The depiction of the female body in Hardy and Moore. - Literature Essay Samples

A focus on the body, especially that of the female body, is integral to Moores Esther Waters and Hardys Jude the Obscure. However such an exploration is to extremely different effects. Zola repeatedly made use of the metaphor of dissection to describe the task of writing fiction this gave prominence to the body. (1) In this manner, both Hardy and Moore attempt to dissect the female body within the dissection of the writing of fiction. Moores dissection revolves around the body of the servant girl specifically, a trope in which such a body is multifaceted and deceitful. Hardy uncovers something rather different. His dissection of the body, despite an apparent persistence of a womens inherent physical weakness, (2) largely focuses on an ungendered body. Rather than the man and woman of married life, Sue and Jude consist of two androgynous halves of a single neutral being. The female servant was an ideal subject for the naturalists because she was in their view not fully herself and was composed of many parts. Indeed, servants had to adjust to and adopt their masters timetables and habits, to fit into their masters clothes. (3) This appears to describe Esther perfectly. The dissection of her body will find that it is as much her own as it is a product of her masters. I daresay my daughter might find you something you are about the same height with only a little alteration- With only a little alteration Esthers body would be somewhat identical to that of one of her employers. The similarities between bodies alludes to Esthers body being far more that of her employers than that of her own and introduces a sense of duplicity. It is this imputed multifaceted nature of the female servant (4) that serves as an invitation to look beyond appearances and to experiment with literary dissection. (5) Upon dissection of the female servants body one may continue to find a sense of commodification of this human body, under the ruling class. Tess O Toole argued, that in a similar way in which the needs of the master dictates the body of Esther as a kitchenmaid, wet nursing trespasses on the heroines body. (6) It is described as a colonisation of of the working class womens body. (7) The servant body becomes somewhat a geographical location which is colonized at Woodview by the colonizer imposing their clothes on Esther but her body is also colonized, as in drained of resources for the purpose of the colonizer, by Mrs Rivers. Moreover, her role as a wet nurse is nothing more than a socially acceptable form of prostitution. She is in essence, selling the resources of her body. This is honed in on by Moore by the semantic import of the word flesh. There is a strong focus on body, and especially flesh throughout. The sinfulness of the world and the flesh her flesh filled with a sense of happiness her flesh was soft and flabby. It is made clear, t hat what is occurring is a simple trade: flesh for money. Hence the body becomes an item of economic value but also a subject of moral degradation as she uses it much in the way a prostitute might. However, it does not quite appear to be Moores intent to degrade the value of the womens body or that of the female servants. Esthers body is just as much a symbol of life and rejuvenation as it is a symbol of commerce and commodification. By suckling different babies with her vital lymph, Esther somehow epitomizes regeneration too. (8) Perhaps, it would be wrong to see her role as a wet nurse as anything other than a noble, invaluable and life-giving role. Moore may even be trying to suggest this through Esthers name as it aptly suggests, she stands for the river of life. (9) This lends Esthers body a somewhat ethereal, divine quality. Her body becomes a feeding ground for life itself, it is crucial perhaps from the beginning that her body was described as so bounteous and healthy. Firmly built, with short strong arms and that she is able to produce such a healthy and beautiful boy, highlighted by the juxtaposition of her mothers fatal and sickly birth. Her body is transformed into that of life giving Goddess with the power of creation and nurturing. Esthers role as the multifaceted servant girl and also as a life-giver gives her body a mysterious, ineffable quality. The fallen servant girl is a trope somewhat fetishized by Moore. Despite such a profound focus and interest in her body throughout, the child itself being an extension and creation of her body, there is surprisingly very little description as to what she actually looks like. At best we know she is good-looking aside from basic descriptions of her height and build. This leaves the reader to flesh-out the appearance of Esther Waters and project or impose our own vision of a body on to her. She is an easy and deliberate target to be fetishized by the reader. Just as her masters dress is imposed on her, symbolically imposing an appearance or body onto her, the reader is able to do the same. She is profoundly vulnerable target for such sexualization as she is the ideal body of femininity (10) . Sandra Lee Bartky explains this by arguing that she she is ideal in the sense that she possesses a practised and subjected body, that is, a body in which an inferior status has been inscribed. (11) Her body is in now way a symbol of proto-feminism but it is a commodified item which is consistently used and sexualized throughout the novel. It is used by William and Mrs Rivers and it is objectified and fetishized by the reader and by those around her. For example, her employer who would mould Esthers body to be more fashionable, or as seen through the male gaze, sexually appealing. That she wished her to be an inch or two taller. Despite whatever role Esthers body takes on, her body is always focused on as that of a woman whether it is degraded or praised, that of the mother or servant. Hardys focus on the body of Sue however, remains largely ungendered. What is similar between the two texts however, is the strong link between body and mind. Despite the claim that [servants] had to deny their own desires and relinquish any privacy, with the result that they become estranged from their own bodies. (12) Both the minds of Esther and Sue are inseparably linked and literarily manifested in their own bodies. That is to say the mind and the body are within one another. Her flesh filled with a sense of happiness once again uses the repeated diction of flesh linking sensation and emotion to the corporeal. Happiness is not only a feeling, but a feeling within the body. Within Jude The Obscure this is a similar theme. From the basis of victorian science, especially within a woman, the mental and physical or mind and bod y did indeed share a close connection. Hysteria, neurasthenia, and chlorosis, the three great diseases of the victorian bourgeois woman, were all commonly diagnosed as nervous disorders arising from some frequently undefined disturbance to the all determining reproductive system. And Sue Bridehead conforms to these expectations in accordance with Hardys own personal views that womens inherent physical weakness makes them vulnerable to mental conflict. (13) She is therefore a fine-nerved mind in a body that is slight. However, it is not for long that Hardy allows gender to morph his presentation of Sues body. She is depicted somewhat androgynously. Not exactly a tomboy, you know, but she could do things that only boys could. It is interesting to explore the way in which this mind, is manifested into the closely linked, body. You spirit, you disembodied creature, you dear, sweet tantalising phantom – hardly flesh at all. On one level, although she is tantalising him, the semantic field of the supernatural invokes that she is haunting him. Not that this is unwelcome but this suggests the fact that she is something he cannot get rid of, even if he wanted to. That is to say, they are inextricable from one another, or two halves of a whole. But the main extrapolation to be gained from this quote is an inference of Sues gender dysphoria. Despite such a close link between body and mind there is a sense that gender of her body is not a defining characteristic of her mind. She is therefore disembodi ed or a phantom, that is to say bodiless.The way in which clothes impose an identity on the body in Esther Waters, clothes play an identical role in Jude the Obscure. Sues underclothes are described as sexless and the passage following her escape sees her asleep by Judes fire in his working clothes. It is therefore inferred that despite such a close connection between the mind and body there is a chasm between the sexuality of the body and the mind. To conclude, the body is treated in a similar fashion by both Hardy and Moore. Clothes are used to imprint identity or ownership onto the body and the mind and body are seen to intersect and affect one another as per the dictates of common scientific belief and Hardys own personal values. Where both novels differ however, is in their treatment of the feminine or gendered aspect of the body. Esthers feminine identity, in mind and body, is crucial to the roles her body undertakes. Her body is both an esteemed symbol of motherhood and life but also an object of fetishization and sexualization. Sues body however, is integral more to the narrative as the counterpart to Judes body, regardless of gender. The extraordinary sympathy, or similarity, between the pair. He is her cousin, which perhaps accounts for some of it. They seem to be one person split in two! Not only do both their bodies correspond in terms of blood as they are cousins but rather than man and woman they are simply two hal ves of a non gendered body. That is to say the main difference between the two texts are the differences in the relation of body and gender. Moreover, Esthers body is life-giving, or something ultimate, yet the bodies of Jude and Sue must combine to form a single entity or body in its entirety. Works Cited 1) Nathalie Sando-Welly The Deceitful Character Huguet, C. (2013). George Moore: across borders. Amsterdam [u.a.]: Rodopi. 2) Bounelha, P. (1981) Female Sexuality, Marriage and Divorce in the Fiction of Thomas Hardy. University of Oxford Thesis. 3) Nathalie Sando-Welly The Deceitful Character Huguet, C. (2013). George Moore: across borders. Amsterdam [u.a.]: Rodopi. 4) Nathalie Sando-Welly The Deceitful Character Huguet, C. (2013). George Moore: across borders. Amsterdam [u.a.]: Rodopi. 5) Nathalie Sando-Welly The Deceitful Character Huguet, C. (2013). George Moore: across borders. Amsterdam [u.a.]: Rodopi. 6) OToole, T. (2010) The Victorian Wet Nurse and George Moores Esther Waters. Taylor and Francis. 7) Michele Russo Spatial Metaphors and Liminal Elements in Esther Waters Huguet, C. (2013). George Moore: across borders. Amsterdam [u.a.]: Rodopi. 8)Michele Russo Spatial Metaphors and Liminal Elements in Esther Waters Huguet, C. (2013). George Moore: across borders. Amsterdam [u.a.]: Rodopi. 9) Michele Russo Spatial Metaphors and Liminal Elements in Esther Waters Huguet, C. (2013). George Moore: across borders. Amsterdam [u.a.]: Rodopi. 10) Bartky, S. Foucalt, (1988) Femininity and Patriarchal Power. Northeastern University Press 11) Bartky, S. Foucalt, (1988) Femininity and Patriarchal Power. Northeastern University Press 12) Nathalie Sando-Welly The Deceitful Character Huguet, C. (2013). George Moore: across borders. Amsterdam [u.a.]: Rodopi. 13) Bounelha, P. (1981) Female Sexuality, Marriage and Divorce in the Fiction of Thomas Hardy. University of Oxford Thesis.