Villette and paper ideas

[gwenifyre]

Hello, everyone! I'm currently taking a graduate level victorian novel class and loving it. But I've been so enjoying the books, I haven't thought enough about paper topics

Comments

[elettaria]

If you're comparing it to CB's other novels, of course you'll know Jane Eyre, everyone does, but have you looked at The Professor as well? It's got those themes running through it, helpfully discussed in the intro in my edition (Penguin Classics), and the narrator is yet another Bronte Male Git, quite a weird one. I've not read Villette in years but it sounds like a good approach. There are suggestions of homoeroticism with Lucy and some of the pupils, aren't there, especially when she cross-dresses for the play?

[gwenifyre]

Ahh... thank you so much, you triggered the other idea that I had had. Yes, there was the connection between her and Ginevra, but the cross-dressing scene reminded me of Sarrazine, which I have read through the filter of S/Z. That might be a good way to take the project.

Unfortunately, I have actually not read Jane Eyre. Embarrassing... I will correct that this summer, I'm sure, but probably not before the paper.

Thanks!

[elettaria]

*snorts*

You may want to spoil the plot and read a synopsis plus a few key scenes, because I suspect that any crit on CB is bound to refer to JE and there is so much in there. Basically, CB seems to have a thing for really shitty men who play power games like there's no tomorrow.

The name Sarrazine rings bells, but I can't remember what it is. Would you elaborate?

[gwenifyre]

It's a story by Balzac about a castrati. There is a rather erotic scene where the narrator is watching him on stage and thinks he is a woman. Roland Barthes uses the story in S/Z to talk about Sarrasine/Sarrazine as a figure that occupies a sort of third space... neither male nor female.

[pricklypartisan]

Good to hear that your assigned reading has proved to be highly addictive. I hope that these remarks (based on a minimalist recollection of the plot) may be helpful to you. I can't elaborate in much detail because I read Villette in a guilty rush ages ago while deadlines for other papers were looming.

However, I do recall the prominence that subterfuge and disguise occupy in the novel. The theatrical crossdressing mentioned by elettaria is a critical moment which you will probably want to address in any account of Lucy's sexuality. Of course, metaphors of games, contests, rivalries, and role-switching are by no means to unique to the invention of gender in Villette. Nevertheless, it would remain quite rewarding to explore how Charlotte Bronte reprises in the novel the favorite tropes (exotic costumes, Gothic apparitions, etc.) for gender instability and variability that she adopted in her earlier works. In the games of Villette, the urgency to conceal and the imminent danger of having secret desires discovered give the

[gwenifyre]

Thanks. Yes, I think that scene on stage is definitely key. Along the same lines you mentioned with personal presentation, putting on the pink dress also seems greatly important.

Thanks for helping me brainstorm!

[elettaria]

Speaking of espionage and voyeurism, there's so much of that in The Professor it's not true. Half the staff seem to think their main job is to spy on everyone else out of the windows, particularly people in the garden.

[elettaria]

(Yes, it's about an Englishman teaching at a school in France. Bit of a theme with CB.)

CB question

[lydia_silence]

For trouble-shooting with 19th century authors, I always start with victorianweb.org CB isn't a Victorian, of course, but there are usually helpful links with critical bibs for Romantic authors, as well. Plus, that entire page is just an absolute gold-mine. Hope it helps.

KT