Nationalism and the Other

I found this week's readings on Post-Colonialism to tie in to our readings from two weeks ago for race and ethnicity studies. Particularly, the readings on nationalism are relevant to our class discussion from that week when we talked questioned how Shelley treats nationality in Frankenstein. We asked if she is in any way contributing to the development of English national identity, and some of us came to the conclusion that she might be critiquing nationalism through the hybridity of the creature. Benedict Anderson argues in "Imagined Communities" that nationalism is a modern phenomenon - created to fill a need for a connection among people who no longer shared the same religion and made possible through print capitalism. Homi K. Bhaba builds off of this by stressing how nationality is narratively produced and not coming from an intrinsic essence. So I again ask, how does nationality figure in Frankenstein. As a work of writing, it might help to narratively produce national identity, or does it combat against the rising idea of nationalism, as some of us argued a few weeks ago? Is Shelley's nationalism/treatment of the other problematic in any way? Furthermore, I want to point out the description of Frantz Fanon's experience in France given by the editors of the Norton. They say that in France, Fanon "found that his service to the French state made no difference to the whites around him, who regarded black French subjects like himself as the Other - as alien and inferior, yet frightening and dangerous. He came to understand that despoite his intelligence, high level of education, and mastery of the French language, he was regarded not as a human being but as a specimen of an exotic and savage race, viewed through stereotypes developed over centuries of racial prejudice" (1437). This description screamed Shelley's monster to me. Even though he is clearly intelligent, has at least some education, and mastery of language, he is regarded as a savage and not a European. What I wonder is if it's possible that we have an other because nationality is developed? Or has there always been an other? I understand Anderson's argument about the development of nationalism, but didn't people always have a sort of patriotism for their nation? In Roman times, conquered peoples were referred to by the state from which they came. And since Fanon writes about the national identity that needs to be created in de-colonized African countries, would this imply that their lack of national identity prior to being colonized is what made them so easy to colonize? The key for Anderson is that this shared identity is "imagined." So for smaller groups such as African tribes, the sense of community is not imagined? I guess what I'm trying to get to through all of these questions is what is the connection, if there is one, between nationalism and the creation of the other?

Bodily Acts of the Subaltern Creature

In "Can the Subaltern Speak" by Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, she brings up the suicide of Bhubaneswari Bhaduri. Bhabaneswari planned her death, purposely choosing the moment when she was menstruating to prove that she had not been pregnant so that people could not speculate that an "illicit" pregnancy was part of her death. Spivak states:

Bhubaneswari had known that her death would be diagnosed as the outcome of illegitimate passion. She had therefore waited for the onset of menstruation. While waiting, Bhuhanswari...perhaps rewrote the social text of sati-suicide in an interventionist way. She generalized the sanctioned motive for female suicide by taking immense trouble to displace, in the physiological inscription of her body, its imprisonment within legitimate passion by a single male (2123).

I propose that the Creature, by murdering William, the brother of Victor Frankenstein, and subsequently, the wrongful prosecution of Justine as the murderer, is in a way a Bodily Act comparable to that of Bhubaneswari's. This event in the story shows how the dominant public misunderstood the purpose of the Creature's act and translated it to subjugate another person who would be considered a twice over subaltern: Justine, poor and female.
Before committing the murder, the Creature wanted to educate William as a companion, however, upon discovering that he was kin to his creator, he states:

"I gazed on my victim, and my heart swelled with exultation and hellish triumph: clapping my hands, I exclaimed 'I, too, can create desolation; my enemy is not impregnable; this death will carry despair to him, and a thousand other miseries shall torment and destroy him" (97).

By placing the locket which he found on William's person, and by placing it with Justine the Creature states:

"Here, I thought, is one of those whose smiles are bestowed on all but me: she shall not escape: thanks to the lessons of Felix, and the sanguinary laws of man, I have learned how to work mischief. I approached her unperceived, and placed the portrait securely in one of the folds of her dress" (97).

Even though the Creature accomplished his goal of bringing misery to Victor, Victor still did not comprehend the full reason as to why the Creature was committing these acts. The Creature had voiced time and again that he sought to vanquish loneliness from his life, he wanted acceptance and understanding, but the world had judged him on based upon his physical appearance and not by the intentions of his soul. The Creature communicates to Victor "I am malicious because I am miserable; am I not shunned and hated by all mankind?"(98) However, Victor's reaction to the creation of another "creature" to stunt this misery for his first creation is interpreted by Victor stating "You may render me the most miserable of men, but you shall never make me base in my own eyes. Shall I create another being like yourself, whose joint wickedness might desolate the world. Begone!"(98) Victor internalizes the Creatures intentions by selfishly thinking that the Creature seeks to live his life to harass him, instead of actually just wanting a companion so that he can leave his past behind and flourish in a new life. However, it is the Creature that tries to reason with Victor, it is the Creature who tries to effectively communicate, but Victor seems to not be able to hear the meaning of his words. The Creature states:

"I intended to reason. This passion is detrimental to me; for you do not reflect that you are the cause of its excess. If any being felt emotions of benevolence towards me, I should return them an hundred and an hundred fold; for that one creature's sake, I would make peace with the whole kind! But I now indulge in dreams of bliss that cannot be realized" (98).

The only way Victor seems to understand the Creature is by the Creature physically committing some form of act to gain his attention; although the Creature can speak, Victor neither trusts nor understands his words.

The Creature Said

I see that many posts have considered Frankenstein as the paradigmatic colonizer, and I suspect that we will have very heated class discussions about the Creature as a colonized entity and its relation to Spivak’s notions of the subaltern, but to what extent is the Creature to be considered a colonizer? While the story Shelley’s devises between Safie and Felix is problematic on its own, the Creature’s narration of that story is of particular interest. In its delivery of Safie’s portion of the cottage narrative the Creature seems to adopt or partake in certain strategies and discourses associated with colonizer. Even if one were to argue that the Creature does not so clearly communicate through its narrative European imperialist conventions, the Creature’s representation of Safie, her father and the cottagers’ interaction with her does seem to suggest an underlying sense of difference. Safie’s father is referred to as “the unfortunate Mahometan” in the relation of his being sentenced to jail (Shelley 82). It seems peculiar to stress the religion of an unjustly convicted individual, but then the Creature presumably learns from the cottagers that Safie’s father’s “religion and wealth” are the cause of his incarceration (Shelley 82). For the rest of the narrative, Safie’s father is simply referred to as the Turk. The Creature’s representation of Safie is usually infused with emphases of the sensual and exotic. In his study of the study of Orientalism, Said addresses authority in terms of “strategic location” and “strategic formation” (1881). Said’s meta-study explains strategic location as the “way of describing the author’s position in a text with regard to the Oriental material he writes about”, while strategic formulation refers to an analysis of the “relationship between texts and the way in which groups of texts, types of texts, even textual genres, acquire mass, density, and referential power among themselves and thereafter in the culture at large” (1881). How does the portion of the Creature’s narrative that is devoted to Safie fit in with these concepts and concerns? Ostensibly, the Creature’s means of representation and signification of Safie in the narrative could be seen as the regurgitation of that which it observed and then internalizes from the cottagers, but what of the Creature’s description of its initial reactions and feelings towards Safie? The Creature may have be availed previous, even if unconsciously, inculcation or means of conceptualizing Safie as a member of ‘the orient’ from the readings (like Paradise Lost) and discussion of the cottagers. Its reactions to Safie seem to be strikingly consistent throughout. Does this suggest inherent feelings in the Creature toward Safie or inherent and essential aspects of Safie’s character? Or may this consistency in reaction and representation be an implied example of the Creature revising and editing his experience, or authority?

Fear the Subaltern.

Spivak uses the word "subaltern" to describe the Other in her postcolonial critique from this week's reading. "A subaltern, according to the dictionary, is a person holding a subordinate position," the book notes, also noting that it was originally used to describe a junior officer from the British army (2111). Let's remove that latter half, shall we? The "term's nuances" is what Spivak draws out- the unorganized mass caught between the "detested superiors" and "feared natives" (2111). "The "subaltern" always stands in an ambiguus relation to power- subordinate to it but never fully consenting to its rule, never adopting the dominant point of view or vocabulary as expressive of its own identity" (2111).

Ok, now I want you to picture the monster as an example -GET THIS!- of a subaltern. ( I know. you didn't think I'd go there. But I did, and so we continue. ) "Because subalterns exist, to some extent, outside power, theorists and advocates of political transformation have consistently looked to them as a potential source of change" (2111). It's hard to picture the future of the novel Frankenstein within the diegesis that Shelley sets up, and I'm completely sure that this was done on purpose. Does the monster kill himself? Does he move to the tropics anyway, by himself? Does he entertain himself by continuing his murderous hobby? Does he move to Russia and join the circus? Essentially, none of the answers to these questions matter- it is the fact that these questions come up at all that Shelley drives for. But I digress.

The reason I bring up the "subaltern" is to not only place the monster under its light, but to also draw out whether or not he is a "potential source of change." Obviously, he has "potential" to do something- he's affected more lives than just Victor's- but I feel that the only "change" he is the source is for more security. I don't think De Lacy or Feliz ever realize the monster's responsibility for the firewood, nor the extent to which the monster watched them. They never went into the room that the monster lived in! As soon as they met the monster, they abandoned their home in fear.

We haven't spoken too much in class about it, but fear is what motivates and influences people to the greatest extent. At least to me, it is fear that motivates more than... love, per say. Fear of another holy book's influence on its people in another country. Fear of terrorism for more airport security measures. Fear of someone else's sexuality because you don't understand the science behind it and feel that they'll rub off some of their gayness on you... but again, I digress.

In this light, the monster is influential. Now, it seems that he does not completely live up to his "subaltern" potential, or he does outside of the text of the novel. Nevertheless, the subaltern is one who "should be" feared, for it is the subaltern that exists outside of the power structure. It is out of control. This touches on the greatest fear of all time, what humans fear the most: not being in control.

Now, there are too many of us here on planet Earth for there to be no control- no country borders, no laws, no society, no classes, no races, no religions. And so the subaltern reigns.

The Global Creature

Because post-colonial studies “overlap with those of race and ethnicity studies,” one is able to view Frankenstein through the combination of theories and critiques employed in both schools of thought (Norton 28).

Indeed, it appears to be a study that shares many familiar concepts with our conversations surrounding Frankenstein as “it aims to describe the mechanisms of colonial power, to recover excluded or marginalized ‘subaltern’ voices, and to theorize the complexities of…identity; national belonging; and globalization” (Norton 27).

It is of great interest to imagine that Shelley created a character facing these exact issues itself. The creature does experience being a “marginalized” voice and also questions his identity, not only nationally, but globally! In 17__, the creature had a global perspective: a concept that the twenty-first century reader is wholly familiar with, but one that would have been a hard sell in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. It could not identify with any other creatures on the globe because it was not of them, however, its “Otherness” instilled within it a global frame of reference so as to grasp its global place.

How does Frankenstein go against the usual “representations of third world countries” and “the political interests of their makers” (27)?

Reality A & Reality B

Thought some of you might be interested in the article "Reality A & Reality B," which appeared last month in the New York Times. Haruki Murakami is a Japanese novelist whose work (in translation) has done fairly well in the US. I read his novel, After Dark, a couple of years ago and it is interesting in that it represents the "chaos," to use his word, of a single night in a strictly linear narrative. In some ways I think you could say that it is this very rigid linear structure that creates the sensation of chaos, which is sort of odd. It also uses what I remember as a "camera angle" feel to distance the reader from the narrative and keep our perception of the story very tightly focused. This close-up framing leaves the reader very much aware of what you are unable to see and creates an interesting tension with the images that are revealed.

Anyway, I digress and it has been a while since I read the novel so maybe I'm remembering it wrong. In any case, give the article a look. I think it fits in nicely with our readings this week.

Chris

Edited to note that my response to the readings is on Blackboard.

Edited again because I'm procrastinating writing my paper and thought this was interesting, too: "If an Island State Vanishes, Is It Still a Nation?" Now, no more internet! Back to work!

Victor's Vision - Ultimate Colonialism

While reading about Post-Colonial theory, I began to wonder if we might interpret Victor as the Ultimate Colonialist. Rather than having to resort to “cultural obliteration [that is] made possible by the negation of a national reality, by new legal relations introduced by the occupying power, by the banishment of the natives and their customs” (Fanon, 1440), etc., Victor plans to create a new race with no culture to speak of. A tabula rasa to be molded and controlled from the ground up. Consider: “A new species would bless me as its creator and source; many happy and excellent natures would owe their being to me. No father could claim the gratitude of his child so completely as I should deserve theirs” (Shelley, 32). Of course this all goes wrong, as we know, but we might say that Victor is driven by an extraordinarily strong and yet suppressed colonial drive.

Dan