. However, Dellamora fails to state
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Hardy’s purpose in implying such a blatant, traditional homosexual paradigm and evaporates
with the absence of textual evidence beyond wild extrapolation. The only theme in Jude that
Dellamora’s theory conforms to is that of Hardy’s emphasis on nonconformity with
Victorian ideals.
Hardy hardly eschews obfuscation in Jude the Obscure. He weaves a dense tapestry of
overlapping symbolism, consecutive and repetitive partnering, consecutive infidelities, moral
ambiguities and moral voids set in a waning Victorian setting and written in a distinctly
uncharacteristic Victorian voice. The paradigm of Victorianism was shifting and his Jude The
Obscure helped in its transition. It is an incendiary novel and the archaic, institutionalized
modus operandi proposed by the doctrine of separate spheres and “Angel in the House” are
fixed squarely in Hardy’s crosshairs. However, Jude the Obscure does not aim to solve the
problems it points out with these Victorian ideals nor the problem it creates in their absence.
Hardy simply shows his disillusionment with the past and concedes to the mysteries of the
impending twentieth century without suggesting that man may ever find a suitable solution
to the problems with decorum that arise between the coupling of a man and a woman. He
does show, however, the nobility in the struggle sparked by the “the strongest passion
known to humanity” (vi) and imbues this struggle with possibly the only virtue to be found
in the novel.
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32
Works Cited
Bonds, Diane S. " Fleshly Temptation in Robert Penn Warren’s A Place to Come To and
Hardy’s Jude the Obscure." American Notes & Queries 19.9/10 (1981): 144.
Academic Search Complete. EBSCO. Web. 10 Mar. 2010.
Dellamora, Richard. "Male relations in Thomas Hardy's Jude the Obscure." Papers on
Language & Literature 27.4 (1991): 453. Academic Search Complete. EBSCO. Web. 10
Mar. 2010.
Hardy, Thomas. Jude the Obscure. New York: Random House, 1923. Print.
Langland, Elizabeth. " A Perspective of Ones Own: Thomas Hardy and the Elusive Sue
Bridehead." Studies in the Novel 12.1 (1980): 12. Academic Search Complete. EBSCO.
Web. 10 Mar. 2010.
Reidhead, Julia ed. The Norton Anthology to English Literature: The Victorian Age. Ed. 8, Vol. E.
New York: W.W. Norton & Company, Inc, 2006. Print.
Thomas, Jane. "Thomas Hardy, Jude the Obscure and ‘Comradely Love’." Literature
&History 16.2 (2007): 1-15. Academic Search Complete. EBSCO. Web. 10 Mar. 2010.
Viewpoint 2.1 Spring 2012
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WOMEN AND DANCE IN LITERATURE:
AN ANALYSIS OF JANE AUSTEN’S PRIDE AND PREJUDICE
VIRGINIA REINART
All aspects of a society exemplify the cultural significance of dance to varying
degrees, but its intimate effects are best understood in the context of the other arts.
Literature is one such art. During the nineteenth century, society underwent a dramatic series
of changes as a result of the industrial revolution, and the perceived role of women was
challenged, culminating in the women’s suffrage movement at the turn of the century.
During this period, works of literature written by women emerged as works of art to be
taken seriously, and the presence and perceptions of dance they include directly reflect the
status of dance in the culture of the 1800s and its relation to the altering status of women.
Pride and Prejudice, published by Jane Austen in 1813, exemplifies the changing social role of
dance in relation to the changing role of women in society from the unique perspective of
the gender these alterations directly affected. Through the subtle satire and adept
characterization inherent in her unique voice, Austen’s masterpiece both upholds and
challenges conventional views of dance and women in society.
Volume one of Pride and Prejudice is rife with social gatherings and dances.
Caught between the logic and clarity of the Age of Reason and the superfluous emotionality
and imagination of the Romantic Era1, the Regency period in England was a time of
transition in which social niceties were paramount2. Dance served dual functions as a
1
Imbriani, V. (2005). A Brief History of England. Retrieved December 2, 2010 from
http://www.liceovittorioimbriani.it/attvita/attivita01-02/inglese/history.html
2
Romance Reader at Heart. (2001). Tidbits and Trivia of the Regency Period . Retrieved December 2, 2010
from Romance Reader at Heart: http://romancereaderatheart.com/regency/index.html
Viewpoint 2.1 Spring 2012
34
stratified means of social interaction and a universal form of entertainment. Nowhere does
the implication of this duality become more evident in Pride and Prejudice than through the
introduction to the main characters in the earliest pages of the novel – it is their interactions,
or lack thereof, on the dance floor that characterize reader’s initial impressions, not their
intellect or choice of companions. The contrast between the amicable Mr. Bingley and the
sober Mr. Darcy, both of “good breeding”, is immediately apparent: “Mr. Bingley…danced
every dance…such amiable qualities must speak for themselves…Mr. Darcy danced only
once… His character was decided. He was the proudest, most disagreeable man in the
world.”3 Under the constraints of nineteenth century society, he who dances well
exemplifies the ideal bachelor - he who does not, the proud, cold individual destined for
solitude. The same is true of women, though with slightly different manifestations. As
evinced by Jane’s marvel over Mr. Bingley’s attention – “I was very much flattered by his
asking me to dance a second time” – and Elizabeth’s dismissal by Mr. Darcy – “I am in no
humour…to give consequence to young ladies who are slighted by other men”4 – attention
given or denied on the dance floor has significant social repercussions. A woman slighted by
her lack of a partner is regarded as a homely or insignificant figure; one given much attention
is attractive and worthy of affection.
As the novel progresses, however, Austen’s satiric nature emerges. Though
the initial flurry of dance activity and apparently serious descriptions of its implications
appears to uphold the conventional nineteenth century perception dance as the defining
social grace, it quickly becomes apparent that she regards this interaction as nothing more
3
Austen, J. (1813/2004). Pride and Prejudice. New York, New York: Pocket Books, a division of Simon &
Schuster, Inc. p. 12
4
Austen, J. (1813/2004). Pride and Prejudice. New York, New York: Pocket Books, a division of Simon &
Schuster, Inc. p. 13
Viewpoint 2.1 Spring 2012
35
than frivolity. Only those whose primary concern is gossip and intrigue give any weight to
dance’s social exchanges; those with whom the reader is lead to empathize rarely participate
in the activity. This is especially evident in the stark contrast between Elizabeth and her sister
Lydia and their respective love interests, Mr. Darcy and Mr. Wickham. Lydia’s exaggerated
character, Austen’s depiction of the quintessential shallow female, thinks only of dances and
men – even in her letter of elopement with “her Officer Wickham”, a rather serious
occasion, she deems it of utmost importance to send her apologies to a gentleman she has
promised a dance – “Tell him I hope he will excuse me when he knows all and…I will dance
with him at the next ball we meet.”5 Elizabeth, Austen’s embodiment of the ideal woman –
one who matches Darcy’s depiction of a woman who exemplifies “capacity, and taste, and
application, and elegance...united”6 – is conversely intellectual and intelligent. Though she
dances well and thus fulfils societal demands, it is neither her sole occupation nor her
greatest desire – her attention is more often devoted to reading than to conventional
entertainments. Darcy is similarly contrasted to Mr. Wickham – and the officers in general –
in an obvious dichotomy of intellectual intelligence versus social aptitude. The officers are
met with widespread approval on the dance floor, but any prolonged relationship leads to ill
repute as in Lydia’s elopement – character revealed by “dance as social arbiter” is ultimately
false. Darcy’s initial characterization as a haughty, standoffish man is similarly inaccurate –
despite the dearth of dancing by his character, by the conclusion of the novel he is
recognized as one of the only faithful, honest men in its pages.
5
Austen, J. (1813/2004). Pride and Prejudice. New York, New York: Pocket Books, a division of Simon &
Schuster, Inc. p. 325
6
Austen, J. (1813/2004). Pride and Prejudice. New York, New York: Pocket Books, a division of Simon &
Schuster, Inc. p. 44
Viewpoint 2.1 Spring 2012
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The concept of dance as ultimate character determinant is further challenged
by Mr. Darcy’s pride. According to Mary, the meekest and plainest of the Bennet sisters,
“One can be proud without being vain. Pride relates more to our opinion of ourselves,
vanity to what we would have others think of us.”7 As indicated by prior depictions, dance,
in addition to its insincerity, is also a vain activity. Therefore, those who participate think
Darcy’s lack of interest a symptom of conceit. However, it is their own narcissism that
prevents them from realizing Darcy is actually proud, an attribute not innately negative; he
has a clear personal image, and his confidence in its accuracy permits him to deign not to
participate in an activity whose essential purpose is to inform one’s vanity – one’s perception
by others – in the absence of poised individuality. His own acknowledgement of dance’s
innate egotism is exemplified in the single occasion in which he and Elizabeth dance
concurrently: their entire conversation mocks the inconsequential social niceties that typify
dance floor banter.8
As a result of this inherent triviality, dance’s role in the plot of the story is
comparatively negligible. Though it initiates relationships and introduces characters, it is the
written communications and extemporaneous conversations that reveal crucial details and
establish movement in the story: it is in a letter that Elizabeth learns the truth of Darcy’s
relationship with Wickham9; it is in the parlor of the Bennet’s home that Bingley proposes to
Jane;10 it is in heated argument and discussion that Elizabeth’s true feelings towards Darcy
7
Austen, J. (1813/2004). Pride and Prejudice. New York, New York: Pocket Books, a division of Simon &
Schuster, Inc. p. 22
8
Austen, J. (1813/2004). Pride and Prejudice. New York, New York: Pocket Books, a division of Simon &
Schuster, Inc. p. 103-4
9
Austen, J. (1813/2004). Pride and Prejudice. New York, New York: Pocket Books, a division of Simon &
Schuster, Inc. p. 364
10
Austen, J. (1813/2004). Pride and Prejudice. New York, New York: Pocket Books, a division of Simon
& Schuster, Inc. p. 386
Viewpoint 2.1 Spring 2012
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are revealed.11 It is the individuals that engage in these conversations whose actions move
the plot, not those of the characters for whom dance epitomizes purposeful existence. As
Elizabeth suggests, “It [is surely] more rational if conversation instead of dancing [make] the
order of the day.”12 While Austen acknowledges the societal significance of dance, she
simultaneously mocks its import by characterizing its participants as the shallowest, most
deceptive characters.
Austen further notes dance’s ineffectiveness through comparison with
another form of movement: walking. Throughout the novel, scenes of dance appear
alternately with depictions of walking in specific contrast. Walking, characterized as
purposeful, directional movement, is placed opposite the static, aesthetic entertainment of
dance. Just as the superficial relations on the dance floor do not reveal pertinent, truthful
information, neither does the physical action of dance itself contribute to significant plot
movement. Rather, it is the scenes of walking and its participants whose actions bear textual
relevance: Elizabeth and Darcy enact their courtship and engagement through a series of
walks and discussions; Elizabeth walks to take care of Jane in her illness; and, in the most
obvious contrast to dancing, Darcy “walked here, and he walked there,” engaging in
purposeful movement rather than the static patterns of English contra dance13. Dancing is
presented as stationary in contrast to its customary significance as a means of social
advancement – Austen suggests that vitality and intellect should replace delicacy and
coquettish etiquette as determinants of social import, especially in women.
11
Austen, J. (1813/2004). Pride and Prejudice. New York, New York: Pocket Books, a division of Simon
& Schuster, Inc. p 419
12
Austen, J. (1813/2004). Pride and Prejudice. New York, New York: Pocket Books, a division of Simon
& Schuster, Inc. p 62
13
Imbriani, V. (2005). A Brief History of England. Retrieved December 2, 2010 from
http://www.liceovittorioimbriani.it/attvita/attivita01-02/inglese/history.html
Viewpoint 2.1 Spring 2012
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It is through this clear critique of nineteenth century society’s reliance on a
deceptive, superficial craft for character judgment that Austen establishes her position on the
altering societal role of women. Just as emerging female professional dancers were relegated
to the submissive, ethereal roles compliant with the male-female objectification dictations of
societal norms14, women, especially those in positions of social consequence, were expected
to fulfill a specific image of submissive domesticity. By placing Elizabeth in position to
receive the audience’s approval and characterizing her according to liberated traits – she “has
no pleasure in anything”15 besides reading; she speaks intelligently, coyly displaying the depth
of her understanding; she engages only in those activities which reveal her strengths while
maintaining her “accomplished” status; and, most importantly, she participates in dance
while mocking its foppish mannerisms – Austen unsubtly conveys her support for the
liberation of women from their oppressive societal place. Later Romantic ballets, such as
Filippo Taglioni’s La Révolte des femmes (sometimes referred to as La Révolte de la Harem),
attempted a similar rebuttal of convention with limited degrees of success;16 literature, which
voiced opinions and was filtered through its lack of visual stimulation, was freer to criticize
convention than escapist ballet’s depiction of ideal society, especially as educated male dance
critics became common members of the audience. Dance, whether in the ballroom as
Austen illustrates or in the fictional realm of the stage, facilitates the perpetuation of societal
norms.
14
Carroll, S. B. (1997). Marriage and the Inhuman; La Sylphide's narratives of domesticity and community.
In L. Garafola, Rethinking the Sylph (pp. 91-106). Hanover, NH: Wesleyan University Press. p. 94
15
Austen, J. (1813/2004). Pride and Prejudice. New York, New York: Pocket Books, a division of Simon
& Schuster, Inc. p 41
16
Meglin, J. A. (1997). "Feminsim or Fetishism?" La Revolte des Femmes and Women's Liberation in
France in the1830s. In L. Garafola, Rethinking the Sylph - New Prspectives on the Romantic Ballet (pp. 6990). Hanover, NH: Wesleyan University Press . p 69, 72
Viewpoint 2.1 Spring 2012
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Despite this freedom, however, Austen’s sense of realism limits the extent to
which she can criticize convention, an effect similar to that inflicted by ballet’s reliance on
idealism. All significant female characters eventually conform to societal expectations by
marrying, revealing an underlying support of convention similar to that in La Sylphide’s
depiction of Madge’s predictions regarding the status of each women’s marital bliss;
“marriage stories, it seems, preoccupy the women in this ballet [story].”17 Even Elizabeth,
despite her presentation as a “liberated” woman though her intellect and satiric treatment of
dance, eventually submits to societal expectations by entering into matrimony. Austen does,
however, establish a sort of hierarchy of societal approval between the three sisters who
conform to submissive social norms. Lydia and Wickham are the least appropriate – their
disappearance and hasty marriage, accompanied by the preference of both for disingenuous
dance, characterize Austen’s criticism and support of convention; she upholds the traditional
institution of marriage while fostering her dismissal of social dance as meaningless frivolity.
Jane and Mr. Bingley represent the status quo – neither is especially controversial or radical
in their actions, reflecting their “good breeding” by adhering to societal norms of courtship,
matrimony, and participating in dance as much as acceptable without becoming
overwhelmed by its vanity. They exist on the fringes of the story, crucial to the plot but not
its “movers and shakers.” Their retiring nature reveals both Austen’s criticism of societal
submission and her acknowledgement of established relationship norms. Elizabeth and
Darcy are the equally controversial progressive counterparts of Lydia and Mr. Wickham;
though they comply with convention by entering into matrimony, Austen uses their
intelligence and status as non-dancers to challenge the idea that deference is implicit in malefemale relationships.
17
Carroll, S. B. (1997). Marriage and the Inhuman; La Sylphide's narratives of domesticity and community.
In L. Garafola, Rethinking the Sylph (pp. 91-106). Hanover, NH: Wesleyan University Press.
Viewpoint 2.1 Spring 2012
40
Austen’s relationship hierarchy reflects her historical position between the
Age of Reason and the Romantic Era. Her attention to convention reflects the logic of the
Age of Reason; her themes of vitality and intellect’s superiority over frivolity, exemplified by
the dichotomy of walking and conversation versus dance, reflect the enlightenment and
celebration of the individual characteristic of the Romantic Era as described by Jean-Jacques
Rousseau: “Natural behavior…unrestrained and impulsive, is good in contrast to behavior
governed by…the rules and customs of society…[which leads to] corruption and evil.”18
Lydia’s choices, governed by superficial societal conventions, lead to irrepute. Elizabeth and
Mr. Darcy’s decisions, governed by intellect and vitality, lead to a substantive relationship.
Jane and Mr. Bingley, however, lie somewhere in the middle; their relationship’s success
perpetuates convention while defying its negative effects through their idealism and
“natural” goodness. Austen’s satiric treatment of these exaggeratedly defined relationships
characterizes her unique stance; romance retroactively rules reason.
Pride and Prejudice is widely regarded as one of Austen’s masterworks, and with
good reason; its publication and acceptance as a serious work of literature represented one of
the earliest recognitions of women’s intellectual merit. Through satire and adroit
characterization, Austen criticizes the society’s superficiality while upholding those
conventions she acknowledges as contemporarily immutable. Her exaltation of the liberated
individual in Elizabeth Bennet and the atypical process by which she becomes romantically
involved with Mr. Darcy supports the established institution of marriage while challenging
its accompanying expectations. This idea is especially poignant in concordance with Austen’s
dismissal of dance - an established means of courtship, social interaction, and an arbiter of
18
Imbriani, V. (2005). A Brief History of England. Retrieved December 2, 2010 from
http://www.liceovittorioimbriani.it/attvita/attivita01-02/inglese/history.html
Viewpoint 2.1 Spring 2012
41
social acceptance – as absent-minded frivolity. Through literature, Austen is able to create
what the inherent escapist nature of theatrical dance prohibits it from ever fully realizing –
an unconventional depiction of ideal, conventional society. Caught in the crux of Reason
and Romanticism, Austen is the quintessential embodiment of each: a woman who is neither
“housewife [nor] whore”19 according to Derby’s ultimatum, but an intelligent, imaginative,
artist.
19
Carlein, N. (1985, March). Women and the Struggle for Socialism. Retrieved December 2, 2010 from
Laneridge Limited: http://www.anv.edu/au/polsci/marx/contemp/pamsetc/women/ws_main.htm
Viewpoint 2.1 Spring 2012
42
Bibliography
Austen, J. (1813/2004). Pride and Prejudice. New York, New York: Pocket Books, a division of
Simon & Schuster, Inc.
Carlein, N. (1985, March). Women and the Struggle for Socialism. Retrieved December 2, 2010
from Laneridge Limited:
http://www.anv.edu/au/polsci/marx/contemp/pamsetc/women/ws_main.htm
Carroll, S. B. (1997). Marriage and the Inhuman; La Sylphide's narratives of domesticity and
community. In L. Garafola, Rethinking the Sylph (pp. 91-106). Hanover, NH: Wesleyan
University Press.
Imbriani, V. (2005). A Brief History of England. Retrieved December 2, 2010 from
http://www.liceovittorioimbriani.it/attvita/attivita01-02/inglese/history.html
Meglin, J. A. (1997). "Feminsim or Fetishism?" La Revolte des Femmes and Women's
Liberation in France in the1830s. In L. Garafola, Rethinking the Sylph - New Prspectives
on the Romantic Ballet (pp. 69-90). Hanover, NH: Wesleyan University Press .
Romance Reader at Heart. (2001). Tidbits and Trivia of the Regency Period . Retrieved December
2, 2010 from Romance Reader at Heart:
http://romancereaderatheart.com/regency/index.html
Viewpoint 2.1 Spring 2012
43
NAMES AS HISTORY AND IDENTITY IN TONI MORRISON’S
SONG OF SOLOMON
ROBERT DORENBERG
The act of naming tends to be a close, considerate process. Parents name their
children after family members, fictional characters, historical figures and any number of
other things. A name, once bestowed upon a person is eternal, legally changeable but then
only ignored, not forgotten. The importance of naming is for the author perhaps even more
of an involved, laborious and deliberate process. Herman Melville, Thomas Pynchon, and
David Foster Wallace, amongst scores of others, show in their writings a close, methodical
and deeply symbolic choice of names for characters and objects. The effect is at times
religious, as in Melville’s Moby Dick, absurd, as in Pynchon’s Gravity’s Rainbow, or satiric, as in
Wallace’s Infinite Jest. For Toni Morrison, the importance of names is integral to her novel
Song of Solomon. Some persons would argue that a name is merely a sign, something that
notes and signifies a person or place, but does not define. Conversely, Morrison’s characters
in Solomon derive entire identities and histories through the names bestowed upon them,
both at birth and as nicknames later in life. In Song of Solomon, names and the act of naming
serves as a way to enforce, provide and reflect on identity, while also being a determinant of
history.
Song of Solomon is set predominantly in a pre-Civil Rights era unnamed Michigan town
and traces, primarily, the life of Macon “Milkman” Dead III and the lives of his family
members. The novel takes place in an era when black people have little power over the lives
they lead. The black community at large is without control over the quality of life it endures,
the jobs it can procure, the money it can possess and generally without a sense of justice and
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respect. African Americans are a people deprived of dignity, many of whom are but several
generations removed from the slave trade. Consequently, the creation of nicknames which
reflect the community, rather than the ruling white class which formally assigns names,
becomes an important ritual for the town’s black residents. As a point of communal pride
and respect, a central street in the town, known formally as “Mains Avenue,” is unofficially
called “Doctor Street” by the local black population, most of whom live in the “Southside”
section of town. The renaming of this avenue is done because “the only colored doctor in
the city had lived and died on that street”i. The poor and powerless residents of Southside
“make the name of their street an announcement of their concern for their own identities”
and a form of subtle resistance and protest.ii After years of confusion brought on by the use
of “Doctor Street” elected officials post declarations around the town stating that the street
must formally be known as “Mains Avenue and not Doctor Street” (4). This attempt to
make the residents of Southside submissive to official regulations backfires on the governing
body as the notices provide some level of legitimacy to the nickname and henceforth the
road becomes known as “Not Doctor Street.” Similarly, the hospital located on Not Doctor
Street, formally called Mercy Hospital, is known by Southsiders as No Mercy Hospital,
stemming from the facilities refusal to service the black population. These names function
as the community’s refusal to simply remain silent and passive to the ruling class. These
actions, while overtly harmless, signify the black community’s rebellion and “the potential
for names to subvert white authority”iii. Names become integral to the black community
who “find that their names, being ‘gifts’ of questionable value from others out of love or
hate, ignorance or accident” must be made personal and owned.iv
Nicknames therefore come to act as attempts to subvert historical truths and create a
new history or meaning. It is essentially a guerilla tactic performed by the powerless black
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community against its ruling class and an attempt to create some sense of insular culture. It
also instills a sense of ownership over the town, which those living in Southside intrinsically
lack, as the vast majority of them rent their homes rather than own. Where official names
are merely legal matters, nicknames are things born out of “yearnings, gestures, flaws, events,
mistakes, weaknesses” all of which are characteristics derived from some sort of truth (330).
A nickname then functions as a revealing tool, something which explains realities which
might otherwise be hidden or obscured by that which is official and readily apparent. In the
context of the novel “names define values [in that] they both reveal and conceal true
identity” which might otherwise be left unapparent.v The Southsiders create these names in
attempts to control their own perceptions of history and cultural identity. This desire to
discover, seek out or create a new history and identity becomes one of the novel’s central
themes.
Like the residents of Southside, Milkman Dead struggles to find some semblance of
identity for himself. But he is distinctly different than the others whom he interacts with, in
that Milkman is essentially a blank slate, devoid of any real sense of history, be it racial,
cultural or familial. He is raised within a family that neither promotes nor prides itself on its
ancestry, but rather values social status and monetary gains as a marker of identity. Milkman
is the son of Ruth, herself the daughter of the town’s aforementioned only black doctor, and
Macon Jr., a man who has shrugged off any sense of black history and pride in favor of a
purely capitalist American Dream. Coming from a house where he is told “the one
important thing you’ll ever need to know: Own things. And let the things you own own
things” destroys any sense of cultural roots which may have otherwise been provided (53).
Thus, Milkman’s only real sense of history and the only value instilled in him is money and
the power which wealth exerts over others. The only heritage he knows is that of money,
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which leaves Milkman a fractured person, unable to empathize with others and deeply
alienated from those around him. Milkman feels no connection with the sense of indecency
and injustice many of his fellow black men and women know. Where others “trade tales of
atrocities, first stories they heard, then those they’d witnessed, and finally the things that
happened to themselves” Milkman is deeply and fundamentally unaware of the realities of
racism in America (82). He knows no “litany of personal humiliation, outrage and anger”
which tends to be the common black experience in per-Civil Rights America (82). When
questioned about the murder of Emit Till, Milkman feels no sympathy or brotherhood
towards the murdered young man, instead believing he is “the one in trouble” (88).
Consequently, while Milkman interacts with the residents of Southside and spends time in
the neighborhood bars, he is different than those who live there full-time. It is not only his
residence on Not Doctor Street, but his very upbringing and world view which makes him a
different kind of person than the men who populate the bars and pool halls in Southside.
Milkman suffers from a lack of shared experience and it therefore makes him a different
person than the Southsiders. He knows they see him differently and he therefore comes to
view himself differently.
The sense of alienation and separateness which plagues Milkman’s life is exacerbated
by the two names he is saddled with: Milkman and Dead. Both names come to symbolize a
sense of powerlessness and lack of control over Milkman’s personal life. He feels the
surname Dead, itself the result of a clerical error, is an unspoken blight upon his family, a
“joke” rather than a name “given…at birth with love and seriousness” (17). In Milkman’s
view, his grandfather, the man initially bestowed the name, “took it. Like a fuckin sheep.
Somebody should have shot him” (89). The name becomes representative of the indignities
forced upon blacks post-Civil War by an indifferent white majority. What Milkman fails to
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understand however, is that the very act of forced naming, in the case of the Dead family
and thousands of other former slaves, destroys a person’s history while deliberately crafting a
new one for them. For the Dead family, this new history is crafted by “somebody who
couldn’t have cared less…a drunken Yankee in the Union Army” (18). Milkman’s
grandfather, whose real name is Jake Solomon, accepts the new name Dead not out of
sublimation or weakness, but as a path toward a new life, a new history. In this new name
he “hoped to wipe out the past by denying his original name and accepting a new one”
regardless of how ludicrous or without justification it may be.vi Milkman however,
generations removed from his family’s slave roots and without a true connection to the past,
sees the name only as a source of shame and embarrassment, much like the nickname he is
burdened with.
Macon Dead III is called Milkman by nearly every person whose path he crosses.
The name itself stems from the town gossip Freddie who once saw his mother Ruth
breastfeeding her son at an unnatural age, when he was old enough to speak, walk and wear
knickers. The name becomes a “dirty, intimate and hot” source of tension for both
Milkman and his father who refuses to “use…or acknowledge” the nickname (15). For
Milkman, the nickname is one of the primary sources of his alienation, as those around him
understand the nickname’s origins while he does not until his mid-20s. Upon discovering the
details behind his nickname, Milkman experiences a sort of existential crisis, being forced to
acknowledge the insecurities and anxieties which he has suppressed all his life. Guitar tells
him that black people “get their names the way they get everything else – the best way they
can” in an attempt to allay Milkman’s guilt and embarrassment (88). Having been forced to
acknowledge his pair of names and the identity which has been shackled onto his very
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existence, Milkman begins to desire some form of escape from the realities of his life in
Michigan.
The revelations which transform Milkman from an overgrown boy whose
adolescence and self-centered attitude has extended well into his 30s, into a man who
understands his historical and cultural roots presents itself initially as a quest for wealth.
Macon tells Milkman of a bag filled with gold, which he believes Pilate has hidden
somewhere in the Pennsylvania town in which the father was born. He entrusts to Milkman
the task of retrieving the gold, which Milkman uses as an opportunity to escape, albeit
briefly, the anxieties of his home life. However, “because the gold does not exist, the focus
of Milkman’s quest shifts to the richer vein of acquiring virtue” and discovering the genuine
heritage and ancestry to which he is linked.vii Ironically, his quest takes him from the relative
safety of the North, to the racism, animosity and violence of the South, in a reversal of the
classic slave narrative in which the northern states offer salvation and safety. Milkman is
oblivious to this quality of this trip however, as he is “bred to insensitivity towards the
customs of the South” and far too self-absorbed to see the larger picture.viii
Upon arriving in the small Pennsylvania town of Danville, Milkman, in his “beige
three-piece suit, his button-down light-blue shirt and black string tie, and his beautiful
Florsheim shoes” is greeted with a welcome normally reserved for heroes coming home after
a long absence (227). When he reveals his name to be Macon Dead he is instantly
recognized and treated as one of Danville’s own. The men whom he interacts with
remember his father, but more importantly his grandfather, who has become a symbol for
what the black man can achieve. The Danville men, some of whom never met Macon Dead
Sr., speak of him with “rheumy eyes” and “such awe and affection” (234). In Danville, the
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name “Dead” signifies achievement, owning something tangible and substantial and the
ability to pride oneself on that achievement. This interpretation of the name Dead is in stark
contrast to what it signifies in Michigan, where the name evokes mostly animosity and
resentment. However, this special treatment only breeds in Milkman a sense of greed and
pride. In the middle of the men reminiscing about his father and grandfather, Milkman is
overcome by a sudden urge to “get up right then and there and go to” the gold (236).
It is important to note that Milkman, once outside of Michigan, never once
acknowledges his nickname. He refers to himself as “Macon Dead,” or simply “Macon,”
hoping to create an air of respect and maturity that he intrinsically lacks back home. Part of
the purpose of his trip is to establish for himself a new identity, even if that identity is
momentary, false and exaggerated. By leaving behind the baggage and anxieties of his home,
Milkman is able to begin to flesh himself out. But, his trip to retrieve the gold is marked by
a “false sense of what freedom means” as Milkman believes the gold itself will allow for the
“first sense of identity he has ever known.”ix Still, even if his exploration of self and identity
are predicated upon falsehoods, the trip into Danville and later Shalimar represents the first
instance of Milkman truly attempting to discover more about where it is that he comes from
and how that history can effect him presently. After leaving Danville, without the gold,
Milkman makes his way to Shalimar, Virginia, the town where he believes the gold may have
been taken to.
Shalimar represents the most important setting in Milkman’s transformation. The
men in Shalimar greet Milkman with an open air of hostility and distrust normally reserved
for the “white men who came to pick them up…when they needed anonymous labor” (266).
This reaction is partly based on Milkman’s appearance, that of the Northern Negro who
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openly flaunts his money and status, but mostly it comes from his actions. Much like it is in
Michigan, an immediate perception is forced upon Milkman, this time being that of the
arrogant and privileged Northern Negro. Understanding nothing about Southern
pleasantries, Milkman “insults their ways and denies their humanity within a few minutes of
his arrival in town.”x. After a casual comment about having to buy another car, Milkman is
“looked [at] with hatred” for being the “city Negro who could buy a car as if it were a bottle
of whiskey” (266). What is more, Milkman “hadn’t found [the men] fit enough or good
enough to want to know their names, and believed himself too good to tell them his” (266).
His very presence and attitude remind the Shalimar men of their inadequacies and poverty.
There is the inevitable confrontation, initiated by one of the insulted men, in which Milkman
holds his own and gains a modicum of respect and acceptance from the man. Following the
fight, Milkman exchanges names with a man named Omar, revealing his identity for the first
time in Shalimar.
Until now, Milkman’s journey has been a physical one predicated on the acquisition
of material wealth. Only when the journey turns to more personal and intangible purposes
does Milkman begin to truly benefit. While the trip has enabled Milkman to be more openly
himself, he is still affecting and creating an identity and appearance for those around him. In
Danville, he presents himself as the successful and well-off young black man from up North,
where as in Shalimar he pretends to be the strong, fearless stranger. As Milkman learns of
his true roots, the mythic story of Solomon and his flight from slavery, he begins to
understand the importance of history and family. Suddenly Milkman, who has spent the first
three decades of his life as a selfish and uncaring person concerned solely with his own
benefit, sees that he is part of something larger and greater than his own life. He finds in his
ancestor’s home, a sense that “communal and mythical values prevail over individualism and
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materialism.”xi Resultingly, the capitalism and greed, which has been instilled in his person
since birth, begins to fade.
Previously, Milkman’s history was marred by the embarrassment he felt over both
his nickname and family name. Both represented the lack of power and absence of control
over his life, which Milkman felt had always been missing. Additionally, the names were a
source of embarrassment and alienation, which have shaped Milkman into the man he is at
age 32. With the knowledge that his history and family are more than just a clerical error on
Freedman’s papers, Milkman is drawn into a “circle of connectedness extending generations
before his own existence.”xii By understanding that he possesses a genuine history,
particularly one which he feels pride and joy in knowing, Milkman ceases to agonize over the
nickname and surname he is affixed to. His personal identity becomes attached to a
communal identity, one stretching from Shalimar to Danville to Michigan, but most
importantly back into the past. Milkman also realizes the importance which a name can
hold, the transformative power which it can possess. His epiphany is realized when he
understands that when “you know your name, you should hang on to it, for unless it is noted
down and remembered, it will die when you do” (329).
What Milkman comes to understand is that it is impossible to control what others
will call him or see him as. What matters is not the view held by someone else, but how the
individual interprets and comprehends his or her own name and history. Within an
understanding of oneself, one’s family and blood history, is a story and contained within that
story are truths, events, even myths which can have the power to inform and shape. For
Milkman it does not matter how unbelievable or fantastic the stories are that he learns while
in Shalimar. What matters is that those stories exist and provide for him a genuine line into
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his own past, which in turn allows for him to accept and understand a new identity and
history, all of which is achieved through the acquisition of his family’s true name.
i
Toni Morrison, Song of Solomon (New York: Knopf, 1977), 4. Subsequent references are cited
parenthetically in the text.
ii
Lucinda H. MacKethan, “Names to Bear Witness,” in Toni Morrison’s Song of Solomon: A Casebook,
edited by Jan Furman (New York: Oxford Press, 2003), 186.
iii
John N. Duvall, “Song of Solomon, Narrative Identity, and the Faulknerian Intertext,” in Bloom’s Modern
Critical Interpretations: Song of Solomon, edited by Harold Bloom (New York: Bloom’s Literary Criticism,
2009), 90.
iv
MacKethan, 186.
v
Ibid., 186.
vi
Ibid., 193.
vii
Jan Furman, “Introduction,” in Toni Morrison’s Song of Solomon: A Casebook, edited by Jan Furman
(New York: Oxford Press, 2003), 4.
viii
Trudier Harris, “Song of Solomon,” In Bloom’s Modern Critical Interpretations: Song of Solomon,
edited by Harold Bloom (New York: Bloom’s Literary Criticism, 2009), 16.
ix
Valerie Smith, “The Quest for and Discovery of Identity,” in Toni Morrison’s Song of Solomon: A
Casebook, edited by Jan Furman (New York: Oxford Press, 2003), 38.
x
Trudier Harris, 16.
xi
Valerie Smith, 38.
xii
Trudier Harris, 21.
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