INTERROGATING FEMININE UTOPIAS:
JEANETTE WINTERSON'S
WINTERSON’S SEXING THE CHERRY, THE PASSION, AND
LIGHTHOUSEKEEPING
A Thesis
A
Submitted to the Faculty of Graduate Studies and Research
In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements
for the Degree of
Master of Arts
in English
University of Regina
by
Sarah van Houten
Regina, Saskatchewan
July, 2007
Elouten
Copyright 2007: S. van Houten
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
permission.
1+1
Library and
Archives Canada
Bibliotheque et
Archives Canada
Published Heritage
Branch
Branch
Direction du
Direction
Patrimoine de redition
I'edition
W ellington Street
395 Wellington
K1A ON4
0N4
Ottawa ON KlA
Canada
W ellington
395, rue Wellington
K1A ON4
0N4
Ottawa ON KlA
Canada
Your file Votre reference
ISBN:
ISBN: 978-0-494-33557-4
Our file Notre reference
ISBN:
ISBN: 978-0-494-33557-4
NOTICE:
non­
The author has granted a nonexclusive license allowing Library
reproduce,
and Archives Canada to reproduce,
publish, archive, preserve, conserve,
conserve,
com m unicate to the public by
communicate
telecommunication
telecom m unication or on the Internet,
Internet,
loan, distribute and sell theses
worldwide, for commercial
com mercial or nonnon­
com mercial purposes, in microform,
microform,
commercial
paper, electronic and/or any other
formats.
formats.
AVIS:
accorde une licence non exclusive
exclusive
L'auteur a accord&
permettant a la Bibliotheque et Archives
archiver,
Canada de reproduire, publier, archiver,
sauvegarder,
conserver,
transm
ettre au public
sauvegarder, conserver, transmettre
telecom m unication ou par ('Internet,
I'lnternet, preter,
preter,
par telecommunication
distribuer et vendre des theses partout dans
com m erciales ou autres,
autres,
le monde, a des fins commerciales
sur support microforme, papier, electronique
electronique
et/ou autres formats.
formats.
et/ou
The author retains copyright
ownership and moral rights in
this thesis. Neither the thesis
nor substantial extracts from
from it
otherwise
may be printed or otherwise
reproduced without the author's
permission.
permission.
L'auteur conserve la propriete du droit d'auteur
et des droits moraux qui protege cette these.
these.
Ni la these ni des extraits substantiels de
celle-ci ne doivent etre imprimes ou autrement
autrem ent
autorisation.
reproduits sans son autorisation.
In compliance
com pliance with the Canadian
Canadian
In
supporting
Privacy Act some supporting
forms
form s may have been removed
removed
from this thesis.
thesis.
from
Conformement
Conform em ent a la loi canadienne
protection de la vie privee,
privee,
sur la protection
quelques formulaires
form ulaires secondaires
these.
ont ete enleves de cette these.
W hile these forms
form s may be included
included
While
in the document
docum ent page count,
count,
their removal does not represent
from the
any loss of content from
thesis.
thesis.
Bien que ces formulaires
aient inclus dans la pagination,
pagination,
aucun contenu
contenu manquant.
manquant.
itil n'y aura aucun
i*i
1*1
Canada
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further
Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
permission.
Reproduced
REGINA
UNIVERSITY OF REGINA
FACULTY OF GRADUATE STUDIES AND RESEARCH
COMMITTEE
SUPERVISORY AND EXAMINING COMMITTEE
Sarah van Houten, candidate for the degree of Master of Arts, has presented a thesis
titled, Interrogating
Interrogating Feminine Utopias: Jeanette Winterson's Sexing the Cherry, the
Passion, and Lighthousekeeping, in an oral examination held on May 2, 2007. The
following committee members have found the thesis acceptable in form and content,
and that the candidate demonstrated satisfactory knowledge of the subject material.
External Examiner:
Dr. Alison Hayford,
Department of Sociology and Social Studies
Supervisor:
Dr. Nicholas Ruddick, Department of English
Committee Member:
Dr. Cindy Mackenzie, Department of English
Committee Member:
Dr. Lynn Wells, Department of English
Chair of Defense:
Dr. Eldon Soifer, Department of Philosophy
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
permission.
ii
ABSTRACT
Winterson’s use of the fantastic in three of her
This thesis examines Jeanette Winterson's
novels: Sexing the Cherry, The Passion, and Lighthousekeeping. The thesis identifies and
Winterson’s critics to interpret her novels in traditional
questions a tendency among Winterson's
feminist ways. A close reading of the three novels shows that Winterson is concerned
with destabilizing overly idealistic and oppressive ideas and images of women. This
thesis shows that Winterson uses fantastic motifs including characters, images, spaces
and extended fantastic episodes in order to question such idealistic attitudes towards
women. To this end, the thesis explores the ways that female characters in these novels
are often more dangerous and violent than male characters, and the ways that feminine
spaces are often confining and oppressive.
The chapter on Sexing the Cherry examines Winterson's
Winterson’s creation of fantastic and
real worlds and shows that neither world presents a feminine utopia. The chapter on The
Passion is concerned with Winterson's
Winterson’s conceptualization of gender and the novel's
novel’s
refusal to portray escape from gender as a freeing experience, while the chapter on
Winterson’s criticism of idealized images of women. In each of
Lighthousekeeping traces Winterson's
these novels, Winterson creates fantastic motifs which seem to be freeing or even utopian
for women, but which, on closer inspection are problematic. By creating these highly
flawed and problematic images of women, Winterson refuses to participate in the
tendency of some feminists to value idealistic images of women.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further
Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
permission.
Reproduced
111
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
I would like to thank my supervisor, Dr. Nicholas Ruddick, for his advice and
assistance as well as Dr. Lynn Wells, and Dr. Cynthia MacKenzie for their
recommendations. Also, I would like to thank the Faculty of Graduate Studies and
Research for its support, which included funding awarded to me during the spring of
2006.
I would also like to thank Dr. Troni Grande and Dr. Jeanne Shami.
2006.1
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
permission.
POST DEFENSE ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
I would like to thank Dr. Alison Hayford for her guidance and recommendations
during the defense.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
permission.
iv
DEDICATION
I would like to thank my family for their support and encouragement over the past years.
My thanks are also due to my friends and to Michael Horacki and family for their
generous help and support.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
permission.
V
TABLE OF CONTENTS
ABSTRACT
ABSTRACT.............................................................................................................................ii
ii
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT......................................................................................................iii
iii
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
DEDICATION
DEDICATION........................................................................................................................ iv
TABLE OF CONTENTS
CONTENTS.........................................................................................................v
v
INTRODUCTION
INTRODUCTION....................................................................................................................1
1
THE HOUSE WITHOUT FLOORS: PROBLEMATIC WOMEN IN SEXING THE
CHERRY
CHERRY.................................................................................................................................15
15
DANGEROUS WOMEN: QUESTIONING RESPECTABLE IMAGES OF WOMEN IN
THE PASSION
PASSION.......................................................................................................................42
.42
FANTASTIC FEMININE MOTIFS IN LIGHTHOUSEKEEPING
LIGHTHOUSEKEEPING...................................62
62
CONCLUSION
CONCLUSION...................................................................................................................... 81
CITED.................................................................................................................... 85
WORKS CITED
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
permission.
11
INTRODUCTION
Jeanette Winterson is a contemporary British author whose work, which first
1985, has become highly popular. Winterson has published eleven novels to
appeared in 1985,
o f short stories, a collection of essays, a children's
children’s picture
date as well as a collection of
book, and numerous articles. As a young child, Winterson was adopted by an Evangelical
couple who raised her to become a missionary until her first lesbian relationship led to
her banishment from the religious community and even from her home. Because
Winterson has been very forthcoming about her extraordinary past, her sexual orientation,
and the circumstances of her coming-out, critics fascinated by her autobiography have
focused on the lesbian elements of her work. Her first novel, Oranges Are Not the Only
1985 and although it is clearly autobiographical in parts,
Fruit, was published in 1985
Winterson also inserts fantastic elements into facts. Winterson hesitates to label her first
“The question put to the
novel as an autobiography and in Art Objects (1995), she writes: "The
writer 'How
‘How much of this is based on your own experience?'
experience?’ is meaningless. All or
nothing may be the answer. The fiction, the poem, is not a version of the facts, it is an
entirely different way of seeing"
seeing” (28). For this reason, critics have also been fascinated
Winterson’s works. The integration of fact
with the combination of fact and fantasy in Winterson's
Winterson’s later fiction. Three of her
and fantastic elements also appears in some of Winterson's
novels, The Passion (1987), Sexing the Cherry (1989), and Lighthousekeeping (2004) are
particularly similar to one another in the use she makes in them of fantastic narrative
elements.
In these novels, Winterson combines historical events and figures with fictional
events and characters. This technique emphasizes the fantastic nature of her invented
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
permission.
2
characters. For example, The Passion describes the Napoleonic wars, and the historical
novel’s protagonists. Sexing
figures Napoleon and Josephine employ Henri, one of the novel's
the Cherry partly describes the events of the English Civil War, and in the novel, King
Charles II plays a small part. Lighthousekeeping describes fictional events that occur at
an
ah actual lighthouse in Scotland built by the grandfather of Robert Louis
Louis Stevenson. Both
Stevenson and Charles Darwin briefly appear in the novel to counsel Babel Dark, one of
the novel's
novel’s protagonists. All three novels contain fantastic narrative episodes and motifs.
For example, in The Passion, Henri and Villanelle, the two central characters, are
Villanelle’s literally stolen heart.
involved in a fantastic episode in which Henri recovers Villanelle's
In Sexing the Cherry, one of the central motifs is a fantastic house without floors.
It will be the aim of this study to show how Winterson uses the fantastic in her
novels to question the type of feminist thinking about gender which is exemplified by
some of her critics; namely Susana Gonzalez, Paulina Palmer and others. According to
this style of
o f feminist interpretation, a style employed by many of Winterson's
Winterson’s critics,
woman is associated with nearness to nature, virtue, beauty and mystical power. Teresa
de Lauretis argues that "the
“the notion of femininity as a privileged condition, a nearness to
nature, the body, the side of the maternal, or the unconscious . . .. is purely a
representation, a positionality within the phallic model of desire and signification; it is
not a quality or a property of
o f women"
women” (19-20). In other words, overly idealistic images of
women are just as harmful and oppressive as any other stereotype of women. Fantastic
motifs and characters allow Winterson to expose the ways that these images of women
are merely fantasies.
permission.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
3
The fantastic will be here defined as a mode of representation, rather than as a
o f fiction. In addition, I will follow Kathryn Hume's
Hume’s definition of the "fantastic"
“fantastic” as
genre of
any departure from "consensus
“consensus reality"
reality” in a narrative (8), and Rosemary Jackson's_
Jackson’s
“The fantastic exists in the hinterland between 'real'
‘real’ and 'imaginary',
‘imaginary’,
statement that "The
indeterminacy” (35). Jackson also
shifting the relationship between them through its indeterminacy"
notes that "The
“The etymology of the word 'fantastic'
‘fantastic’ points to an essential ambiguity: it is
un-real"
un-real” (20). This ambiguity arises from the contradictions inherent in fantastic
literature:
It reveals reason and reality to be arbitrary, shifting constructs, and thereby
scrutinizes the category of the 'real'.
‘real’. Contradictions surface and are held
antinomically in the fantastic text, as reason is made to confront all that it
traditionally refuses to encounter. The structure of fantastic narrative is one
founded upon contradictions. (21)
Throughout the three novels, Winterson brings realistic and fantastic worlds, realms, and
characters into collision. These collisions suggest the extreme incompatibility between
novels’ protagonists and their historical settings. In The Passion, Winterson
the novels'
constructs Venice as a fantastic city, in which impossible occurrences take place. In the
novel, Henri, a poor French soldier, struggles to fit into the fantastic city of Venice,
whereas Villanelle, a Venetian casino worker, struggles to fit into the real world of
o f the
Napoleonic wars. In Sexing the Cherry, the main character, Jordan, moves back and forth
between specific points in history. He visits many fantastic places (a house without
floors, a city in which spoken words have physical shapes, and a floating city), but does
not appear to fit in anywhere. His mother the Dog-Woman, on the other hand, possesses a
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
permission.
4
fantastically large body which ensures that she cannot fit into the real world of England.
Lighthousekeeping describes the relationship between Silver, a young girl, and Pew, her
die fantastic nature of Pew's
Pew’s
mysterious guardian. Silver has certain problems with the
character, and then struggles to find a place to belong in the real world after her fantastic
life with Pew in the lighthouse is over.
The three novels at issue, as many critics including Paulina Palmer, Marilyn R.
Farwell, Susana Gonzalez, and Daphne M. Kutzer have pointed out, are also concerned
with questions of gender, and gender will indeed be a prime cause of
o f the incompatibility
between protagonists and settings in these novels, which abound with fantastic female
characters trying to exist in male-dominated worlds. However, contrary to what some
critics have said, Winterson does not always associate the fantastic with women in a
positive way. Magical spaces are often restrictive, uncomfortable, or even dangerous. It is
important to note that these fantastic spaces are not utopian. Indeed, the fantastic
elements of the novels may sometimes be horrifying and dangerous for both men and
women.
Some critical attention has been paid to The Passion and to Sexing the Cherry,
though Lighthousekeeping is too recent to have attracted much scrutiny. Critics have
Winterson’s feminist, lesbian or queer
focused on the issue of gender as it relates to Winterson's
agendas in these and other novels, and some attention has been paid to the question of
postmodernist. With respect to The Passion, for example,
whether or not Winterson is a postrnodernist.
Maria del Mar Asensio, using an approach influenced by Judith Butler, claims that
“uses those social clichés,
cliches, those sets of binary oppositions that constitute
Winterson "uses
men’s sexual identity as opposed to women's
women’s sexual identity, in order to subvert them
men's
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
permission.
5
arbitrariness” (267). Asensio believes that sexual
- and to expose their constructedness and arbitrariness"
Villanelle’s
binarism is incorporated into the novel so that it may be contested, and sees Villanelle's
webbed feet, her masquerade, and Henri's androgyny as ways of resisting or subverting
o f a natural or essential gender (266).
the idea of
Paulina Palmer takes a similar approach-in
approach in her essay "The
“The Passion: Storytelling,
Desire” (1998), in which she claims that the novel is a study of lesbian love
Fantasy, Desire"
Villanelle’s role in the text as being to take over Henri's
Henri’s narrative in order
(104). She sees Villanelle's
“lesbian narrative space"
space” (106), and believes that Villanelle is a figure of
to create a "lesbian
“the conventional model of woman as commodity
transgressive sexuality who exceeds "the
o f exchange endorsed by phallogocentric culture"
culture” (115). Palmer identifies the
and object of
Villanelle’s character that illustrate her transgressive excess, and
fantastic elements of Villanelle's
“the text representing [Villanelle] exceeds conventional expectations of realism,
notes, "the
erupting in a plenitudinous display of baroque imagery, episodes of magic realism, and
narrative-lines” (115).
competing genres and narrative-lines"
Both Asensio and Palmer are concerned with the ways in which characters,
especially female characters, do not fit into traditional gender categories. They both see
Winterson as working to subvert gender categories in order to give power and agency to
female characters. According to these critics, gender categories are restrictive
constructions. The category of "feminine"
“feminine” is an oppressive one for them because it limits
possibilities for women and places them under patriarchal control. However, I will argue
“feminine” and "masculine"
“masculine”
that Winterson does not necessarily see gender categories of "feminine"
as a threat to female power. Female characters in the novel, including Villanelle, often do
correspond to a more conventional model of woman, such as the one outlined by de
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
permission.
6
Lauretis, yet are still powerful characters who refuse to be controlled by male power.
o f prejudice against
This is important because it shows Winterson resisting any kind of
_ genders. Winterson refuses to condemn any gender category, whether "feminine"
“feminine” or
and even
otherwise. Also, Palmer is ignoring the ways that Villanelle is manipulative and-even
problematic in the
Villanelle’s treatment of
o f Henri is very problematic
violent towards Henri. Indeed, Villanelle's
novel. Though Winterson creates powerful female characters, these women are never
flawless.
Winterson’s treatment of gender. Kutzer writes
M. Daphne Kutzer also focuses on Winterson's
“It is daring not so much in its off-hand acceptance of sexual persuasions
of The Passion: "It
of all sorts, but rather in its recognition that gender is a construct, one whose boundaries
canal”
shift and reform as easily as the watery reflections of churches in a Venetian canal"
(139). Kutzer does not dwell on the fantastic in the novel except to say that "The
“The reader
(.139).
novel’s meditations on gender, sexuality and passion more palatable because
may find the novel's
they are embedded within the fantastic. The magical playfulness of the novel can, in
matter” (139). Unlike Kutzer, I will
some ways, dilute the seriousness of its subject matter"
Winterson’s agenda in regards to gender.
affirm the importance of the fantastic to Winterson's
Winterson is able to criticize the idealization of women, through her use of the fantastic.
Winterson’s treatment of
Laura Doan and Cath Stowers have also focused on Winterson's
“Jeanette Winterson's
Winterson’s
gender and I will question some aspects of their readings. In "Jeanette
Sexing the Postmodern"
Postmodern” (1994), Doan writes that Winterson is pursuing a lesbian project
(138). Stowers examines both The Passion and Sexing the Cherry in her essay
“Journeying with Jeanette: Transgressive Travels in Winterson's
Winterson’s Fiction"
Fiction” (1995).
"Journeying
Stowers reads Henri and Jordan, the male protagonists of The Passion and Sexing the
Reproduced with permission of
o f the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
permission.
7
Cherry, as feminized men with mixed-gender identities and concludes that travels and
journeys in the novelsserve
serve as attempts to "escape
“escape from, to reconceptualize, gender"
gender”
(149). These critics see Winterson working to illustrate the idea that gender is a construct,
(149):
and to problematize the idea of traditional, heterosexual gender binaries. That gender is a
construct is certainly evident in the novels, but I will show that Winterson maintains a
distinction between the categories of masculine and feminine.
“The Postmodern Lesbian Text: Jeanette Winterson's
Winterson’s Sexing the
In her essay "The
Cherry and Written on the Body"
Body” (1996), Marilyn R. Farwell claims that Sexing the
Cherry may be read as a lesbian narrative. She sees the juxtaposition of male and female
narratives as underscoring "the
“the artificiality of the narrative system, especially the male
heroic story"
story” (179). Farwell draws a comparison between Winterson's
Winterson’s novels and
Monique Wittig's
Wittig’s The Lesbian Body (1973), saying that both authors depend on a
"repositioning
“repositioning of the female body through its representation as excessive"
excessive” (187). Farwell
focuses on the Dog-Woman, the female protagonist of Sexing the Cherry. Farwell views
the Dog-Woman's
Dog-Woman’s excessive and grotesque body as part of Winterson's
Winterson’s strategy to cause
the heroic male narrative to be absorbed and overpowered by the female narrative.
Dog-Woman’s claims to be heterosexual and her
Farwell does acknowledge both the Dog-Woman's
strict views about how to behave like a lady. However, she does not see these claims as
Meija
conflicting with her assertion that the Dog-Woman possesses a lesbian body. Merja
Farwell’s point by noting that "although
“although the Dog-Woman
Makinen helpfully summarizes Farwell's
is superficially conservative in her views, the grotesqueness of her appearance argues for
agency” (108). However, the Doga much more subversive assertion of power and agency"
Woman is not always opposed to patriarchal images of women or male power, and there.
there
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
permission.
8
are several ways in which she is powerless. Farwell may be ignoring some of the
difficulties with interpreting a clear opposition between a masculine heroic story and a
feminine narrative in the novel.
■ _
“Jeanette Winterson's
Winterson’s Politics of Uncertainty in Sexing the Cherry"
Cherry” (1996),
In "Jeanette
Susana Onega also focuses on the fantastic nature of the Dog-Woman (303), this time
finding her fantastic body and outrageously violent acts to be problematic in reading
Winterson as a feminist. Onega wonders whether Winterson's
Winterson’s aim is to "denounce
“denounce the
oppression of woman within patriarchy and to negotiate the redefinition of male and
subjectivity” or to "do
“do away with patriarchy but only as the necessary prerequisite
female subjectivity"
to articulating her own equally sexist, vindictive, self-righteous and totalizing matriarchal
order” (311). The Dog-Woman is sexist, vindictive and self-righteous, but these faults are
order"
part of the way that Winterson criticizes the feminist tendency to read powerful women
as perfect beings. That the Dog-Woman is not an idealized female figure of power is part
Winterson’s feminist strategy.
of Winterson's
Sara Martin, in contrast to Onega, finds that Winterson is too politically correct in
Winterson’s Sexing the Cherry as
her portrayal of the Dog-Woman (203). She takes Winterson's
“truly challenging, shocking fiction about powerful
evidence that women cannot write "truly
women"
women” (208), and blames Winterson for being afraid to question the "'respectable'
“‘respectable’
feminism” (208). Martin further explains this type of
o f image by
image of woman built by feminism"
claiming that contemporary female writers generally tend to portray women in an
“to see deep inside us, to relinquish
idealistic light. She says that without the willingness "to
this absurd moral superiority, and the let men see into our defects (not the ones they have
gained” (209). Martin identifies the Dog-Woman as an
imputed to us) not much is gained"
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
permission.
9
example of this kind of
o f "respectable"
“respectable” image of women. However, I will show that
Winterson's
Winterson’s portrait of
o f the Dog-Woman and many of her other female characters are far
from respectable images of
o f woman. The Dog-Woman does not represent moral
superiority and is not an idealistic image of woman.
Lisa Moore, in "Teledildonics:
“Teledildonics: Virtual Lesbians in the Fiction of Jeanette
Winterson"
Winterson” (1995), discusses the way that Winterson avoids presenting an idealized
vision of the lesbian body. She writes that Winterson's
Winterson’s writings "go
“go beyond the utopian
terms of previous lesbian writing and theory that has celebrated the lesbian body's
body’s
distance and difference from language and the dominant culture"
culture” (104). Winterson makes
a "particularly
“particularly powerful attempt to imagine a lesbian body without a liberatory political
agenda"
agenda” (104). I will suggest that it is Winterson's
Winterson’s feminist strategy to avoid presenting
idealized female characters of all kinds, not just lesbian ones. Indeed, this type of
o f strategy
may be seen as part of
o f a liberatory political agenda which endeavours to free women
from all stereotypes, even those which appear flattering. I will argue that Winterson does
present feminist utopias through her use of the fantastic, but then she subverts them. In so
doing, she challenges the respectable image of woman built by feminism. Moore also
notes that "there
“there is very little representation of
o f homophobia"
homophobia” in Winterson's
Winterson’s writing
(108). Though there is little homophobia directed against women in Winterson, I will
examine instances of
o f homophobia directed towards male characters. This prejudice on the
part of female characters challenges an idealistic type of feminist ideal of women, which
describes women as loving, caring, tolerant beings by refusing to present perfect female
characters.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
permission.
10
10
Winterson’s critics, Susana Gonzalez deals most directly with the use of the
Of all Winterson's
Winterson’s feminist strategy. In her essay "Winterson's
“Winterson’s
fantastic and its connection to Winterson's
Sexing4he Cherry:
Cherry. Rewriting 'Woman'
‘Woman’ through Fantasy"
Fantasy” (1996), Gonzalez argues that
Sexing-the
“woman.” With regards to the Dog-Woman, she writes,
the novel offers a new vision of "woman."
“It is precisely
precisely.. . .. in her rebelling against this social and cultural imposition of
"It
‘femininity’ that we recognize her as a woman; it is from her `unfemininity'
‘unfemininity’ that most of
`femininity'
come” (285). Gonzalez believes that the Dog-Woman's
Dog-Woman’s power
her power and strength come"
comes from both her female body and her rebellion against patriarchal definitions of
femininity, so that she is female, yet not feminine. Gonzalez notes that in Jordan's
Jordan’s
“adopts the language and forms of fantastic literature as an apt mode
travels, Winterson "adopts
women’s experiences"
experiences” (287). Winterson redefines male or patriarchal reality
to express women's
"through
“through the body and through fantastic pictures and images which are uncontrollable
because they escape patriarchal dictates. She affirms the revolutionary capacity of fantasy
women’s discourse and to undermine male totalizing and oppressive
to give voice to women's
discourse"
discourse” (293). Moreover, "Winterson's
“Winterson’s display of fantasy in this novel lends itself to
be analyzed as a protest against the constraints of patriarchy and against the concept of
"woman"
“woman” as patriarchally defined"
defined” (292).
Gonzalez's
Gonzalez’s argument that the fantastic is an apt mode to describe women's
women’s
experiences is certainly useful, but she ignores Winterson's
Winterson’s uses of the fantastic to
describe male characters'
characters’ experiences. In Sexing the Cherry, for example, Jordan has the
ability to travel to fantastic other realms, and it is his experiences and his stories about the
women he encounters on his travels that make up much of the novel's
novel’s plot. Gonzalez
addresses the role of
o f men in the novel as follows:
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further
Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
permission.
Reproduced
11
o f violence, the
As is shown in Sexing the Cherry, in contrast to the male discourse of
words conveys a new view, not only of the
female discourse of love and words
relationships between the sexes, but of culture and society as male-defined.
relationships
Winterson seems to affirm that men provoked wars, men built factories that destroy
the environment and men brought discord to the world. (291)
However, this is an overly simplistic way of reading the novel. The Dog-Woman is far
more violent than any of the male characters in Sexing the Cherry, although she is also
Dog-Woman’s excessive violence makes it tempting
humorous and likable. Though the Dog-Woman's
to label Winterson as an androphobic radical feminist, as Onega suggests, to do so is to
o f Winterson's
Winterson’s feminist project. Winterson also provides a female
ignore the subtlety of
o f prejudice in the form of the rule book about men which begins, "Men
“Men are
discourse of
easy to please but are not pleased for long before some new novelty must delight them"
them”
27).1Thus, in this novel there is no simple "female
“female discourse of love and words"
words”
(SC 27).1
opposing destructive masculinity.
Winterson refuses to uphold the idealized femaleness that Gonzalez refers to in
her interpretation. This thesis will argue that Winterson does indeed attempt to challenge
“‘respectable’ image of woman built by feminism"
feminism” (Martin 208). She does so by
the "'respectable'
creating fantastic feminine motifs and female characters that are ambiguous. In other
words, these elements are open to different and conflicting interpretations. These motifs
and characters do not fit easily into a traditional paradigm of femininity as benevolent,
close to nature, beautiful and gentle. Femininity is much more doubtful according to
Winterson. The three novels are alike in their constructions of ambiguous, fantastic
1 The abbreviations SC, P,
P, and L will hereafter be used in parenthetical references to Sexing the Cherry,
The Passion and Lighthousekeeping, respectively.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
permission.
12
12
feminine sites. Through these constructions, Winterson offers a challenge to idealistic
feminism.
Winterson’s project as the subversion of gender
Though it is tempting to see Winterson's
binaries partly through the use of the fantastic, she does not pit herself against the idea of
heterosexuality or fixed gender categories per se. For example, in The Passion, the
heterosexual relationship between Henri's
Henri’s mother and father (which has some fantastic
Villanelle’s cross-dressing
elements) is represented as being supportive and loving. Also, Villanelle's
may seem to work to conceal or problematize her gender, but it may also be viewed as a
way of drawing more attention to her femininity. The Queen of spades, after all, easily
sees through the disguise, whereas the Cook, a villainous representation of the evils of
patriarchal culture, is sexually attracted to Villanelle because of her gender ambiguity.
Here, gender ambiguity operates to make Villanelle a victim of the patriarchal villain
rather than as a means to escape his power. In Lighthousekeeping, Winterson may even
critics’ obsessive focus on her fiction as an attack on
be said to make a joke about the critics'
traditional gender categories. For example, near the end of the novel while living in Capri
after being forced out of the lighthouse, Silver steals a parrot after hearing it speak her
name. When Silver first sees the parrot, the bird calls out "Pretty
“Pretty boy! Pretty boy!,"
boy!,” at
“Who cares about gender at a time like this?"
this?” (L 157).
157).
which Silver remarks, "Who
In the first chapter, I will discuss the ways that the fantastic motifs in Sexing the
Cherry suggest the possibility of an ambiguous freedom for women. I will show that the
fantastic feminine elements in the novel often suggest fragility and impermanence. The
Dog-Woman has a powerful body, but she is also absurdly ignorant and innocent about
sex. Gonzalez points out that the fantastic spaces in the novel seem to provide the women
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
permission.
13
13
with an escape from male discourses and laws. However, this is not always the case. For
example, one of the first fantastic places that Jordan visits in the novel is a house with no
house’s inhabitants must move around while balancing on tightropes.
floors. All of the house's
However, the laws of gravity still exist; it is just that the inhabitants of the house
obstinately resist the convention of a house with a floor. Moreover, the fantastic places
“reality” of gravity, but they are bound by
that Jordan visits seem to be free from the "reality"
different kinds of laws and are sometimes more dangerous as a result. In the house with
“pit” (SC, 14).
14).
no floors, people must beware of falling into the "pit"
In the chapter on The Passion, I show how the many feminine fantastic motifs in
Villanelle’s
the novel are sometimes literally freeing for women: for example, Villanelle's
relationship with Venice; the Queen of spades and her house; Georgette and her home;
and Josephine's
Josephine’s relationships to the spaces around her. I will also explore the ways that
fantastic feminine motifs are potentially dangerous and confining—and not just for the
male characters. For the fantastic is not always liberating for women either, as the
Villanelle’s lost heart will show. Unlike other critics of The Passion, I
episode involving Villanelle's
will demonstrate that Winterson conceives of gender itself as a fantastic concept which
may be either freeing or confining.
In the third chapter, I will pay particular attention to Babel Dark, the male
protagonist of Lighthousekeeping. Dark, a character with violent tendencies towards
women, is often the recipient of the reader's
reader’s sympathies which Winterson evokes in part
through her use of fantastic motifs. The fantastic sites in Lighthousekeeping all have a
Silver’s mother's
mother’s unbalanced house adds to the enjoyment of some things
dual nature. Silver's
(like flipping pancakes), but is also dangerous and eventually leads to Silver's
Silver’s mother's
mother’s
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
permission.
14
death. The fossil cave is a wonderful discovery, but for Babel it is also frightening in
what it reveals about evolution. I will argue that the fantastic, seemingly utopian sites in
Winterson’s brand of the
this novel are often uncomfortable and frightening because Winterson's
fantastic refuses to have recourse to "compensatory,
“compensatory, transcendental other-worlds"
other-worlds”
(Jackson 180).
180).
Winterson refuses to align herself with idealistic feminists who wish to maintain a
“male discourse of violence"
violence” and the "female
“female discourse of
clear distinction between the "male
love."
love.” Throughout Sexing the Cherry, The Passion and Lighthousekeeping, Winterson
uses fantastic motifs to question idealistic images of women.
permission.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
15
15
THE HOUSE WITHOUT FLOORS: PROBLEMATIC UTOPIAS IN SEXING THE
CHERRY
Sexing the Cherry tells the story of the Dog-Woman and her son Jordan, who live in
London during the reign of Charles II. The Dog:Woman
Dog-Woman is a fantastically hideous and
large woman, whereas Jordan possesses the magical ability to travel to mysterious other
“real,” but the
realms. In Sexing the Cherry, Winterson uses fantasy to interrogate the "real,"
“real” may not always be neatly aligned with the male or with patriarchal culture as
"real"
Gonzalez has suggested. Winterson does subvert male hegemony and compulsory
heterosexuality, but this subversion is never compensatory or transcendental. In the plots
o f Winterson's
Winterson’s novels, woman-woman relationships, homosexual relationships, and other
of
non-normative relationships and gender roles are not conceptualized as perfect utopian
alternatives; rather, attempts to escape normative gender roles and sexual relationships
are often met with punishment and suffering. The alternatives to male hegemony are also
problematic. Cath Stowers has written that Winterson's
Winterson’s novels, specifically, The Passion,
Sexing the Cherry and Written on the Body, often depict transgressive travels to other
“Travel.. . .. becomes an attempted entry into some kind of utopian space, a
realms: "Travel
conceptual territory of the future, a terrain on which notions of sexual identity are
challenged.. . .. tropes of
o f travel in her work serve as increasing attempts to escape from, to
challenged
reconceptualize, gender"
gender” (149). However, seemingly utopian spaces in Winterson are
often problematic, and many of the "other"
“other” realms in Sexing the Cherry are only
ambiguously utopian, and sometimes even overtly threatening.
The fantastic is not always freeing for women in the novel. However, according to
“In Sexing the Cherry, Winterson adopts the language and forms of
Susana Gonzalez, "In
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
permission.
16
16
fantastic
fantastic- literature as an apt mode to express women's
women’s experiences"
experiences” (287), and indeed,
the female characters in Sexing the Cherry are consistently associated with the fantastic.
The floating city, Rapunzel's
RapunzeFs tower, the mermaid's
mermaid’s well, Zillah's
Zillah’s prison, the Dog- Woman's
Woman’s body, and the prostitutes'
prostitutes’ brothel all constitute magical or fantastic spaces.
Moreover, women move through the worlds of the novel in impossible ways and often
possess impossible bodies. The Dog-Woman is fantastically large, and Fortunata is
fantastically light. Gonzalez claims that in this novel, fantasy works to free women from
the constraints of patriarchy. However, fantasy also works in more ambiguous ways in
Sexing the Cherry. As Rosemary Jackson writes, "a
“a characteristic most frequently
associated with literary fantasy has been its obdurate refusal of prevailing definitions of
the 'real'
‘real’ or 'possible',
‘possible’, a refusal amounting at times to violent opposition"
opposition” (14). Sexing
the Cherry is filled with women who violate the possible, either through their bodies, or
through their fantastic relationships to the "real"
“real” world, but this violation may harm these
women themselves.
Gonzalez believes that Winterson rejects traditional femininity in Sexing the
Cherry, and instead "portrays
“portrays female characters that are strong, active, conscious,
committed and independent"
independent” (283). This idea is supported by the grotesquely huge and
hideous character of the Dog-Woman, one of the main characters in the novel. The DogWoman describes herself as large enough to outweigh an elephant at a fair and considers
the degree of her hideous appearance as follows: "My
“My nose is flat, my eyebrows are
heavy. I have only a few teeth and those are a poor show, being black and broken"
broken” (SC
17).
17). Gonzalez believes that the Dog-Woman rebels against the "social
“social and cultural
imposition of femininity"
femininity” (285). However, only the male characters in the novel view the
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
permission.
17
Dog-Woman as resisting femininity, whereas she views herself as aspiring towards
femininity. The Dog-Woman is undeniably physically dominating and powerful, but at
certain
dimes she displays certain weaknesses traditionally associated with femininity. For
certain-times
example, she says,
saysr "I
“I sing of other times, when I was happy, though I know that these are
figments of
o f my mind and nowhere I have ever been"
been” (SC 7). As we shall see, the DogWoman is constructed as a fantastic and grotesque woman by the male characters in the
novel. Indeed, the Dog Woman perceives herself as hideous mainly because the male
characters do so.
Moreover, the Dog-Woman does not always rebel against the imposition of
“Whereas gender, as a social category, is artificially
femininity. Gonzalez claims, "Whereas
constructed, Winterson seems to consider the sexed body as essence, the basic, central
identity” (284), arguing
and most important characteristic which gives human beings an identity"
that the Dog-Woman gains power from her female body in combination with her
complete lack of femininity. Gonzalez refers disparagingly to the "artificial,
“artificial, manconstructed canon of femininity"
femininity” in which "women
“women are expected to be petite, demure,
giving, passive, receptive in the home and, above all, attractive"
attractive” (285). There are many
ways in which the Dog-Woman is not traditionally feminine; however, she does admire
this kind of femininity and even aspires to it. For example, when she comments on
Jordan’s looks saying, "He
“He resembled me not at all, a thing which must have been a
Jordan's
do” (SC 61), it
secret relief to him, though he never shuddered in my company as others do"
becomes clear that she is sensitive to others'
others’ opinions of her appearance. Likewise, when
describing dressing herself for a special occasion, she says, "despite
“despite my handicaps I cut
something of a fine figure, I thought"
thought” (SC 61). Here, in a surprising statement considering
permission.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
18
Dog-Woman’s size and power, she apparently considers her physical appearance to
the Dog-Woman's
be a handicap. She sometimes even dresses up with pearls, displaying a desire to conform
idea of feminine beauty. Early in the novel, she states, "I
“I would have liked
to a traditional idea-of
to pour out a child from my body but you have to have a man for that and there's
there’s no man
who's
who’s a match for me"
me” (SC 3). There is a
a trace of longing here, suggesting that the DogWoman does not consider herself to be completely self-sufficient. Indeed, she possesses
the traditionally feminine desire to be attractive, to find a man, and to become a mother.
The male characters fail to see these aspects of the Dog-Woman. For example, she
is constantly and completely misunderstood by her son Jordan, the other narrator of the
novel. At one point, Jordan claims:
I want to be like my rip-roaring mother who cares nothing for how she looks, only
for what she does. She has never been in love, no, and never wanted to be either.
self-doubt... . .. I think she loves me but I don't
don’t
She is self-sufficient and without self-doubt.
wouldn’t say so; perhaps because she doesn't
doesn’t know herself. When I
know. She wouldn't
left, I think it was relief she felt at being able to continue her old life with the dogs
103)
and the dredgers and the whores she likes. (SC 103)
Everything that the reader learns about the Dog-Woman throughout the novel makes it
clear that Jordan is wrong about her. In reality, she is obsessed with her appearance, she
frequently doubts herself, and she has a deep love for Jordan. From the beginning, she
never doubted that Jordan would leave her, saying, "When
“When he left me I was proud and
broken-hearted, but he came from the water and I knew the water would claim him
again” (SC 82), and when he leaves the second time, she describes herself as being "full
“full
again"
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
permission.
19
19
of fear"
fear” (SC 148).
148). Jordan is also wrong in that the Dog-Woman has been in love with a
man, though he rejected her out of terror. She describes-the
describes the experience as follows:
I fell in love once
once.. . .. I decked myself in my best clothes like a bullock at a fair,
but none of this made him notice me and I felt my heart shrivel to the size of a
pea. Whenever he turned his back to leave I always stretched out my hand to hold
him a moment but his shoulder-blades were too sharp to touch. I drew his image
in the dirt by my bed and named all my mother's
mother’s chickens after him. (SC 31)
Jordan is certainly very wrong about his mother, but so is the boy whom the Dog-Woman
loves. Her fear of touching him and her bashfulness show that he has nothing to fear from
her. Indeed, his idea of the Dog-Woman as something terrifying is not founded on the
reality of her true nature. Though she is fantastically powerful and huge, the DogWoman's
Woman’s unrequited love for this boy reveals that she has feminine vulnerabilities. She is
not simply the powerful enemy of
o f patriarchy that Gonzalez identifies in her character.
In a similar vein, Marilyn R. Farwell reads the Dog-Woman as a lesbian subject and
a "miserable
“miserable failure as a heterosexual woman"
woman” (185), but this reading takes insufficient
account of the Dog-Woman's
Dog-Woman’s frequent attempts to engage in heterosexual sex and of her
regrets at their failures. The Dog-Woman's
Dog-Woman’s desire to have intercourse and to give birth
ought to be considered when assigning her a gender or sexual orientation. She recalls
experience of sexual intercourse with a man: "he
“he complained that he could not find the
sides of my cunt and felt like a tadpole in a pot"
pot” (SC 109).
109). After the man urges the DogWoman to squeeze in her muscles, serious embarrassment ensues: "He
“He was stuck . .. .. with
the aid of a crowbar they prised him out and refreshed him with mulled wine while I sang
him a little song about the fortitude of spawning salmon"
salmon” (SC 109).
109). The man tells her that
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
permission.
20
she is simply too big, but the Dog-Woman sees nothing wrong with her body and later
“It seemed all in proportion to me"
me” (SC 110).
110). She did her best to accommodate her
says, "It
lover and make herself pleasing to him, and she does not consider herself to be lacking in
partner’s timidity for the debacle.
any way, but blames her partner's
Critics often see Winterson as trying to explore possibilities in non-heterosexual
“creates a
relationships in her novels. Laura Doan, for example, claims that Winterson "creates
space not just for lesbians but for productive, dynamic, and fluid gender pluralities and
sexual positionings”
positionings" (153). However, Sexing the Cherry frequently seems to disparage
men in general and non-normative or homosexual sexualities for men. This is made
evident in the brothel scenes in the novel. Sexing the Cherry contains many prostitutes
man’s brothel; the whore from
including those whom Jordan encounters living in the rich man's
Spitalfields whom the Dog-Woman befriends; and the prostitute that Jordan meets in the
city where love is illegal. These women are powerful and independent, but they are also
vindictive and hate men, and are often portrayed as inhuman. Even the Dog-Woman, the
most physically monstrous of all the women in the novel, believes that she is weaker than
her prostitute friends. She refuses a job in the brothel, reasoning that "Surely
“Surely such to-ing
and fro-ing as must go on night and day weakens the heart and inclines it to love?"
love?” (SC
36). The Dog-Woman is not completely fearless after all; rather, she is afraid of falling in
love.
On the other hand, the prostitutes are less frail than the Dog-Woman because of
their ability to control their hearts. Like the Dog-Woman, they display grotesque violence
towards men. At one point, the Dog-Woman witnesses one man's
man’s bestial fantasy and asks
her friend if this is typical, to which the friend replies, 'There
‘“There is no usual manner . . ..
permission.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
21
God’s Elect, do you not know? Surely God's
God’s
There is only the unusual. These men are of God's
pleasure?’ Then
Thai she laughed hideously and told me the man was "aa
Elect are entitled to pltasure?'
o f Croniwell
Cromwell and would be dead by morning"
morning” (SC 86). The implication
great supporter of
.seems to be that the Puritans-are
Puritans are entitled to pleasure, but that they must die for it. The
Dog-Woman discovers her Puritan enemies, Preacher Scroggs and Neighbour Firebrace,
engaged in sexual intercourse with one another, but this homosexual encounter is
constructed as perverted and immoral, an act which deserves the terrible retribution that
the Dog-Woman contrives to inflict on them. Scroggs and Firebrace are playing the roles
of Caesar and Brutus when the Dog-Woman appears and violently kills them both with
her axe. Disgusted to see the "unrepentant
“unrepentant vermin"
vermin” "embracing
“embracing each other and wiping
each other's
other’s faces with their emissions"
emissions” (SC 86), she forces her way into their sexual
fantasy and executes them. This scene hardly constitutes a utopian space for alternative
sexual positionings. In the case of Scroggs and Firebrace, it seems that not all sexualities
are acceptable.
One of the epigraphs of Sexing the Cherry provides another avenue for questioning
feminine utopias in the novel. The epigraph states: "The
“The Hopi, an Indian tribe, have a
language as sophisticated as ours, but no tenses for past, present and future. The division
does not exist. What does this say about time?"
time?” ([iv]). Critics tend to answer this question
by saying that according to Winterson, time does not exist, or that time is merely a
construction of patriarchal culture and language. Gonzalez claims that Winterson rejects
the male definitions of
o f time, history, woman and the binary opposition between fantasy
and reality (281). Similarly, Cath Stowers sees the novel as gendering linear time as
masculine and "fluxing
“fluxing time travel"
travel” (147) as feminine, so that Jordan's
Jordan’s ability to travel in
permission.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
22
time is evidence that he is a feminized male. However, these critics may be missing the
Winterson’s intent. That the Hopi-possess
Hopf possess a language without tenses and
subtlety of Winterson's
therefore must have a different idea of time was claimed by the linguist Benjamin Whorf.
“there is a systematic relationship
The famous Sapir-Whorf hypothesis states that "there
between the grammatical categories of the language a person speaks and how that person
both understands the world and behaves in it"
it” ("Sapir-Whorf
(“Sapir-Whorf hypothesis").
hypothesis”). Thus,
Winterson’s epigraph about "fluxing
“fluxing time"
time” is, in fact, derived from a male discourse. The
Winterson's
Sapir-Whorf hypothesis suggests that thought may be influenced by the structure of the
“W horf s formulation of this 'principle
‘principle of
language in which one thinks. However, "Whorf's
relativity’ is often stereotyped as a `prisonhouse'
‘prisonhouse’ view of
o f language in which
linguistic relativity'
one’s thinking and behavior is completely and utterly shaped by one's
one’s language"
language” ("Sapir(“Sapirone's
hypothesis”). Winterson's
Winterson’s use of time in the novel appears to derive from the
Whorf hypothesis").
“masculine” time that is
desire to undermine this hypothesis. Susana Gonzalez refers to "masculine"
linear and follows from past to present and future. However, Winterson characterizes the
alternative to this model of time—the Hopi model—as
model— as "masculine"
“masculine” also. The Hopi model
“The old man said it was
of time is described to Jordan by a European man as follows: "The
world” (SC 140).
140). Jordan "asked
“asked
impossible to learn their language without learning their world"
meaning” (SC 140).
140). The
him how long it had taken him and he said that question had no meaning"
question clearly does have a meaning for Jordan and for speakers of English with a
traditional sense of time. The European man is perfectly capable of
o f answering Jordan's
Jordan’s
question but he refuses to do so. He chooses to adhere to the Hopi language and
worldview. In a sense, he disproves the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis by this very statement
because he shows that even though he speaks English, he is capable of understanding and
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
permission.
23
adopting a non-Western conceptualization of
o f time. Thus, one's
one’s worldview is not
necessarily structured by his or her language.
Winterson's
Winterson’s allusion to the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis suggests that even the
reconceptualization of linear time has its origin in masculine discourses, and that a binary
opposition between masculine (linear) and feminine (fluxing) concepts of time is not so
easily constructed. The context of Jordan's
Jordan’s story about the Hopi is.
is also significant. He
tells the story to the Dog-Woman after apologizing for speaking so little, and noting that
he and his mother have never been particularly talkative. The Dog-Woman recalls that
she "was
“was perplexed by this, since I like to think of myself as a cheerful person, ever ready
with some vital conversation. Had not Jordan and myself talked forever when he was a
boy?"
boy?” (SC 140).
140). When Jordan ends his story about the Hopi, the Dog-Woman simply
says, "After
“After this we continued in silence"
silence” (SC 140).
140). Though critics have seen the concept
of fluxing time and language as potentially offering liberation from patriarchal control,
the story of
o f the Hopi itself has the effect of silencing the Dog-Woman. Just as the
European man silenced Jordan with his refusal to answer any questions, Jordan silences
his mother with his comments on the meaninglessness of language. In this case, the
masculine discourse about fluxing time actually serves to silence and confuse the DogWoman. Thus, the fantastic concept of fluxing time may not be easily aligned with
femininity or interpreted as a freeing force in opposition to masculine linear time.
As with the epigraph, many critics have focused on the episode in the novel when
Winterson’s subversive feminism.
Jordan discusses the practise of grafting as evidence of Winterson's
The novel's
novel’s title indicates that grafting is an important motif in the novel. Indeed, Jordan
dwells on the idea saying:
permission.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
24
grafting is the means whereby a plant, perhaps tender or uncertain, is fused into a
hardier-member
hardier member of its
its strain, and so the two take advantage of each other and
produce a third kind, without seed or parent. In this way fruits have been made
resistant to disease and certain plants have learned to grow where previously they
could not. (SC 76)
Critics have been attracted to the motif of the grafted tree as a symbol for a third gender;
that is, something that is neither male nor female in the traditional sense and that
dissolves gender binaries. Of the motif, Laura Doan notes, "Winterson
“Winterson recuperates the
process of
o f grafting, not as an artificial, scientific reproductive mechanism, but as sexual
reproduction outside of
o f (beyond) a heterosexual model and, in turn, spawning a third sex
relatively free of binarisms"
binarisms” (153). Gonzalez adds that the hybrid cherry is a fantastic
"fusion
“fusion of two female beings"
beings” (289). Both critics see grafting as a utopian solution to
oppressive heterosexuality. However, I argue that the motif of grafting offers no freedom
from or solution to the heterosexual paradigm.
Firstly, "grafting
“grafting and budding are vegetative methods used to propagate plants of
a clone whose cuttings are difficult to root or to make use of a rootstock rather than
having the plant on its own roots"
roots” (Hartmann 100).
100). In horticultural terms,
a cultivar that must be reproduced by asexual methods to maintain its
characteristics is termed a clone, as distinguished from a line, which will maintain
its characteristics without change by seed propagation. Almost all fruit and nut
cultivars and many woody ornamental cultivars are clones. All plants that are
members of
o f the same clone have the same genetic makeup and are, in reality,
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
permission.
25
exact descendants of the mother plant from which the clone originated, although
the original mother plant may have died many years earlier. (Hartmann 89)
Thus, it is difficult to see how
how the practice of grafting could produce a third sex or a
fusion of two female beings, for "The
“The primary advantage of clones is the uniformity of
the member plants. All members have the same genetic makeup (genotype) and
alike” (Hartmann 91). In light of this, the motif of
potentially they can all be exactly alike"
grafting is problematic in the novel. Doan is clearly mistaken in understanding the
product of a graft to be a third sex.
Moreover, the Dog-Woman does not approve of grafting, claiming that the
hybrids have no gender and must therefore be "a
“a confusion to themselves"
themselves” (SC 77).
Farwell takes note of the Dog-Woman's
Dog-Woman’s objection, but sees her "conservatism"
“conservatism” as "a
“a ruse
for a bodily female subject that reorders the narrative gender positionings"
positionings” (183).
However, all these critics overlook the Dog-Woman's
Dog-Woman’s real objection to the practice of
grafting. That the tree must be a confusion to itself is not her objection. When she says,
"Let
“Let the world mate of
o f its own accord . . .. or not at all"
all” (SC 77), she shows that she
objects to the practice because Jordan is forcing the Polstead Black and Morello cherry
trees to join with each other when they otherwise would not do so. She disproves of the
graft as a forced reproduction. Indeed, her comment indicates that she sees the practice of
grafting as a kind of rape. This scene, which critics have offered as evidence of
Winterson's
Winterson’s belief in a multiplicity of gender roles, is extremely problematic because of
the Dog-Woman's
Dog-Woman’s objection. Stowers takes note of Jordan's
Jordan’s desire to graft part of
Tradescant onto himself and sees it as evidence of the feminization of
o f masculinity in the
novel (148). Nonetheless, the practise of grafting is a masculine art which in this case is
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
permission.
26
Jordan’s explorations are "more
“more
performed upon female plants. Stowers claims that Jordan's
desire” than with "the
“the male model of
concerned with discovering a reciprocal love and desire"
control of
o f the Other"
Other” (149). The practise of grafting, however, has nothing to do with
reciprocal love or desire. It is a masculine art passed from Tradescant to Jordan and
forced upon the cherry (an emblem of feminine virginity). If this episode of the novel is
an attempt at reconceptualizing gender, it does not present a successful escape from the
heterosexual paradigm.
During his fantastic travels, Jordan arrives in a city where words have physical
“thick cloud over the city, which every so often must be
shapes which rise up and form a "thick
language” (SC 10).
10). Gonzalez notes that in the city of
thoroughly cleansed of too much language"
words "Winterson
“Winterson [uses] a metafictional device to refer to all those preceding patriarchal
discourses that linger on ...
... [language] is a male-constructed system into which women
must force their experiences"
experiences” (286-7). However, this fantastic episode resists being easily
separated into masculine and feminine discourses. Gonzalez ignores the fact that Jordan
and one of the woman cleaners regret the erasure of certain kinds of language. Jordan
says,
Indeed I was sorry to see the love-sighs of young girls swept away. My
companion, though she told me it was strictly forbidden, caught a sonnet in a
wooden box and gave it to me as a memento. If I open the box by the tiniest
amount I may hear it, repeating itself endlessly as it is destined to do until
11)
someone sets it free. (SC 11)
As this passage proves, the city must be cleansed not only of masculine language, but
also of the "love-sighs
“love-sighs of young girls."
girls.” It seems that erasing patriarchal discourses is
permission.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
27
actually harmful to women in this episode. Indeed, it is significant that the removal of
these patriarchal discourses is welcomed by the male citizens of the town but is
physically harmful for women. Because the words resist erasure, one woman cleaner is
by "a
“a vicious row,"
row,” and "the
“the men responsible made their defence of
o f the grounds
mauled by
that the words no longer belonged to them"
them” (SC 10).
10). The cleaners must take their mops
up in balloons in order to reach the words, which form a cloud above the city. Gonzalez
also claims that Winterson "affirms
“affirms the revolutionary capacity of fantasy to give voice to
women's
women’s discourse and to undermine male totalizing and oppressive discourse"
discourse” (293),
but in this fantastic episode, women's
women’s discourses are cleaned away along with those of
men.
After all of
o f the words have been removed, Jordan notices new words appearing
from people who "not
“not content with the weight of their lives, continually turned the
heaviest of
o f things into the lightest of properties"
properties” (SC 12).
12). The fantastic lightness of
language in this city is what allows people—mostly men—to free themselves from past
discourses. Winterson assigns words the quality of "lightness"
“lightness” or weightlessness, thereby
associating them with many of the female characters in the novel. When Jordan disguises
himself as a girl, an old woman gives him a rule book in order to teach him about men.
The fifth rule proclaims, "Men
“Men deem themselves weighty and women light. Therefore it is
simple to tie a stone round [men's]
[men’s] necks and drown them should they become too
troublesome"
troublesome” (SC 28). The rule is commenting on men's
men’s stereotypes about men and
women. It is possible to interpret this rule as a suggestion that men deem women to be
constantly in need of
o f control and confinement lest they be "light"
“light” in the sense of being
sexually unreliable. According to the female writer of the rule book, this kind of
permission.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
28
patriarchal stereotyping of women must be opposed with violence. However, the rule
book also constitutes alist of the writer's
writer’s stereotypes about men. Winterson seems to
bring these stereotypes into focus as a way of interrogating them. However, the matter of
stereotypes is very complex; after all, many women are light in Sexing the Cherry,
not in the way that the rule book suggests.
though perhaps not
All of the twelve dancing princesses and Fortunata's
Fortunata’s dancing students, are
associated with lightness, as is the Dog-Woman's
Dog-Woman’s mother: "my
“my mother, who lived only a
while and was so light that she dared not go out in a wind, could swing me on her back
and carry me for miles"
miles” (SC 19).
19). Gonzalez argues that in Sexing the Cherry, gravity
represents patriarchal society, and the ability to fly allows women to escape it. However,
the rule book does not explicitly state that men are wrong in deeming themselves weighty
and women light, but simply claims that this rigid view of things makes men easy to do
away with. It seems that men's
men’s fantastical misunderstandings about women in this novel
are sometimes proven correct. For example, one princess describes her marriage as
follows: "I
“I was his falcon. I hung on his arm and fed at his hand ...
... He said I would tear
him to pieces if he dealt softly with me"
me” (SC 51). This princess escapes her husband's
husband’s
confinement through a fantastic and violent metamorphosis: "At
“At night, in June I think, I
flew off his wrist and tore his liver from his body, and bit my chain in pieces and left him
on the bed with his eyes open . . .. As your lover describes you, so you are"
are” (SC 52). This
husband's
husband’s fantasy about his "light"
“light” wife actually comes true, only to cause his own death.
The motifs of
o f gravity and lightness also appear frequently in the fantastic episode
about the house with no floors. Of
O f the house, Jordan says, "it
“it is well known that the
ceiling of one room is the floor of another, but the household ignores this ever-downward
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
permission.
29
floors” (SC
necessity and continues to live ever upward, celebrating ceilings but denying floors"
14). The people eat their meals at tables andchairs
chairs that are suspended from the ceiling,
14).
“Whatever food is left over at the end
and must be careful not to drop anything or to fall: "Whatever
heard” (SC
of the meal is scraped into the pit, from whence a fearful crunching can be heard"
14). Life in this house is both more dangerous and more exciting as a result of
o f the
14).
o f floors, but the reality of gravity still exists and is emphasized by the fact that
absence of
people resist it. In this case, ignoring gravity does not make it disappear, but rather gives
it greater power and importance. This is emphasized when Jordan watches Fortunata
leave the house: "she
“she was climbing down from her window on a thin rope which she cut
o f times during the descent. I strained my eyes to follow her, but
and re-knotted a number of
gone” (SC 14).
14).
she was gone"
Jordan begins his quest to find Fortunata at this point and discovers that she is the
youngest of the twelve dancing princesses. Gonzalez summarizes the traditional tale as
follows:
Twelve princesses manage for a while to face, trick and escape patriarchal
oppression represented in the figure of their father; they are kept incarcerated but
rale
escape every night to go dancing till they are brought back under patriarchal rule
when a prince succeeds in finding out how they escape and where they escape to.
(289)
Winterson revises the tale in Sexing the Cherry by making the princesses fantastically
light, even weightless. When Jordan meets with Fortunata in person, she relates the story
of the twelve dancing princesses to him, and describes the enchanted realm to which they
traveled each night: "my
“my sisters and I flew through the window night after night and
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
permission.
30
danced in a silver city of curious motion. The city itself danced. It had the sensation of
being on board ship, of being heaved from corner
comer to corner
comer on top of the tossing tide"
tide” (SC
96). The people of
o f the city seem to be able to control the direction, but they cannot stop
- the city from moving: "The
“The city, being freed from the laws of gravity, began to drift
upwards from some 200 miles, until it was out of the earth's
earth’s atmosphere. It
I t ...
... began to
circle the earth at leisure, never in place for long, but in other respects like some off-shore
island"
island” (SC 98). Fortunata reveals that she and her sisters were drawn to the city because
of their uncommon quality of lightness:
My sisters and I have always been light. When my third sister was born
bom she was
prevented from banging her head against the ceiling only by the umbilical cord.
Without that she would have come from the womb and ascended straight upwards.
My fifth sister was so light that she rode on the back of our house cat until she was
twelve. (SC 99)
The lightest of
o f all the princesses is Fortunata: "She
“She was so light that she could climb
down a rope, cut it and tie it again in mid-air without plunging to her death. The winds
supported her"
her” (SC 55). This image is striking for its illogicality. If the winds can support
Fortunata, then why does she bother climbing down the rope? Though this elaborate
display of cutting and tying the rope emphasizes that Fortunata is immune to gravity, she
still must adhere to the pretence of following its laws.
Indeed, the fantastic lightness of the princesses is problematic throughout the
novel. By describing the twelve dancing princesses as "light,"
“light,” Winterson alludes to
George MacDonald's
MacDonald’s fairytale
fairy tale "The
“The Light Princess"
Princess” (1864), in which a princess is
unaffected by gravity. She floats in the air, and is also overly light-hearted. One of the
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
permission.
31
royal doctors explains, "She
“She cares for nothing here. There is no relation between her and
world” (67). Eventually, however, her feeling for a young prince causes her to weep
this world"
so that consequently her gravity is restored. In his analysis of this story, U.C.
Knoepflmacher suggests that when the princess is returned to the ground, patriarchal rule
regains control (130). However, this type of feminist reading of the story ignores the fact
that lightness has both advantages and disadvantages. The princess’s
princess's parents have an
argument about the nature of lightness, in which the king argues that lightness is good,
whereas the queen believes it is bad:
‘T is a good thing to be light-handed,'
light-handed,’ said the king.
"Tis
"Tis
‘’Tis a bad thing to be light-fingered,'
light-fingered,’ answered the queen.
"Tis
‘’Tis a good thing to be light-footed,'
light-footed,’ said the king.
"Tis
‘’Tis a bad thing—'
thing— ’ began the queen; but the king interrupted her. (58)
Eventually, both parents confirm that lightness of body is not good, and undertake to cure
their daughter. Her lightness makes the princess unable to take anything seriously, and,
though it lets her escape patriarchal rule, her lightness does not translate to happiness.
Indeed, MacDonald suggests that there is something missing in her laugh: "I
“I think it was
a certain tone, depending upon the possibility of sorrow—morbidezza, perhaps. She never
smiled"
smiled” (63). The moral of this story seems to be that there are advantages and
disadvantages to both lightness and heaviness. Happiness cannot be found in either
extreme.
As in "The
“The Light Princess,"
Princess,” lightness is not equivalent to happiness or freedom in
Sexing the Cherry, for though it is sometimes associated with freedom and power, it also
has disadvantages. For example, the Dog-Woman's
Dog-Woman’s mother is in danger of being blown
permission.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
32
away in the wind, and the twelve dancing princesses are swept into the unknown as a
result of their lightness. Fortunata explains haw
how she and her sisters discovered the
“when the weightless city was directly overhead, though utterly
floating city saying, "when
concealed, we were the first to feel the pull of its counterforce, and on the same night we
found ourselves being dragged out of
o f bed and slammed up against the window like a
dozen flies"
flies” (SC 99). This city is free from the earth's
earth’s gravity, but it does have its own
"counterforce,"
“counterforce,” and the princesses are subject to this force just as they would be to
gravity.
In some versions of the traditional tale, the magical realm to which the princesses
travel is associated with evil. For Max Liithi,
Luthi, "the
“the twelve beautiful princesses who
gradually dance their shoes to pieces in an underground world are, like so many other
beautiful maidens . . .. under the spell of dark powers"
powers” (6-7). Liithi
Luthi may be drawing from
the Grimm variant of the tale in which all those who accept the king’s
king's challenge to
discover the princesses'
princesses’ nightly activities must either succeed or die (54). In Aleksandr
Afanas'ev's
Afanas’ev’s version, the fantastic realm has hellish connotations: "the
“the oldest sister
pushed her bed to one side and disclosed a passage to the underground kingdom, to the
realm of the accursed king. They began to climb down a ladder"
ladder” (225). In contrast to
these traditional versions, Winterson's
Winterson’s revision at first appears to imagine the princesses'
princesses’
realm as a perfect utopia. However, as we have seen, her princesses are also under the
spell of
o f the power of the "counterforce."
“counterforce.” Fortunata explains the princesses'
princesses’ manner of
dealing with this force saying, "we
“we decided that there were only two possibilities: either
we could ballast ourselves against further attack, or we could open ourselves to whatever
might happen. Our vote was unanimous, and on the following night we lay in bed in our
permission.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
33
waited” (SC 99). These women have no choice but to submit to an
ballgowns and waited"
unknown force. In this way, though they may be free from the power of gravity, they are
not completely free. Indeed, they are dragged out of their beds by a force even stronger
than gravity. It seems clear that their vote is unanimous because submitting to the
“counterforce” is the only real option available.
"counterforce"
Winterson explores the disadvantages of certain freedoms in many ways throughout
the novel. In another episode, Jordan encounters eleven of the twelve princesses living
together in an unusual, enchanted city. In this city, all the buildings regularly change
places, so that no building ever remains in one place for long: "to
“to escape the insistence of
creditors they knock down their houses in a single night and rebuild them elsewhere"
elsewhere” (SC
39). In this shifting town, people refuse to be confined and Jordan discovers that moving
from place to place "is
“is a most fulfilling pastime and accounts for the extraordinary
longevity of the men and women who live there"
there” (SC 39). Jordan comments on the
o f this city saying, "Since
“Since settling down and rooting like trees, but without the
advantages of
ability to make use of the wind to scatter out our seed, we have found only infection and
discontent"
discontent” (SC 40). This shifting city appears to be very similar to the ever-moving
silver city in which the princesses danced; however, this place is not a perfect utopia or
escape from reality either. As we discover, the creditors are not deterred by the
movement of
o f the houses: "it
“it is more usual than not for the escapees to find their pursuers
o f their choice"
choice” (SC 39).
waiting for them on the new site of
The fantastic episodes of the novel frequently depict disagreement and betrayal
between women as well as between women and men. Gonzalez notes Fortunata's
Fortunata’s
“by escaping her husband-to-be at the church, [Fortunata] is
defiance of men saying, "by
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
permission.
34
defying the patriarchal rule, not only of her husband but of her father as well"
well” (291). This
is certainly true, but Gonzalez fails to recognize that Fortunata is also escaping from her
is
eleven sisters, and abandoning them at their communal wedding. Fortunata is the only
one of the sisters who is not "divorced"
“divorced” from her husband, because she escapes before the
marriage ever occurs. Gonzalez claims that "by
“by identifying only with women, women
marriage-ever
will be able to discover their own true nature, as opposed to the male-defined roles and
centuries” (290-291). Clearly, however,
behaviour patterns imposed on them for centuries"
Fortunata does not possess an unproblematic relationship with her sisters, and womanwoman relationships in the novel are not the utopian haven that Gonzalez exalts.
Many different variants of the traditional tale depict disagreements between the
oldest and youngest sisters. For example, in Andrew Lang's
Lang’s version, the youngest of the
twelve dancing princesses, whose name is Lina, becomes suspicious that she and her
sisters are being followed: 'There
“‘There is somebody behind me,'
me,’ cried the princess; 'they
‘they are
holding my dress.'
You foolish thing,'
dress.’ ‘You
thing,’ said her eldest sister, 'you
‘you are always afraid of
something. It is only a nail which caught you'"
you’” (5). It might be argued that in the
traditional versions of
o f the tale the princesses are betrayed, not by the prince, but by the
eldest sister's
sister’s failure to acknowledge the warnings of her siblings. Winterson's
Winterson’s version of
the tale also contains a kind of antagonism between the eldest and youngest sisters. When
“they
Jordan enquires after the youngest princess at the house where the others live, "they
looked at one another, then the eldest said, 'Our
‘Our youngest sister is not here. She never
came to live with us'"
us’” (SC 55). The sisters seem almost to have forgotten about
Fortunata's
Fortunata’s existence, but once reminded of her the eldest predicts that "she
“she must be old
now, she must be stiff. Her body can only be a memory. The body she has will not be the
permission.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
35
had” (SC 55). This revelation is surprising considering the eldest princess's
princess’s
body she had"
“For some
some years I did not hear from my sisters, and then, by a strange
earlier statement: "For
eventuality, I discovered that we had all, in one way or another, parted from the glorious
tastes” (SC 44). The eldest sister
princes and were living scattered, according to our tastes"
appears to be omitting Fortunata, since we know that Fortunata had never married a
glorious prince in the first place. The eldest sister is not referring to all of her siblings
here, indicating that she either wishes to deceive Jordan, or simply no longer considers
Fortunata to be her sister.
Fortunata explains that after they were discovered, the princesses were forced to
marry twelve princes: "We
“We decided to build a church in our garden. We built it out of the
ice, and it cut our hands and the blood stained the snow like the wild red roses in the
hedges"
hedges” (SC 95). The princesses build the church together as if preparing for a sacrifice.
Fortunata describes the wedding day as follows: "It
“It was the winter of our marriage, my
sisters and I. We were to be married all together, all twelve of us on the same day. On
New Year's
Year’s Day, in blood-red dresses with our black hair"
hair” (SC 95). This statement
almost sounds as if the princesses will be married to each other "all
“all together, all twelve of
us"
us” rather than to twelve princes. Moreover, by being married simultaneously in the
church they constructed together, the princesses are ceremonially joined to one another.
Thus, Fortunata's
Fortunata’s departure from the ceremony of marriage is a refusal to share in the
sisters’ sacrificial suffering.
sisters'
Problematic relationships between women are also evident in the story of the fifth
princess, who reveals herself to be the witch who imprisons Rapunzel in the tower. Joyce
Thomas describes the tower from the Grimms'
Grimms’ "Rapunzel"
“Rapunzel” tale as follows: "the
“the tower's
tower’s
permission.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
36
rigid structure rises like an old clock, devoid of hands, permanently fixed at some past
hour denoting Rapunzel's
Rapunzel’s girlhood. It is essentially a life-denying fixture whose
architecture leads nowhere"
nowhere” (180). However, in Winterson's
Winterson’s version of this tale, the
tower is a fantastic female space associated with the love between two women. The
princess initially speaks in the voice of
o f a detached narrator, and refers to Rapunzel and
"an
“an older woman"
woman” (SC 47). She says that the townspeople "vilified
“vilified the couple, calling
one a witch and other a little girl. Not content with names, they ceaselessly tried to break
into the tower, so much so that the happy pair had to seal up any entrance that was not on
sky” (SC 47). Winterson's
Winterson’s tower is like the one in the canonical version
a level with the sky"
o f the tale in one sense; specifically, in that it is meant to exclude men. However,
of
Winterson revises the tale in that Rapunzel and the witch fall in love. Gonzalez sees this
“the chief way out of women's
women’s apparent
and other lesbian relationships in the novel as "the
men” (289). However, this relationship does not free either woman from
dependence on men"
men’s control.
men's
In Winterson's
Winterson’s "Rapunzel,"
“Rapunzel,” the witch is thrown out of her tower and blinded by
the prince, while in the Grimms'
Grimms’ version, it is the prince who falls from the tower.
Nonetheless, Rapunzel and the prince still live happily ever after in Winterson's
Winterson’s revision
of the tale: "After
“After that [Rapunzel and the prince] lived happily ever after, of course"
course” (SC
47). At this point in the tale, the princess assumes a first person style of narration, admits
“As for
that she herself is the older woman or the witch who loved Rapunzel, and says, "As
me, my body healed, though my eyes never did and eventually I was found by my sisters"
sisters”
(SC 47). It may be tempting to view Winterson's
Winterson’s revision as disputing the compulsory
heterosexuality of the traditional version by creating a lesbian relationship between
permission.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
37
Rapunzel and the witch, but it cannot be ignored that heterosexuality prevails in the end.
Why has Winterson not taken the opportunity to address the fact that the tale ends in the
marriage between Rapunzel and the prince? It is because Winterson does not fall into the
trap of some feminists'
feminists’ tendency to see woman-woman relationships as unproblematic
and utopian. Thus, in Winterson's
Winterson’s rendition of
o f the tale, Rapunzel's
Rapunzel’s abandonment of the
witch is a betrayal which ends their homosexual relationship.
On one of his journeys, Jordan finds himself with Zillah, a young girl who has
been locked in a doorless tower: "I
“I asked her what it was that kept her here. 'It
‘It is myself,'
myself,’
‘Only myself.'
myself.’ It was then I realized the room had no door"
door” (SC 33). Jordan
she said. 'Only
Zillah’s story:
later learns Zillah's
A young girl caught incestuously with her sister was condemned to build her own
death tower. To prolong her life she built it as high as she could, winding round and
round with the stones in an endless stairway. When there were no stones left she
sealed the room and the village, driven mad by her death cries, evacuated to a faroff spot where no one could hear her. (SC 34)
This fantastic episode may be read as showing that patriarchy punishes Zillah for her
non-normative behaviour by forcing the imprisonment. In Contemporary Women's
Fiction: Narrative Practice and Feminist Theory, Paulina claims that "Sisterhood
“Sisterhood and
women's
women’s community are generally regarded by feminists as providing both a refugefrom
from
and a challenge to the oppressive facets of a patriarchal society"
society” (126). However, this
episode with Zillah is certainly not a utopian conceptualization of sisterhood. Zillah is a
repelling figure, and Jordan throws himself out of the tower to escape the smell of her
breath "like
“like cheese in muslin"
muslin” (SC 33).
permission.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
38
In addition to those of Rapunzel and Zillah, there are several other oppressive
relationships between women in the novel. For example, another of the twelve dancing
princesses tells Jordan that she and her husband had lived alone in a castle for eighteen
“and saw no-one
no one but each other. Then someone found us and then it was too late.
years "and
The man I had married was a woman. They came to burn
bum her. I killed her with a single
blow to the head before they reached the gates, and fled that place"
place” (SC 50). In reference
to this episode, Gonzalez notes that only one of the twelve dancing princesses is happy in
her marriage and that it because the princess's
princess’s husband happens to be a woman.
“describes the only successful love/sex relationship
According to Gonzalez, this episode "describes
portrayed in Sexing the Cherry: a lesbian relationship"
relationship” (289). This is a problematic
statement primarily because it is difficult to know why the princess feels it necessary to
kill her lover. Moreover, Gonzalez ignores the relationship between the third princess's
princess’s
husband and his male lover. This is a loving relationship that must be seen to be at least
as successful as the one Gonzalez refers to, though it, too, ends in tragedy, this time
because the princess herself kills both men out of
o f jjealousy.
ealousy.
Jordan tells us that Fortunata possesses the knowledge of how to escape the
confines of one's
one’s body: "She
“She believes that we are fallen creatures who once knew how to
fly. She says that light burns
bums in our bodies and threatens to dissolve us at any moment
m om ent...
...
To her dancers she says, 'Through the body, the body is conquered"
conquered’” (SC 69 sic). Jordan
tells us about how she transforms her dancers: "Most,
“Most, she releases like butterflies over a
flowering world. Bodies that could have bent double and grown numb she maintains as
metal in a fiery furnace, tempering, stretching, forcing sinews into impossible shapes and
calling her art nature"
nature” (SC 69). Here, we can see Winterson making a connection between
permission.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
39
transformation, love, and the function of a mother. Fortunata's
Fortunata’s metaphors of
the ideas of transformation;
forcing of sinews and a fiery furnace are violent ones that oddly evoke a mother's
mother’s
womb.2
womb.2 Jordan gives Fortunata his medallion with the inscription from the book of
“Remember the rock from whence ye are hewn and the pit from whence ye are
Isaiah: "Remember
digged” (SC 101).
101). She responds by laughing and says, "What
“What about your wings? . . .. How
digged"
blades?” (SC101).
(SC 101).
can you forget those when the stumps are still deep in your shoulder blades?"
Fortunata's
Fortunata’s fantastic transformations have a double nature. On the one hand, this fantastic
escape from the body constitutes a kind of
o f freedom, yet on the other hand, it involves the
dissolution of the body and seems to be associated with a rejection of humanity
altogether.
Near the end of the novel, Winterson introduces the twentieth-century reincarnation
of
o f the Dog-Woman. In this woman's
woman’s narrative, patriarchal oppression is associated with
the fantastic. This nameless ecologist imagines her father's
father’s house
as a shell to contain me. An environment suitable for a fantastic creature who
needed to suck in the warmth and nourishment until it was ready to shrug off the
shell and burst out. At night, in bed, I felt the whole house breathing in and out as I
did. The roof tiles, the bricks, the lagging, the plumbing, all were subject to my
rhythm. I was a monster in a carpeted egg. (SC 128)
128)
With this last image, the ecologist imagines her parents'
parents’ home, an emblem of the
patriarchal family, as a womb. This interior space is nurturing and confining, as well as
fantastic and ordinary. Winterson seems to suggest that there is no easy opposition
between the feminine fantastic and the masculine real.
22 Here,
Blake’s "The
“The Tyger"
Tyger” (1794), by imagining a furnace of
o f creation.
Winterson is referencing Blake's
permission.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
40
The ecologist also questions the nature of what is real or possible,
possible. She complains
“all want to be heroes and all
nil we want
Want is for them to stay home and help with
that men "all
the housework and the kids"
kids” (SC 132).
132). She also longs to escape the real world and says
that she likes to "look
“look at the stars and invent a world where there was no gravity, no
holding force"
force” (SC 128).
128). She seems to say that women are entrapped in the real, and held
“holding forces."
forces.” In her imaginary conversation with
by the forces of gravity and other "holding
the "men
“men in suits"
suits” who are responsible for polluting the river, she says, "I
“I listen carefully
while they tell me with all the patience of a mother to a defective child that if we don't
don’t
have enough force to blow up the world fifty times over, we're
we’re not safe. If we do, we are"
are”
(SC 126).
126). Though she longs to escape the real world and its laws, she also cares about it.
For her, these men are a violent threat to the real world. The ecologist views them as
being trapped in a horrible fantasy and detached from the implications of the real facts
that she collects from the polluted river.
Rosemary Jackson believes that fantasy is only truly subversive and transgressive
when it attempts to "remain
“remain 'open',
‘open’, dissatisfied, endlessly desiring"
desiring” (9). Winterson does
use the fantastic to express women's
women’s experiences, but her fantasy never presents an
entirely successful resistance to the hetero-normative. Though Winterson creates many
fantastic feminine realms in Sexing the Cherry, these are often fragile, impermanent,
threatening or otherwise problematic. Winterson's
Winterson’s refusal to create a fantastic utopia may
“goodness, stability, [and] order
be the ultimate subversion of the rational world in which "goodness,
prevail” (Jackson 174).
174). She shows that even fantasy is not enough to
will eventually prevail"
women’s lives perfect. Jackson writes that truly fantastic works represent
make women's
"dissatisfaction
“dissatisfaction and frustration with a cultural order which deflects or defeats desire, yet
permission.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
41
refuse to have recourse to compensatory, transcendental other-worlds"
other-worlds” (180). According
to
to this definition, Sexing the Cherry may certainly be named a truly fantastic work.
permission.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
42
DANGEROUS WOMEN: QUESTIONING RESPETCTABLE IMAGES OF
WOMEN IN THE PASSION
Critics of The Passion have often approached the novel from feminist or lesbianfeminist perspectives. For Maria del Mar Asensio, "Winterson
“Winterson presents the patriarchal
world of Henri, with Napoleon as his father figure, as the male side of the world of her
criticism” (275). Paulina Palmer takes a
novel, and, consequently, as the butt of her criticism"
similar approach in her essay "The
“The Passion: Storytelling, Fantasy, Desire"
Desire” (1998), in
which she claims that the novel is a study of lesbian love (104). She sees Villanelle as a
figure of lesbian and transgessive
transgressive sexuality that exceeds "the
“the conventional model of
woman as commodity and object of exchange endorsed by phallogocentric culture"
culture”
(115). According to Palmer, Villanelle's
Villanelle’s role in the text is to take over Henri's
Henri’s narrative
in order to create a "lesbian
“lesbian narrative space"
space” (106). However, I will argue that Winterson
also criticizes the female characters in the novel, while Henri evokes the most sympathy
from the reader. Both Palmer and Asensio are concerned with the ways that Winterson's
Winterson’s
female characters do not fit into traditional gender categories. They both see Winterson as
working, partly through her use of the fantastic, to subvert gender categories in order to
give power and agency to female characters and to criticize the "male
“male side of the world of
the novel."
novel.” However, in my view Winterson uses many of the fantastic elements in The
Passion to question what Sara Martin terms the "'respectable'
“‘respectable’ image of woman built by
feminism"
feminism” (208). Women are not always positive figures in this novel; they are often
manipulative and violent.
The novel has two narrators: Henri, a French soldier, whose job is to kill chickens
for Napoleon's
Napoleon’s meals; and Villanelle, a mysterious Venetian woman who has webbed
permission.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
43
feet and eventually becomes a prostitute for the French army.-It
army. It begins with Henri's
Henri’s
narration of his life in France before joining
joiningthe army. The first fantastic element to
appear in the novel is Henri's
Henri’s mother's_religious
mother’s religious devotion to the figures of the Virgin and
Christ. Henri describes Georgette, his mother, as if she were a saint: "When
“When she was
twelve she told them that she wanted to be a nun, but they disliked excess and assured her
that marriage would be more fulfilling. She grew in secret, away from their eyes"
10).
eyes” (P 10).
This passage suggests that Henri's
Henri’s mother's
mother’s religious feeling makes her not just
figuratively excessive, but literally bigger than those around her. That she "grew
“grew in
secret"
secret” without anyone's
anyone’s knowledge suggests that she is larger than she ought to be. From
a feminist perspective, this introduction to Georgette suggests that she is fantastically
incompatible with the patriarchal world of her family. However, as we shall see,
Winterson later problematizes such a view.
Henri tells us that after leaving her family in order to become a nun, Georgette was
forced to accept the hospitality of the first man who would take her in: "Quite
“Quite without
fear, because she believed in the power of the Virgin, my mother presented herself to
Claude (my father) and asked to be taken to the nearest convent"
convent” (P
( P 12).
12). Palmer claims
that this "enforced
“enforced marriage"
marriage” represents compulsory heterosexuality (Lesbian 80).
However, there is nothing forceful about the way that Claude proposes to Georgette. In
fact, she is faced with a lack of options, not only
only because of male power, but also because
of women: "She
“She couldn't
couldn’t go home. She couldn't
couldn’t go to a convent so long as her father was
bribing every Mother Superior with a mind to a new altar piece"
piece” (P 12).
12). Even the nuns in
the convents obstruct her plans to fulfill her calling, having their own interests to protect.
Nonetheless, Georgette's
Georgette’s marriage does not represent a failure or a yielding of power, but
permission.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
44
a victorious sacrifice which has its own rewards. For example, during the time she spends
,with
.with Claude, she acquires remarkable abilities: "Three
“Three months went by and she
discovered that she had a way with plants and that she could quiet frightened animals"
animals” (P
11).
11). Georgette's
Georgette’s hetero-normative relationship with Claude is not oppressive; rather, it
awakens new and fantastic power in her.
Henri frequently associates women with the fantastic. When he begins to long for
his mother, he says, "Here,
“Here, without women, with only our imaginations and a handful of
can’t remember what it is about women that can turn a man through passion
whores, we can't
into something holy"
holy” (P 29). Through this overly idealistic description of women,
Winterson seems to mock Henri's
Henri’s naiveté.
naivete. His perception of women is made more
ridiculous by the fact that he seems not to recognize the "handful
“handful of whores"
whores” as women.
After the war is over, Henri is struck by how differently men and women react to the
news of peace:
At least a dozen women whom I've
I’ve never met have thrown their arms around my
neck and blessed me. Most of the men are in groups of five or six, still by the
church, but the women are joining hands and making a great circle that blocks the
road and fills the space from one side of the street to the other. They start to dance,
going round and round faster and faster until my eyes are dizzy with keeping up
with them. I don't
don’t recognize their song but their voices are full. (P 48)
The women link with each other and with their fantastic movements create the magical
space of the circle, excluding the men and moving so fast that they are no longer visible.
Even their song is unrecognizable. The dance, the song and the circle all serve to exclude
the men who stand by and watch. Henri seems to suggest that the end of the war is a
permission.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
45
Henri’s
greater relief to the women, who are stereotypically peace-loving and gentle. Henri's
view of the soldiers
soldiers is very different: "To
“To survive the zero winter and that war we made a
-view
pyre of_our
ofour hearts and put them aside for ever
ever.. . .. When I say I lived with heartless men, I
correctly” (P 91). Henri's
Henri’s fantastic conceptualization of women is made to
use the word correctly"
sound idealistic and even ridiculous, while his view of the male soldiers also stereotypes
soundidealistic
o f emotion.
them as being bereft of
When Henri speaks of
o f women who really are fantastic, there is still a sense that he
idealizes women too much. For example, Henri is initially horrified by the army's
army’s
treatment of the prostitutes who are hired to service it, but he eventually comes to see
them as possessing fantastic power:
The vivandieres were runaways, strays, younger daughters of too-large families,
servant girls who'd
who’d got tired of giving it away to drunken masters, and fat old
dames who couldn't
couldn’t ply their trade anywhere else. On arrival they were each given
a set of underclothes and a dress that chilled their bosoms in the icy sea-salt days.
Shawls were distributed too, but any woman found covering herself on duty could
be reported and fined. (P 41) -But his pity is later transformed into admiration: "the
“the vivants were expected to service as
many men as asked them day or night. One woman I met crawling home after an officer's
officer’s
party said she'd
she’d lost count at thirty-nine. Christ lost consciousness at thirty-nine"
thirty-nine” (P
(P 41).3
41 ).3
That these women survive horrible tortures elevates them in Henri's
Henri’s mind. He is full of
admiration for the strength of women. His description of the woman who lost count at
thirty-nine suggests that he sees her suffering as being even more admirable than that of
permission.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
46
Christ, since Christ lost consciousness, whereas the woman only lost count. Henri
frequently describes women in these overly idealistic terms. In creating female characters
Henri’s stereotypes about
that are fantastically virtuous, Winterson actually subverts Henri's
women by highlighting his excessive idealism.
o f the novel, Villanelle, is a fantastic female character. Her
The other narrator of
narrative describes her life in Venice as the daughter of a boatman. She proclaims that the
boatmen are famous for possessing webbed feet, though they may never reveal them, and
explains that their wives must complete a complex ritual when they are pregnant in order
1
to ensure that their sons, but not their daughters, will have webbed feet. Villanelle's
Villanelle’s
father died before she was born,
bom, and her mother failed to put rosemary in her boat, so that
the ritual was not perfectly performed and Villanelle herself was born
bom with webbed feet—
a trait never before found in a girl. Asensio provides a useful feminist reading of this
o f the novel:
aspect of
In fact, this fairy-tale society is very much like the 'real'
‘real’ world, insofar as it is
both gender and class-specific. Boatmen constitute a hermetic guild. Their trade is
patriarchally organized for it is inherited by the son from the father. Furthermore,
their secret ways, inaccessible to any other social or sexual group, guarantee their
power and their privileged position which is biologically marked by their webbed
feet. All this explains the importance of the above-described ritual and the
subversive significance of the 'mistakes'
‘mistakes’ committed by Villanelle's
Villanelle’s mother. (269)
This interpretation of the episode seems convincing; however, there are a number of ways
in which the narrative resists this kind of simplified summarization.
33 Winterson's
Winterson’s account of the vivandieres differs from the historical facts about them. In reality,
"Vivandieres
“Vivandieres were mainly confined to garrison camps or posts, and served as a kind of post sutler, selling
permission.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
47
First, Villanelle explains that before her birth, her biological father revealed his
webbed feet to a tourist in exchange for money. The tourist was driven mad by the sight
in the same_madhouse
same madhouse to which Henri retreats after
of the feet and subsequently ended up in
seeing Villanelle's
Villanelle’s webbed feet. Significantly, this episode has erotic undertones:
The man brought up the question of the webbed feet. At the same time he drew a
purse of gold from his pocket and let it lie quietly in the bottom of the boat. Winter
was approaching, the boatman was thin and he thought what harm could it do to
unlace just one boat and let this visitor see what there was. (P 54)
The language here evokes the idea of negotiations between a prostitute and a client. If, as
Asensio suggests, the phallus is "precisely
“precisely represented in those webbed feet that only
boatmen have"
have” (269), then it is puzzling that she does not note the homoerotic
connotations of the father's
father’s revelation.
Villanelle's
Villanelle’s father disappears afterwards and is presumed dead. It is the father's
father’s
absence which makes the performance of the ritual difficult for Villanelle's
Villanelle’s mother. The
mother is not certain whether she ought to perform the ritual once her husband is dead,
and she cannot place her offerings on the grave of the most recently dead person in her
family because he is missing: "How
“How like him, she thought, to be as absent in death as he
was in life"
life” (P 55). Here, the wife derides the husband for failing to fit into his
heterosexual role as father. Thus, Villanelle's
Villanelle’s mother does not intend to subvert the
established tradition of the boatmen. It is rather the father's
father’s transgression in revealing the
boatmen's
boatmen’s secret that causes the disruption of
o f the ritual. Asensio's
Asensio’s feminist reading of
o f the
episode in which "Villanelle's
“Villanelle’s mother causes Villanelle to subvert tradition"
tradition” (269) is
problematic because the father's
father’s actions can be said to have more subversive significance
food and drink to the troops"
troops” (Hughes).
permission.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
48
Villanelle’s mother. It seems clear that the father's
father’s homoerotic transgression
than those of Villanelle's
is the cause of
o f his daughter's
daughter’s abnormality. In a sense, it is he who subversively bestows
is
the webbed feet on Villanelle.
Importantly, Villanelle's
Villanelle’s mother and the midwife are repelled by the webbed feet
and immediately try to do away with them:
The midwife tried to make an incision in the translucent triangle between my first
two toes but her knife sprang from the skin leaving no mark. She tried again and
again in between all the toes on each foot. She bent the point of the knife, but that
was all. 'It's
‘It’s the Virgin's
Virgin’s will,'
will,’ she said at last. (P 56)
Villanelle's
Villanelle’s stepfather comforts the mother saying, "No
“No one will see so long as she wears
shoes and when it comes to a husband, why it won't
won’t be the feet he'll
he’ll be interested in"
in” (P
56). Importantly, the stepfather is the most accepting of
o f Villanelle's
Villanelle’s unfeminine
deformity. It is the women who resist this subversion of tradition, fearing that Villanelle
will be unmarriageable, whereas male transgression is the cause of this fantastic
deformity and a male character teaches the women to accept it. Clearly, Winterson is not
only criticizing the "male
“male world"
world” of the novel, but also the female one represented by
Villanelle's
Villanelle’s mother and the midwife.
Much of Villanelle's
Villanelle’s narrative takes place in the fantastic city of Venice and critics
have devoted much attention to the function of this city in The Passion. Palmer has
suggested that some of
o f the fantastic qualities of Winterson's
Winterson’s Venice associate the city
with femininity: "The
“The shifting perspectives which she ascribes to the city, along with the
connections it displays with water, relate it to femininity"
femininity” (Passion 113).
113). Similarly, M.
Daphne Kutzer sees a connection between femininity and Venice in the novel: "Venice
“Venice
permission.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
49
becomes an evocative symbol of [female] passion. It is a city of canals, water, reflections,
beauty, and mystery. It
If shifts constantly and is built seemingly on nothing, but has
endured for centuries. Not only has it endured, but it has outlasted and outwitted any
number of emperors, armies and governments"
governments” (139). Interestingly, both critics also see
the novel working to destabilize gender binaries. Kutzer finds the novel daring in its
"recognition
“recognition that gender is a construct"
construct” (139), whereas Palmer writes that Winterson is
engaged in "deconstructing
“deconstructing conventions of sexual difference"
difference” (Passion 103).
103). On the one
hand these critics express the desire to eradicate oppressive gender binaries and, we must
assume, the associated conventions of femininity; on the other, they desire to read
traditionally feminine qualities in the city of Venice. This sort of contradictory reading
seems to stem from a feminist tendency towards an interpretation treats women in an
overly idealistic manner.
Such idealism is evident when Palmer writes, "Winterson
“Winterson describes Venice as
assuming, on occasion, an insubstantial, visionary appearance. Her depiction of 'this
‘this
mercurial city'
city’ as a utopian realm where 'the
‘the laws of the real world are suspended'
suspended’ and
`all
‘all things seem possible'
possible’ relates it to systems of a similarly utopian kind envisaged by
feminist philosophers"
philosophers” (Passion 114).
114). She defends this kind of utopia by claiming that
"We
“We need utopian visions"
visions” (Passion 114).
114). However, it is important to note that though
the vision of Venice in The Passion certainly suggests this kind of utopia, it
simultaneously resists the label. As Asensio's
Asensio’s description of the patriarchal society of the
boatmen has already suggested, there are many ways in which Venice is not utopian.
Venice cannot be called a utopia since the laws of the real world are not suspended; this
is made apparent when Henri is convicted for murdering Villanelle's
Villanelle’s husband. In the city
permission.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
50
of disguises, it is surprising that Villanelle is not able to save Henri
Henri from being caught,
but she predicts that there will be no escape-from
from the law when she says, "The
“The authorities
will come here"
here” (P
( P 148).
148). Indeed, there are
are suggestions that these authorities are boatmen
themselves:
They came early, as early as the vegetable boats on their way to market. They
came without warning. Three of
o f them, in a shiny black boat with a flag.
Questioning they said, nothing more. Did Villanelle know her husband was dead?
What happened after she and I left the Casino so hurriedly? (P 150)
150)
Though Villanelle can walk on water, some things are impossible even for her in Venice,
and the patriarchal institution of the law has force even here. Neither Villanelle nor Henri
question this institution; rather, they seem to acknowledge that they have committed a
crime.
Villanelle does not speak of
o f Venice as a particularly utopian space: "we've
“we’ve more
or less abandoned ourselves to pleasure . . .. We became an enchanted island for the mad,
the rich, the bored, the perverted"
perverted” (P 56-7). Sometimes, she describes the city as a kind of
hell:
Surrounded by water with watery alleys that do for streets and roads and silted up
back ways that only the rats can cross. Miss your way, which is easy to do, and
you may find yourself staring at a hundred eyes guarding a filthy palace of
o f sacks
and bones. Find your way, which is easy to do, and you may meet an old woman
in a doorway. (P 53)
Indeed, as we shall see, Venice is often an unsafe place for women.
permission.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
51
Villanelle's
Villanelle’s narrative details her employment in a Venetian casino: "I
“I dressed as a
boy because that's
that’s what the visitors liked to see. It was part of the game, trying to decide
which sex was hidden behind tight breeches and extravagant face paint"
paint” (P 59). In
Venice, cross-dressing is a way in which people indulge their fantasies of gender
confusion. As Villanelle says, "There
“There are women of every kind and not all of them are
women"
women” (P 63). Many critics have interpreted Villanelle's
Villanelle’s cross-dressing as a means of
deconstructing the idea of
o f a natural gender. For example, Palmer claims that the crossdressing "draws
“draws attention to the inauthenticity of all gender roles, foregrounding their
dimension” (Passion 112),
112), while Laura Doan notes that cross-dressing
performative dimension"
"manoeuvres
“manoeuvres the dresser into a position of power, not only the power of knowledge and
the ability to control perception but also, and more important, the power and freedom to
choice” (148).
choose and play with choice"
Yet while Villanelle's
Villanelle’s cross-dressing does offer her a certain amount of power,
there is also a sense in which it makes her powerless. Her indecision about whether or not
to reveal her sex to the Queen of spades arises from the fact that she doesn't
doesn’t know
whether the Queen is able to see through her disguise or not, showing that she actually
doesn't
doesn’t control others'
others’ perceptions of her. Indeed, Villanelle anxiously wonders, "what
“what
was it about me that interested her?"
her?” (P 71). In the end, when Villanelle finally confesses
her secret, the Queen is not at all surprised, and appears to have known all along. This
response erodes even more of Villanelle's
Villanelle’s power, since Villanelle had been sure that her
disguise was convincing. The moment that Villanelle reveals that she is a woman is also
the moment when her love affair with the Queen of spades really begins. It is as if the
fantasy created by the disguise inhibits their ability to unite.
permission.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
52
The visitors to the casino see that Villanelle is dressed as a boy, but the hint of the
“I wore ...
... a pirate's
pirate’s shirt that
thaf
female beneath her costume tantalizes them. She recalls, "I
concealed my breasts. This was required, but the moustache I added was for my own
amusement. And perhaps for my own protection. There are too many dark alleys and too
many drunken hands on festival nights"
nights” (P 60). Here we learn that at the festival women
are particularly at risk if they expose their femininity. In this feminine city, femininity
simultaneously represents both power and vulnerability. Interestingly, the man whom
“my
Villanelle eventually marries was also quickly able to discern that she is a woman: "my
I’m a woman, has asked me to marry him. He has
flabby friend, who has decided I'm
promised to keep me in luxury and all kinds of fancy goods, provided I go on dressing as
a young man in the comfort of our own home. He likes that"
that” (P 68-9). This villain, who
rapes Villanelle before their marriage and frequently beats her, is attracted to her crossdressing. Villanelle's
Villanelle’s drag, rather than mocking the notion of a stable gender identity,
appears to make her "true"
“true” gender even more obvious to this man. Since we know that he
has decided Villanelle is a woman, his attraction to her is heterosexual. Thus, Villanelle's
Villanelle’s
disguise makes her uncertain about what the Queen may know or like about her, and
makes her a victim to a patriarchal villain. In these respects, cross-dressing is far from
empowering for Villanelle.
Winterson further problematizes any attempt to read Villanelle's
Villanelle’s cross-dressing as
a subversion of
o f gender by the way that Villanelle acquires one of her costumes: the
soldier's
soldier’s uniform. The soldier offers her a purse of gold if she can defeat him at billiards:
"there
“there must be some of
o f my father's
father’s blood in me because I have never been able to resist a
purse. And if I lost? I was to make him a present of my purse. There was no mistaking his
permission.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
53
meaning” (P 75). Villanelle loses the game of billiards and pays the soldier with a sexual
meaning"
favour: "he
“he was a man who liked-his
liked his women face down, arms outstretched like the
crucified Christ. He was able and easy and soon fell asleep. He was also about my height.
rest” (P 76). The subversive power of
I left him his shirt and boots and took the rest"
Villanelle’s cross-dressing is somewhat diminished by the fact that she must prostitute
Villanelle's
herself in this way in order to acquire the costume. She must perform this submissive
heterosexual role before she can undertake to perform a new sexual identity with the aid
of the costume. Though cross-dressing is freeing in some respects, it is actually quite
oppressive in others.
Villanelle describes being in love with the Queen of spades as being in a fantastic
and unknown space. While musing on her intense emotions for the Queen she says, "How
“How
is it that one day life is orderly and you are content, a little cynical perhaps but on the
whole just so, and then without warning you find that the solid floor is a trapdoor and you
are now in another place whose geography and whose customs are strange?"
strange?” (P 74). This
is an interesting comment coming from one so at home in ever-shifting Venice with its
strange geography and customs. The fantastic nature of Villanelle's
Villanelle’s relationship with the
Queen is contrasted to the banality of the Queen's
Queen’s relationship to her husband. Villanelle
is jealous of
o f this nameless man: "He
“He kissed her forehead and she smiled. I watched them
together and saw more in a moment than I could have pondered in another year. They did
not live in the fiery furnace she and I inhabited, but they had a calm and a way that put a
knife to my heart"
heart” (P 82). Palmer analyzes this episode in the following way:
wife’s forehead, affirming his ownership of her and
He plants a kiss on his wife's
signalling the control which he exerts on her life. This episode illustrates the
permission.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
54
constraints which a phallogocentric economy imposes on women's
women’s lives,
betweenthem by curtailing their sexual
separating and inhibiting relationships between—them
and social freedom. (Passion 105)
105)
Palmer, however, is ignoring what we already know about the Queen of spades: "She
“She had
married late in life, had not expected to marry at all being stubborn and of
o f independent
means . . .. He was a quiet and cultured man of whom she was fond"
fond” (P 72). The Queen is
not dependent on her husband for money; indeed, this man seems to have little influence
on her life since he is mostly concerned with his maps and books. The allusion to the
"fiery
“fiery furnace"
furnace” of
o f the Old Testament is interesting in that in the Bible story, the fiery
furnace is meant as a punishment for Shadrach, Meshach and Abed'nego
Abed’nego who refuse to
worship King Nebuchadnez'zar.
Nebuchadnez’zar. The three men survive the fire because God intercedes
for them.4
them.4 This allusion makes Villanelle's
Villanelle’s love affair seem like a horrible punishment
that only someone with great devotion could survive. Romantic or sexual passion is
equivalent to religious passion or devotion for Villanelle. She and the Queen of spades
exist in a fantastic "fiery
“fiery furnace,"
furnace,” whereas the Queen and her husband live in the real
world together, and Villanelle is jealous and hurt by the intimacy she witnesses between
‘real’ love.
the married couple and envies them for their 'real'
Villanelle's
Villanelle’s relationship with the fantastic Queen of spades does not end because
of the intercession of oppressive patriarchy, as Palmer seems to suggest. It is Villanelle
who decides to end her relationship with the Queen after seeing the exchange between the
married couple. Winterson portrays Villanelle as disappointed that the Queen will not
leave her husband: "In
“In the morning when I left I did not say I would not see her again. I
w ithout permission.
permission.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without
55
simply made no arrangement.
arrangement... . .. She loved her husband"
husband” (P 106).
106). Villanelle leaves the
o f the husband, but because of the Queen's
Queen’s love for her husband.
Queen, not because of
“strange
Villanelle seems to want a more normative, monogamous relationship without "strange
quarters” (P
( P 105).
105). Apparently, the fantasy of her relationship with
meetings in unfamiliar quarters"
the Queen is not satisfying for Villanelle as she envies the married couple their heteronormative domesticity.
The Queen of
o f spades is associated with the fantastic, but this only contributes to
make her more dangerous. Winterson's
Winterson’s fantastic feminine spaces are potentially
dangerous for women as well as men. After her return to Venice, Villanelle attempts to
o f spades. She says,
reunite with the Queen of
I don't
don’t know what madness drove me to take a house opposite hers. A house with
six storeys like hers, with long windows that let in the light and caught the sun in
pools. I paced the floors of my house, never bothering to furnish any of them,
looking in her sitting-room, her drawing room, her sewing-room and seeing not
her but a tapestry of myself when I was younger and walked like an arrogant boy.
156)
(P 156)
This passage suggests that Villanelle is under the power of some spell. The two women in
identical houses present a fantastic mirror image of female space. Moreover, each room
of Villanelle's
Villanelle’s home has a view directly into a corresponding room in the Queen of
spades's
spades’s house, so both of the houses and the women's
women’s bodies seem to have become
mirror images of
o f each other: "I
“I was beating a rug on my balcony when I finally saw her.
She saw me too and we stood like statues, each on our balconies. I dropped the rug into
44 After the three have been cast into the fire, Nebuchadnez'zar
Nebuchadnez’zar says "I
“I see four men loose, walking in the
midst of the fire, and they are not hurt; and the appearance of the fourth is like a son of the gods"
gods” (Daniel,
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
56
canal” (P 156).
156). At this point, the husband has left on a treasure quest and the Queen
the canal"
seems to want to renew the love affair with Villanelle. However, when they meet,
Villanelle becomes terrified and realizes that if she makes eye contact with the Queen,
she may lose her heart once more. The fantastic power of the Queen of spades can be
“In
menacing as well as liberating, and in the end, Villanelle feels lucky to have escaped: "In
the morning I shut up my house and never went there again"
again” (P
( P 159).
159). Villanelle is
doesn’t want to lose her heart once more, and
terrified of falling in love again because she doesn't
doesn’t want to be magically trapped in the Queen's
Queen’s tapestry. To be in the Queen's
Queen’s
she doesn't
possession, in her fantastic space, is also to be trapped. Winterson seems to be saying that
there can also be an imbalance of power in relationships between women.
Villanelle is a fantastic character not only because of her incongruous part-human
and part-animal body, but also because of certain incongruities in her decisions. Palmer
writes of Villanelle,
Though engaging in sexual relations with men, she seldom does so from choice
but, like Henri's
Henri’s mother and the prostitutes whom he encounters, is motivated by
social and economic pressures. Her marriage to the physically repulsive 'rich
‘rich man
with fat fingers'
fingers’ whose hands, she recollects with disgust, 'crept
‘crept over her body
like crabs,'
crabs,’ is an act of pragmatism which she performs in order to escape from
Venice, and environment which has become intolerable to her on account of the
termination of
o f her love affair with the Queen of Spades. (Passion 104)
104)
Palmer does not mention that this man is the same one who raped Villanelle earlier. It is
true that at first Villanelle seems to minimize the importance of this rape saying, "He
“He
started to laugh and coming towards me squashed me flat against the wall. It was like
3.24)
permission.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
57
being under a pile of fish. I didn't
didn’t try to move, he was twice my weight at least and I'm
I’m
I’d nothing to lose either, having lost it already in happier times. He left a
no heroine. I'd
goodbye” (P 70). However, her calm
stain on my shirt and threw a coin at me by way of goodbye"
tone actually serves to emphasize its horror. That Villanelle marries this man soon after
the rape indicates that she is motivated by more than "social
“social and economic pressures"
pressures” or
"pragmatism"
“pragmatism” and that she is making a conscious choice to punish herself. Certainly this
“the one and only intense sexual
episode suggests that Palmer is mistaken in saying that "the
involvement she experiences is the relationship which she forms with the Queen of
Spades"
Spades” (Passion 104).
104).
Indeed, it can also be argued that Villanelle is not averse to masochistic
heterosexual relationships. While contemplating the idea of a male God, Villanelle says,
What a wonder, joining yourself to God, pitting your wits against him, knowing that
you win and lose simultaneously. Where else could you indulge without fear the
exquisite masochism of the victim? Lie beneath his lances and close your eyes.
Where else could you be so in control? Not in love, certainly. His need for you is
greater than your need for him because he knows the consequences of not
possessing you, whereas you, who know nothing, can throw your can in the air and
live another day. You paddle in the water and he never crosses your mind, but he is
busy recording the precise force of the flood around your ankles. (P 79-80)
As Palmer has noted, sexual relationships in The Passion are often described religious
terms. It is therefore not amiss to consider Villanelle's
Villanelle’s relationship with God to be a kind
of heterosexual love affair in which domination and submission play an important role.
Villanelle thinks of God as a man and enjoys the idea of being his victim and the control
permission.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
58
she feels in being certain of his love for her. This passage is deeply problematic for any
reading which endeavours to label Villanelle as purely lesbian in her desires.
In perhaps the most fantastic scene in the novel, Villanelle
ViHanelle requests Henri to go into
- find her heart in the Queen's
Queen’s house. He asks, "flow
“How will I find your heart? This house is
six storeys,"
storeys,” to which she replies, "Listen
“Listen for it beating and look in unlikely places. If
there's
there’s danger, you'll
you’ll hear me cry like a seagull over the water and you must hurry back"
back”
(P 131).
131). Though Henri doesn't
doesn’t believe that Villanelle can literally have given her heart to
the Queen of spades, he does as he is asked and goes to look for it. After searching
throughout many mysterious rooms, he enters a large closet "racked
“racked with dresses of every
kind, smelling of musk and incense. A woman's
woman’s room. Here, I felt no fear. I wanted to
bury my face in the clothes and lie on the floor with the smell about me"
me” (P 132).
132). It is in
this room, however, where Henri is in the greatest danger. In this room he eventually
discovers Villanelle's
Villanelle’s heart:
On my hands and knees I crawled under one of the clothes rails and found a silk
shift wrapped round an indigo jar. The jar was throbbing. I did not dare unstopper it.
I did not dare to check this valuable, fabulous thing and I carried it, still in the shift,
down the last two floors, and out into the empty night. (P 132)
132)
On his journey through the house, he had noticed an unfinished tapestry depicting
Villanelle. When he tells her about it after returning her heart to her, she explains that "if
“if
the tapestry had been finished and the woman had woven in her heart, she would have
been a prisoner for ever"
ever” (P 133).
133). Palmer explains this episode in the following way:
"[Villanelle]
“[Villanelle] manipulates him into retrieving her heart from the possession of the Queen
of Spades who holds it in thrall. Thus, instead of allowing him to co-opt her into
permission.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
59
hers” (Passion
becoming an actor in his drama, she induced him to perform a part in hers"
105). She then draws on Marilyn R. Farwell's
Farwell’s ideas about lesbian narrative, noting that
-105).
“the insertion of
o f lesbian subject or relationship into the text has the effect of disrupting
"the
scripts” (Passion 105).
105). However, this
conventional heterosexual narrative structures and scripts"
fantastic episode seems to adhere to a heterosexual script. It cannot be denied that Henri
rescues Villanelle, and it is also he who narrates the episode. The episode resembles a
fairy-tale in which a young man must undertake an impossible task in order to please a
princess and Henri assumes the role of hero. Villanelle cannot retrieve her own heart and
says, "I'm
“I’m afraid to go in in case I can't
can’t bring myself to leave again"
again” (P
(.P 128).
128). Villanelle's
Villanelle’s
entrapment by the Queen of spades is perhaps even more life-threatening than her
entrapment by her husband and it is Henri who, playing the traditional male protagonist,
must rescue her from both.
“By portraying herself not as the object of Henri's
Henri’s love but as
Palmer asserts that "By
the lover of the Queen of
o f Spades, [Villanelle] successfully repositions herself in the
narrative in the role of
o f active agent"
agent” (Passion 105).
105). Moreover, with the entry of
Henri’s role in the narrative "diminishes
“diminishes in importance and his
Villanelle into the text, Henri's
declines” (Passion 105).
105). Palmer and Farwell see Villanelle's
Villanelle’s refusal to
agency declines"
reciprocate Henri's
Henri’s love for her and her manipulation of him as evidence of Villanelle's
Villanelle’s
o f patriarchy. These critics ignore the ways that Villanelle's
Villanelle’s
successful subversion of
treatment of Henri is portrayed as cruel and unjustified and hardly an ethical model that
feminism might approve of.
Villanelle’s husband in order to save her, and in their
Henri eventually kills Villanelle's
?
escape Villanelle reveals her webbed feet and walks on water to push their boat to safety.
permission.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
60
These fantastic webbed feet save Henri and Villanelle only temporarily. The murder and
Villanelle’s subsequent refusal to
to marry him drive Henri mad, the Venetian authorities
Villanelle's
confesses his crime. He is eventually locked in an insane asylum and
arrest him, and he Confesses
Villanelle cannot persuade him to run away to France again. The asylum becomes a
fantastic place for Henri, where he is able to hear the voices of the dead speaking to him,
and where he eventually comes to feel safe. So, Henri's
Henri’s exposure to the feminine
fantastic has been anything but liberating for him for it has left him confined in the insane
asylum and his narrative beyond this point seems infected with incoherence.
Indeed, Villanelle treats Henri in a way that is very similar to how the Queen of
spades has treated her. Palmer passes over the sexual relationship that Villanelle initiates
with Henri, claiming that it "is
“is an isolated event which, either despite or because of the
fact that he has fallen in love with her, she seldom permits to be repeated"
repeated” (Passion
{Passion 104).
104).
However, this relationship is comprised of more than one sexual encounter; indeed,
Villanelle eventually gives birth to a daughter fathered by Henri. Villanelle describes
visiting Henri in the insane asylum:
I was still sleeping with him in those days. He had a thin boy's
boy’s body that covered
mine as light as a sheet and, because I had taught him to love me, he loved me
well. He had no notion of what men do, he had no notion of what his own body
did until I showed him. He gave me pleasure, but when I watched his face I knew
it was more than that for him. If it disturbed me I put it aside. I have learnt to take
160)
pleasure without always questioning the source. (P 160)
This last statement recalls the Queen's
Queen’s reaction when Villanelle ended their relationship:
"as
“as she got older she took what she could of life but expected little"
little” (P 106).
106). Villanelle
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
permission.
61
Henri’s passionate obsession with her, she simply put it
admits that while she knew of Henri's
aside and took her pleasure. It is impossible not to criticize Villanelle for her treatment of
Henri.
The lesbian relationship between Villanelle and the Queen is actually quite a
destructive force in the novel. However, in the conclusion to one of her essays on The
Passion, Palmer claims,
Since, in existing hetero-patriarchal culture where women are assigned the role of
object of exchange between men, lesbian love is not supposed to exist at all and,
in so doing, contradicts the Law on which this culture is based, its delineation
necessarily involves, as Castle points out, a movement into the realm of
o f utopian
{Passion 114-115)
114-115)
fantasy. (Passion
As we have seen, for Winterson, the existence of
o f lesbian love does not lead to a realm of
utopian fantasy. Winterson has surpassed the simple feminist agenda that Palmer
delineates above. For this reason, the lesbian relationship in The Passion may be seen to
be more destructive and painful than the heterosexual relationships. Fantastic
masquerading is not always empowering, and fantastic female characters are not always
virtuous alternatives.
permission.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
62
FANTASTIC FEMININE MOTIFS IN LIGHTHOUSEKEEPING
No criticism on Lighthousekeeping exists as of yet, but reviews of the novel have
been generally positive. The novel tells the story of a young girl named Silver who, after
mother’s death, becomes an apprentice to the town's
town’s lighthousekeeper, Pew.
her mother's
Throughout the novel, Pew tells Silver the history of
o f a preacher named Babel Dark.
Dark's
be seen as the novel's
Dark’s narrative is so expansive, that may
m aybe
novel’s second protagonist. As
with Sexing the Cherry and The Passion, Lighthousekeeping contains many fantastic
episodes and motifs. Silver's
Silver’s mother's
mother’s house, Miss Pinch's
Pinch’s house, the fossil cave, the
lighthouse itself, and Silver's
Silver’s cabin at the end of the novel are all fantastic places. The
novel also contains fantastic characters—unreal characters who seem to have been
borrowed from Robert Louis Stevenson's
Stevenson’s Treasure Island (1883) and The Strange Case
of
DrrJekyll
Jekyll and Mr Hyde (1886). Winterson uses these fantastic elements and episodes in
ofD
order to present an ambiguous feminist agenda. She often presents a certain feminist ideal
of
o f woman, such as that identified by Teresa de Lauretis, only to subvert it. There is no
utopian femininity in Lighthousekeeping.
Silver and her mother live in an off-balance house that is precariously situated on
a cliff and they have a dog whose front legs are longer than his back legs. Winterson may
be influenced by Stevenson's
Stevenson’s portrait of the lame pirate Long John Silver in this regard.
Stevenson writes of this character, "It
“It was something to see him wedge the foot of
o f the
crutch against a bulkhead, and, propped against it, yielding to every movement of the
ship, get on with his cooking like someone safe ashore"
ashore” (Treasure Island 74-5). Like
Long John Silver, Winterson's
Winterson’s Silver must battle with gravity. In answer to the question
"Why
“Why didn't
didn’t we move house?"
house?” Silver explains, "My
“My mother was a single parent and she
permission.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
63
o f wedlock"
wedlock” (L 4). The fantastic off-balance house is a punishment
had conceived out of
inflicted on the mother by a patriarchal society which blames her for her misfortune: "she
“she
was sent up the hill, away from the town, with the curious result that she looked down on
it"
it” (L 5). However, this last sentence also suggests that Silver's
Silver’s mother seems to take a
certain pride in
in this banishment. Indeed, the house has other advantages as well: "tossing
“tossing
pancakes was something you could do really well in our house -— the steep slope under the
oven turned the ritual of loosening and tossing into a kind of jazz. My mother danced
while she cooked because she said it helped her to keep her balance"
balance” (L 6). As with the
princesses’ floating city in which "the
“the walking turned to leaping, and
twelve dancing princesses'
leaping into dancing, so that no one bothered to go sedately where they could twist in
light” (SC 97), so this house may easily be read as symbolizing a feminist
points of light"
resistance to patriarchal oppression. Silver and her mother do not see banishment from
patriarchal society as punishment. Rather, they take pride in their position above the town
and turn their punishment into dancing.
However, there are ways in which the house resists this feminist reading. The
house is described as impractical—ridiculously so: "The
“The chairs had to be nailed to the
floor, and we were never allowed to eat spaghetti. We ate food that stuck to the plate—
shepherd's
shepherd’s pie, goulash, risotto, scrambled egg. We tried peas once—what a disaster—
and sometimes we still find them, dusty and green in the corners
comers of the room"
room” (L 3-4).
mother’s pride or enjoyment in the
Moreover, Silver does not completely share in her mother's
home. She dislikes their isolation from the rest of the world and says of her mother, "She
“She
was the one who hated going out. She was the one who couldn't
couldn’t live in the world she had
been given. She longed for me to be free, and did everything she could to make sure it
permission.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
64
never happened"
happened” (L 5). Indeed, Silver displays a longing to escape this house: "At
“At night
my mother tucked me into a hammock slung cross-wise-against
cross-wise against the slope. In the gentle
sway of the night, I dreamed Of
of a place where I wouldn't
wouldn’t be fighting gravity with my own
weight” (L 4). Here, Silver indicates that her constant struggle with the house is a
body weight"
strain, and that she would actually prefer to accept gravity. It would seem that, in this
house, she felt that her very existence—her body weight—was at odds with her world. If
she lived in the town with other people, she would be more comfortable.
Beyond its discomfort and impracticality, the house is also explicitly threatening.
Silver and her mother are obliged to climb to it with the aid of harnesses and ropes, an
awkward process eventually leading to the mother's
mother’s death:
Up she went, carrying the shopping, and pulling me behind her like an afterafter­
thought. Then some new thought must have clouded her mind, because she
suddenly stopped and half-turned, and in that moment the wind blew like a shriek,
and her own shriek was lost as she slipped. (L 6-7)
Thus, the women's
women’s existence in this house represents both a resistance to patriarchal
oppression and a fatal danger for the women who live in it. One reviewer of
Lighthousekeeping notes, "The
“The heroines of Jeanette Winterson's
Winterson’s fiction have been
fighting gravity for decades. With fantastical powers of weightlessness, walking on water
and winging their way through cyberspace, their quest is to attain a bearable lightness of
being"
being” (Sethi). It is certainly true that Winterson's
Winterson’s heroines are constantly battling gravity
in different fantastic ways, but it is important to note that they also frequently lose their
battles. In Lighthousekeeping, the feminist fight against patriarchal gravity is conceived
as being first, impractical and ridiculous and finally, even fatal.
permission.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
65
The ambiguity of Winterson's
Winterson’s feminist agenda is also evident in the fantastic
o f Miss Pinch, the schoolteacher who takes Silver in after the mother's
mother’s death. She
figure of
“coffin-shaped handbag"
handbag” (L 8). On the one hand,
is a witch-like woman who carries a "coffin-shaped
Miss Pinch appears to resist compulsory heterosexuality and prescribed gender roles for
women. She lives by herself in a house that is similar in some respects to that of Silver's
Silver’s
mother. It is isolated and hidden among the other abandoned houses on the street: "Miss
“Miss
Pinch's
Pinch’s house was boarded up too, because she said she didn't
didn’t want to attract burglars"
burglars”
(L 9). Because of
o f her house's
house’s seclusion, Miss Pinch feels that she is immune to these
probably male burglars. Miss Pinch seems like the most likely candidate to take in Silver,
but when Silver asks about it she replies "No.
“No. My house is not suitable for children"
children” (L
18).
18). Miss Pinch refuses to become an adoptive mother and instead advertises for another
guardian.
On the other hand, Miss Pinch, though a powerful and independent woman, is as
repressive and repressed as her name suggests. Her house is extremely uncomfortable:
Silver describes how Miss Pinch made a bed for her thus: "She
“She placed two kitchen chairs
o f them. Then she got an eiderdown out of
o f the
end to end, with a cushion on one of
cupboard—one of
o f those eiderdowns that have more feathers on the outside than on the
inside"
inside” (L 9). Miss Pinch also displays excessive alienation from and fear of
o f the outside
world: "Miss
“Miss Pinch was a great one for geography—even though she had never left Salts
in her whole life. The way she describes the world, you wouldn't
wouldn’t want to visit it anyway"
anyway”
16).
(L 16).
Finally, though Miss Pinch herself does not fit into any prescribed female roles,
she is also the character with the clearest and strictest ideas of the correct roles for
permission.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
66
women. Significantly, it is while Silver is under the care of Miss Pinch that she is first
assigned a gender. This happens when the townspeople ask, "Well,
“Well, what could we do
with her?"
her?” (L 16).
16). Before this point in the novel, the reader is uncertain whether Silver is
a girl or a boy.3
boy. It is Miss Pinch who makes Silver's
Silver’s gender into an issue. Silver says,
“She warned me that I shouldn't
shouldn’t be too ambitious—not suitable for Females, but that
"She
librarianship was suitable for Females. Miss Pinch always said Females, holding the word
away from her by its tail"
tail” (L 105).
105). Miss Pinch's
Pinch’s disgust seems almost to indicate that she
does not like to view herself as female, and that as a result, she doesn't
doesn’t necessarily see a
correlation between her female body and her gender. If this attitude to gender is
subversive, it is not liberating for Miss Pinch.
Silver is taken in by Pew, the fantastic lighthousekeeper: "Mr
“Mr Pew has the look of
being there forever. He is as old as a unicorn, and people are frightened of him because
he isn't
isn’t like them. Like and like go together. Likeness is liking, whatever they say about
opposites"
opposites” (L 15).
15). Winterson's
Winterson’s Pew bears a great resemblance to Blind Pew in Treasure
Island, whom Stevenson describes as follows:
He was plainly blind, for he tapped before him with a stick, and wore a great
green shade over his eyes and nose; and he was hunched, as if with age or
weakness, and wore a huge old tattered sea-cloak with a hood, that made him
appear positively deformed. I never saw in my life a more dreadful-looking
figure. He stopped a little from the inn, and raising his voice in an odd sing-song,
addressed the air in front of him. (23-24)
55 The initial ambiguity about her gender at first seems to suggest that Lighthousekeeping is taking the same
direction as Winterson's
Winterson’s novel Written on the Body (1992), which is famous among critics for its
ambiguously gendered narrator.
permission.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
67
Winterson's
Winterson’s Pew also has a frightening appearance: "His
“His shapeless hat was pulled over
o f teeth. His hands were bare and purple. Nothing else
his face. His mouth was a slot of
could be seen. He was the rough shape of human. DogJim growled. Pew grabbed him by
the scruff and threw him
him into the boat, then he motioned for me to throw in my bag and
follow"
follow” (L 19).
19). Winterson seems to have fantastically lifted Pew from Treasure Island
and placed him in her own novel in the role of a storyteller. Part of Silver's
Silver’s training in
order to become the next lighthousekeeper involves learning all of Pew's
Pew’s stories, so that
she can pass them on. Pew explains that the important part of any story is always the
woman contained in it:
Tell me the story, Pew.
What story, child?
The story of Babel Dark's
Dark’s secret.
It was a woman.
You always say that.
There's
There’s always a woman, somewhere, child; a princess, a witch, a
stepmother, a mermaid, a fairy god-mother, or one as wicked as she is beautiful,
or as beautiful as she is good.
Is that the complete list?
Then there is the woman you love.
Who's
Who’s she?
That’s another story. (L 73)
That's
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
permission.
68
This fairy-tale language is very different from Miss Pinch's
Pinch’s ideas about women, but it is
equally repressive in its attitudes towards women in that Pew lists various stereotypical
roles for women.
Pew’s stories are about a man named Babel Dark and his lover Molly. In
Many of Pew's
Babel’s life was ruined by a woman. He says that Babel's
Babel’s
these stories, Pew explains that Babel's
“starts with Samson . . .. because Samson was the strongest man in the world and a
story "starts
woman brought him down"
down” (L 27). In one sense, Pew descries Molly's
Molly’s great power in
destroying the strongest man in the world. In another sense, she is stereotyped by this
construction because it is her feminine beauty that gives her power over Babel Dark.
Molly is conventionally beautiful and alluring (her physical appearance recalls both
Villanelle and the Queen of spades): "There
“There was a pretty girl lived in Bristol and all the
town knew her for her red hair and green eyes"
eyes” (L 28).
Pew tells us that Molly was working in her father's
father’s store when she met Babel:
"Babel
“Babel Dark used to visit the shop to buy buttons and braids and soft gloves and neckties,
because I have said, haven't
haven’t I, that he was a bit of
o f a dandy?"
dandy?” (L 28). That Babel is
described as a dandy implies that there is something non-normative about his masculinity
although this is not a point in his favour. When Babel beats Molly because he is
suspicious of
o f her fidelity, Pew describes him as being womanish. Babel's
Babel’s father "took
“took
him aside and told him not to be a panicky fool, but to own up and marry the girl"
girl” (L 29).
Pew seems to blame Babel for not being man enough to trust Molly.
Winterson's
Winterson’s ambiguous feminist agenda is further emphasized by her surprising
approach to instances of male mistreatment of women in Lighthousekeeping. The first
instance is mentioned at the beginning of the novel when Silver announces,
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
permission.
69
I have no father. There's
There’s nothing unusual about that, even children who do have
fathers are often surprised to see them. My own father came out of the sea and
went back that way. He was crew on a fishing boat that harboured with us one
night when the waves were crashing like dark glass. His splintered hull shored
him for long enough to drop anchor inside my mother. (L 3)
Silver derides fathers everywhere for their neglect, and yet also seems to say that she has
no use for a father anyway. Silver explains the fact that her mother became pregnant with
“There had been no lock on her door that light when my father came to call"
call”
her, saying "There
(L 4-5). Here Silver seems to suggest that her mother might have used a lock had one
been available on the night in question. Nonetheless, Silver seems to harbour romantic
ideas about her father who "came
“came out of the sea"
sea” and paid a visit to her mother while
simultaneously considering him to be the cause of her mother's
mother’s punishment.
Silver further romanticizes her father's
father’s actions: "A
“A child born
bom of
o f chance might
imagine that Chance was its father, in the way that gods fathered children, and then
abandoned them, without a backward glance, but with one small gift. I wondered if a gift
had been left for me"
me” (L 33). Here, in a non-feminist vein, Silver is likening her father to
a god. Though she seems to blame him for his abandonment of her, she simultaneously
possesses an idealistic and highly flattering view of him. Silver's
Silver’s contradictory feelings
about her father do not present the sort of uncomplicated condemnation of the father that
one would expect if the novel were traditionally feminist.
This unorthodox feminism is also evident in Pew's
Pew’s light-hearted attitude towards
rape. He tells Silver a story in which a man approached Pew's
Pew’s mother on the beach:
permission.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
70
He did foresee a fine child born
bom within nine months of this day.
day. . . .. she was very
perplexed by that, but the fine rogue assured her that the very same thing has happened to Mary, and she had given birth to Our Lord. And after that they took a
long walk along the beach. And after that she forgot all about him. And after that,
his fortune-telling came true. (L 91; sic)
This passage is comical because of its suggestion that Pew's
Pew’s mother was ignorant of the
fact that she was being taken advantage of and that sexual intercourse with this fine rogue
might lead to a pregnancy and a child. Yet, the comical tone of this story is incongruous
given its implied subject—rape. Pew's
Pew’s mention of Mary recalls a passage from The
Passion in which Patrick describes Christ's
Christ’s conception:
women like you to treat them with respect. To ask before you touch. Now I've
I’ve
never thought it was right and proper of God to send his angel with no by your
leave and then have his way before she's
she’s even had time to comb her hair. I don't
don’t
think she ever forgave him for that. He was too hasty. So I don't
don’t blame her that
she’s so haughty now. (P 44)
she's
This passage implies that God sent his angel to rape the Virgin, since she was never given
a choice. However, Patrick, who displays the same sort of casual attitude that Pew has
regarding his mother's
mother’s implied rape, believes that if God has perpetrated an offence, it is
only the offence of
o f hastiness. These casual and even humorous descriptions of rape are
difficult to reconcile with the feminist aspects of Winterson's
Winterson’s novels unless one reads
these descriptions as ways of
o f mocking approaches to rape in which the female victim is
elevated as a result of
o f her suffering.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further
Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
permission.
Reproduced
71
71
During her time with Pew, Silver learns the story of the family ancestor
responsible for building the lighthouse at Cape Wrath—Babel Dark, named for the
biblical Tower of Babel. Babel, a fantastic figure, is a nineteenth-century clergyman
living in the town of Salts. Babel's
Babel’s role contributes to Winterson's
Winterson’s ambiguous feminist
stance in that he at first seems to be a traditional patriarchal villain, yet he remains a
this,
sympathetic character despite this.
Pew tells us that as a young man, Babel fell in love with a girl named Molly.
When she became pregnant with his child, Babel betrayed her by marrying another
woman. Babel's
Babel’s wife presents a traditionally virtuous image of woman: "His
“His new wife
was gentle, well read, unassuming, and in love with him. He was not the least in love
advantage” (L 51). Babel quickly learned to hate his
with her, but that, he felt, was an advantage"
wife and mocked the way that she struggled to bring his breakfast tray to him each
morning: "the
“the door opened, she smiled -— not at him, at the tray -— because she was
concentrating. He thought, irritably, that a tightrope walker he had seen on the docks
would have carried this tray with more grace and skill, even on a line strung between two
masts"
masts” (L 52). Babel's
Babel’s wife is trying to be a perfect and virtuous wife, even though the
breakfast is always cold once it arrives. Babel hates her inability to please him, and as a
result the reader is treated to extended passages detailing his vicious abuse:
In the bedroom, he turned her face down, one hand against her neck, the other
bringing himself stiff, then he knocked himself into her in one swift move, like a
wooden peg into the tap-hole of a barrel. His finger marks were on her neck when
he had finished. He never kissed her. (L 54)
permission.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
72
This passage appears to describe a rape, and this time the description is not comic.
Though the descriptions of Dark's
Dark’s cruelty towards his wife are extremely disturbing,
Winterson simultaneously contrives to make the reader sympathize with him. For, though
his nameless wife is virtuous, she is also dull. It is especially difficult to sympathize with
her uncomplaining submission to Dark's
Dark’s abuse. In one episode, he leaves his wife on a
bench at a fair while he spends six hours with his former lover, and she waits patiently for
him the entire time. Babel explains his abusive behaviour, saying that "[he]
“[he] began to
taunt his wife, not out of cruelty at first, but to test her, perhaps to find her"
her” (L 54).
Winterson never allows us to "find"
“find” this woman, though. She remains a faceless and
empty figure; as Babel says, she is "a
“a plain vessel who could carry things"
things” (L 56). Her
charity and generosity to the poor are the only qualities she possesses, yet it is possible to
despise her because she submits to so much mistreatment.
According to Lighthousekeeping, "some
“some say it was Dark, and the rumour that
hung about him, that led Stevenson to brood on the story of Jekyll and Hyde"
Hyde” (L 26).
Silver tells us, "The
“The Stevensons and the Darks were almost related, in fact they were
related, not through blood but through the restless longing that marks some individuals
from others"
others” (L 2). Stevenson appears as a character in Winterson's
Winterson’s novel and meets with
Babel to talk about his double life: he lives part of the year under the name Lux with
Molly, and part of the year as Babel Dark with his nameless wife in Salts. Babel explains,
"Stevenson
“Stevenson had not believed him when Dark told him that all the good in his life had
lived in Bristol with Molly. Only Lux was kind and human and whole. Dark was a
hypocrite, an adulterer and a liar"
liar” (L 187).
187). Babel tells us that Stevenson has gotten the
story wrong: "The
“The obvious equation was.
was Dark=Jekyll. Lux=-Hyde.
Lux=Hyde. The impossible truth
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further
Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
permission.
Reproduced
73
reverse” (L 187).
187). Thus, the apparently virtuous preacher is
was that in his life it was the reverse"
- actually the
the evil, violent Hyde, whereas the adulterer is the kindly Dr. Jekyll. Winterson
has re-written The Strange Case of
o f Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde so that Dark is transformed
into a monster, not by the use of chemicals but through his conflicting loyalties to the two
women. Stevenson's
Stevenson’s novel is a virtually all-male text; as Richard Dury notes, the cast of
main characters in Stevenson's
Stevenson’s novel "form
“form an exclusively male social network"
network”
Winterson’s revision with female characters is not
(Stevenson, xxxix). However, Winterson's
necessarily feminist in the sense of empowering for women. It is never made clear which
of the two women in Babel's
Babel’s life is responsible for splitting his personality nor does this
seem to matter. Babel is frightened by the images of women in his mind. He sees women
as being mysteriously connected to the ancient past, and he is terrified of women because
of this. In this way, Winterson shows that overly idealistic images of women are harmful
to men as well as to women.
Reviewers of
o f Lighthousekeeping have noted the importance of the motif of the
lighthouse as an allusion to Virginia Woolf
W oolfss To the Lighthouse (1927) mainly because
Winterson has been profoundly influenced by Woolf. In her book Art Objects, for
example, Winterson devotes a chapter to explaining Woolf
W oolfss importance. Winterson's
Winterson’s
engagement with To the Lighthouse, as with The Strange Case of
o f Dr Jekyll and Mr
M r Hyde,
contributes to her ambiguous feminist agenda. In both To the Lighthouse and
Lighthousekeeping, lighthouses represent the maternal. In her discussion of the lighthouse
as a symbol of Mrs Ramsay, Jane Goldman writes, "as
“as Mrs Ramsay gives love, stability,
and fruitfulness to her family and those in her orbit, so the female force should always
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
permission.
74
function. It serves to ameliorate or mitigate the effects of male violence, hate, and
destructiveness"
destructiveness” (60).
As Woolf
Woolf’s
Silver’s lighthouse represents
s lighthouse represents Mrs Ramsay, so Silver's
mother "When
“When we buried my mother, some of the light went out of me, and it
her own mother:
seemed proper that I should go and live in a place where all the light shone outwards and
none of it was there for us"
us” (L 24). But, as one reviewer notes, Winterson's
Winterson’s lighthouse
also represents Babel Dark: "His
“His dislocating mind is unravelling into the ether in his
double life of two marriages; one loveless, the other based on enlightening love that is
flawed by doubt, and he lives for only two months a year with his beloved Molly under
the name of Lux. Dark is a living version of the lighthouse"
lighthouse” (Sethi). Interestingly, Molly
also thinks of Babel in terms of a lighthouse: "when
“when she slept or when she was alone,
when the children were quiet, her mind spread round him like the sea. He was always
present. He was her navigation point. He was the coordinate of her position"
position” (L 102).
102).
However it is Babel's
Babel’s stability and constancy in the negative sense of his inability to
change that causes the destructive end to his relationship with Molly. Winterson's
Winterson’s
lighthouse is not entirely a female symbol opposed to male violence and destruction.
Rather, Winterson uses the image of the lighthouse to problematize this idealistic view of
a stabilizing and loving female force.
One of the recurring images in Lighthousekeeping is that of the womb as a
fantastic space. At various points in the novel the womb represents at once a feminine
utopian space and repressive confinement. On her first night in the lighthouse, Silver
"curled
“curled up to keep warm, my knees under my chin, and hands holding my toes. I was
back in the womb. Back in the safe space before the questions start"
start” (L 32). Silver seems
permission.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
75
“I
to long for the safety of this space, associating darkness with being inside the womb: "I
had been drifting through the unmarked months, turning slowly in my
m y weightless world.
It was the light that woke me; light very different to the soft silver and night-red I knew"
knew”
(L 24). Yet the darkness is reminiscent of uterine safety, and it is also associated with the
terrible memory of her mother's
mother’s death: "Sometimes
“Sometimes it took on the shapes of the things we
wanted: a pan, a bed, a book. Sometimes I saw my mother, dark and silent, falling
me” (L 20).
towards me"
The doubleness of the womb motif is made evident through Babel's
Babel’s thoughts
about Molly: 'My
‘“ My seahorse,'
seahorse,’ Molly had called him, when he swam towards her in their
bed like an ocean of drowning and longing. The sea cave and the seahorse. It was their
game. Their watery map of the world. They were at the beginning of
o f the world. A place
before the flood"
flood” (L 81). The next section of the novel, actually entitled "A
“A Place Before
the Flood,"
Flood,” describes Babel's
Babel’s discovery of
o f a fantastic cave:
The wall of the cave was made entirely of fossils. He traced out ferns and
seahorses. He found the curled-up imprint of small unknown creatures. Suddenly
everything was very still: he felt that he had disturbed some presence, arrived at a
moment not for him.
him.. . .. He pressed the tips of his fingers into the tight curl of the
fossils, feeling them like the inside of an ear, or the inside of
o f . . .. no, he wouldn't
wouldn’t
think about that. He pulled his mind away, but still his fingers moved over the
raised soft edges of this mosaic of shapes. He put his fingers to his mouth, tasted
sea and salt. He tasted the tang of
o f time. Then, for no reason at all, he felt lonely.
117)
(L 117)
permission.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
76
Winterson strongly implies that this cave resembles female genitalia; it is as if Dark has
discovered the womb of the world and is frightened by the feminine power of the earth.
Later, Charles Darwin visits the cave and upsets Dark with his notion of evolution. Dark
is forced to re-evaluate his beliefs: "He
“He had always believed in a stable-state system,
made by God, and left alone afterwards. That things might be endlessly moving and
didn’t want a broken world. He wanted something splendid
shifting was not his wish. He didn't
and glorious and constant"
constant” (L 119-20).
119-20). This episode of
o f the novel takes issue with some
feminist critiques of
o f Darwinian theory such as Charles E. Bressler's
Bressler’s statement that "in
“in
The Descent of
o f Man (1871), Darwin announces that women are of a 'characteristic
‘characteristic of
[...]
[...] a past and lower state of civilization.'
civilization.’ Such beings, he noted, are inferior to men,
who are physically, intellectually and artistically superior"
superior” (145). In Lighthousekeeping,
feminine qualities are associated with the past. Darwin comforts Dark by saying
"Nothing
“Nothing can be forgotten. Nothing can be lost. The universe itself is one vast memory
system. Look back and you will find the beginnings of the world"
world” (L 167).
167). Darwin's
Darwin’s
appearance in the novel also works to maintain a binary opposition between male and
female. It seems that the masculine is associated with this "stable-state
“stable-state system"
system” whereas
the "broken
“broken world"
world” with all its unpredictability is associated with the feminine via the
image of the cave. Though the cave is a powerful and fantastic feminine space, it is not
utopian.
The cave and its associations with mystical and powerful femininity perpetuate an
ideal of womanhood as connected to the earth. Babel's
Babel’s discovery of feminine power
causes him to be overwhelmed by fear:
permission.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
77
If the movement in him was like the movement in the world, then how would he
ever steady himself? There had to be a stable point somewhere ... Perhaps there
was no God at all. He laughed out loud. Perhaps, as he had always suspected, he
felt lonely because he was alone. He remembered his fingers in the hollow spirals
of the fossils. He remembered his fingers in her body. No, he must not remember
120)
that, not ever. He clenched his fists. (L 120)
Babel's
Babel’s repeated admonishments to himself when he begins to think of Molly's
Molly’s genitals
o f his puritanical and.inational
and-irrational self-denial. However, we
at first seem to be a symptom of
later learn that these thoughts are truly dangerous for Babel. Winterson exposes the
potential danger of such fantastic images of femininity when Babel eventually commits
suicide in an attempt to unite with this mystical force:
The man had taken off his boots and folded his clothes neatly on top of them. He
was naked and he wanted to walk slowly out to sea and never come back. There
was only one thing he would take with him, and that was the seahorse. They
would both swim back through time, to a place before the flood. (L 122)
122)
o f the cave is associated with both the patriarchal
In this way, the fantastic space of
discourse of evolutionary theory and the patriarchal concept of woman as connected to
nature and the earth. Looked at through either lens, the fantastic cave does not represent a
utopia.
The lighthouse is constructed as a fantastic space. It and Pew are fantastically
associated with one another: "There
“There were days when he seemed to have evaporated into
the spray that jetted the base of the lighthouse, and days when he was the lighthouse"
lighthouse” (L
95). However, despite its fantastic power, the lighthouse is not immune to the "real"
“real”
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
permission.
78
world. Towards the end of the novel, Silver and Pew are cast out of the lighthouse
because it is going to be mechanized and as keepers, they have become obsolete: "the
“the
Northern Lighthouse Board . . .. replied, very formally, that Mr Pew would leave on the
appointed day, and there would be no right of appeal"
appeal” (L 104).
104). After this, Pew disappears
on his boat, and Silver makes her way into the "real"
“real” world. This section of the novel,
"New
“New Planet,"
Planet,” describes the,
the collision of two worlds: a fantastic one and a real one. It
Silver’s failed attempts to fit in with all aspects of the world beyond Cape
presents Silver's
Wrath. She gets a room in the Holiday Inn and, following Miss Pinch's
Pinch’s advice, tries to
get a job at a library. Her arrival in the real world is a source of
o f comedy: "In
“In Pew's
Pew’s
stories, any ordinary seaman always asked for a hammock, that being half the price of a
bed, but there were no hammocks to be had at The Holiday Inn"
Inn” (L 136).
136). At the library,
Silver gets into an argument with the librarian who will not give her a card: "'Here
“‘Here is the
form. We'll
W e’ll need a permanent address, utility bill, and a signed photo."What,
photo.’ ‘What, like a film
star?'
star?”’ (L 137).
137). Silver's
Silver’s discussion with the librarian is bizarre, yet it makes a certain
amount of
o f sense as well—exposing
well— exposing the ridiculousness of the library's
library’s rules and
regulations. Winterson confuses the distinction between the real and the fantastic here,
but neither the lighthouse nor the Holiday Inn represent a good alternative for Silver.
At the end of the novel, we learn about Silver's
Silver’s love affair with a woman.
Whereas Molly and Babel's
Babel’s wife are described in a fair amount of
o f detail, we are given
almost no information about Silver's
Silver’s lover. Virtually all that is known about her is that
she is a woman. This unnamed woman, who appears to have a successful lesbian
relationship with Silver, has even less personality than those repressed and abused
permission.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
79
women in heterosexual relationships with Babel. Rather than idealizing this character,
Winterson barely pays any attention to her.
cliches: "Thank
“Thank you for making me happy"
happy” (L
This section is filled with romantic clichés:
“You are beautiful to feel
feel.. . .. We both love kissing.
216), Silver says at one point, and "You
lot” (L 217). In his review of the novel, Benjamin Kunkel concludes with
We do it a lot"
“Here nothing gets in the way of lyricism or love, and the result is
some justification, "Here
uplift” (Kunkel). On the one hand,
rhapsodic inconsequence and vacuous romantic uplift"
Winterson creates a utopian lesbian relationship between Silver and her lover, but on the
cliches make us doubt the relationship's
relationship’s perfection. When
other hand, these sorts of clichés
Silver's
Silver’s lover asks, "How
“How long do you think we've
we’ve got?"
got?” (L
( 1 218), Silver seems to think
that she is asking how long it will be until morning, but the reader cannot help but
wonder how long this too-perfect relationship can last.
Silver decides to take her new lover to a fantastic space like that of the lighthouse:
“When I fell in love with you, I invited you to stay in a hut on the edge of a forest.
"When
Solitary, field-flung, perched over the earth, and hand-lit, it was the nearest thing I could
lighthouse” (L 209). However, this space also resists the label of utopia. Silver
get to a lighthouse"
describes the house as an uncomfortable, awkward space:
The hut was made of rough brown planks, bark-topped, that overlapped under a
clay tile roof. It had no foundations; it stood two metres off the ground on a set of
staddle stones. This kept the rats away, but the night-time creatures snuffled and
shuffled underneath. That first night, in the unsteady single bed, I lay awake while
(X 211)
you slept. (L
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
permission.
80
The house is not the only source of Silver's
Silver’s discomfort; she is also made uncomfortable
lover’s body:
by her lover's
The following morning, I woke early, stiff and thirsty, because no one sleeps well
in a small bed with a not so small lover
lover.. . . I think I had spent the night with you
balanced in the six-inch gap between the edge of the bed and the tongue-andgroove wall. You were lying centre square, your head on both pillows, snoring. I
didn't
didn’t want to wake you, so I slid down the six-inch gap, and crawled out under
the bed, bringing with me a very dusty almanac for 1932.
1932. (L 212)
This passage describes a fantastic space—the space between the bed and wall—a sort of
transitional space where no one is meant to be. By squeezing herself through this small
dark space in order to escape her lover's
lover’s embrace, Silver is re-enacting her own birth—
struggling to escape the confinements of another, larger, woman's
woman’s body. The
uncomfortable space in the bed may
be seen to represent the womb: not an ideal space,
maybe
but one that is uncomfortable and must be escaped. Once again, even this successful
lesbian relationship is not perfect.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further
Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
permission.
Reproduced
81
CONCLUSION
Winterson’s feminist strategy to resist and subvert
I have argued that it is part of Winterson's
“respectable” image of woman according to which woman is associated with nearness
the "respectable"
to nature, virtue, beauty and mystical power. This privileged notion of femininity is a
fantasy and I suggest that Winterson means it as a fantasy that oppresses women.
Winterson’s strategy of interrogating certain feminist images of women is also
Winterson's
evident in other novels. In Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit, many of the most
problematic relationships are woman-woman relationships, and the protagonist's
protagonist’s lesbian
romances are not presented as being utopian in comparison to heterosexual relationships.
In Winterson's
Winterson’s latest work, a children's
children’s novel called Tanglewreck (2006), the protagonist
is menaced by a powerful female villain who threatens to destroy time. This magical
woman, Regalia Mason, is the epitome of a beautiful and mystically powerful female
figure. In a scene which very much recalls the one in Sexing the Cherry when the
ecologist imagines a board meeting, Regalia Mason battles male hegemony and
dominates a board room full of men while smugly thinking to herself that, "even
“even though
the world might be coming to an end, the men still chatted about their golf and their
children"
children” (160). However, Regalia is not concerned with constructing a feminine utopia,
but with destroying time, all human beings and the world. Like Regalia, the Dog-Woman
and the Queen of
o f Spades, Winterson's
Winterson’s powerful female characters are often associated
with violence and cruelty.
It might also be argued that Winterson is infatuated and even obsessed with the
patriarchal notion of "Woman"
“Woman” as mysterious Other. Critics have been puzzled by
Winterson’s display of
o f female characters that comply with the patriarchal definition of
Winterson's
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further
Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
permission.
Reproduced
82
“Woman.” Of
O f Winterson's
Winterson’s novel Written on the Body, Patricia Dunker has written,
"Woman."
“Louise, with her fabulous body, sexy petticoats, décolleté
decollete dresses and malicious wimp of
"Louise,
of cliché,
cliche, the prize. Winterson has to use
a husband, is all woman, the mistress of
heterosexual clichés
cliches if she is to preserve the possibility ofher
o f her narrator being a man. To
text” (84-5). Indeed,
me, this closes down rather than opens up the possibilities in the text"
“heterosexual clichés"
cliches” may also be found in the three novels at issue here. For, such
such "heterosexual
Winterson’s male and female characters desire. The Dogwomen are those that many of Winterson's
hero’s mother, Villanelle desires the beautiful
Woman desires to become the traditional hero's
o f spades, and Babel desires Molly. In each case, these "heterosexual
“heterosexual clichés"
cliches”
Queen of
characters’ minds and are not real human beings.
exist mostly in characters'
However, it is important to note that Winterson also seems to find the idea of
traditional femininity to be inescapable. It is for this reason that associating Winterson
with Wittig, as Farwell as done, becomes problematic. In an article about a lesbian
woman’s lawsuit against her prejudiced employer, Winterson writes,
woman's
Can we get this straight? Only a woman can be a lesbian but lesbians are not
“Pussy”, that has nothing
women? If kids pour cat food into your coat and shout "Pussy",
“lezzie” and "dyke"
“dyke” are because you are
to do with being a woman. Yells of "lezzie"
queer, not because you are female. It seems that the law is seeking to confirm the
prejudices of homophobes everywhere—that lesbians are not 'real'
‘real’ women. ("If
(“If
Foxes”)
Only Lesbians Were Foxes")
Wittig’s famous statement, "Lesbians
“Lesbians are
This appears to be a direct rebuttal to Monique Wittig's
women” (32). Clearly, Winterson does not align herself with Wittig. Moreover,
not women"
Winterson seems to take offence at the suggestion that lesbians are not women. Though
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
permission.
83
critics have seen her novels as destroying gender binaries, Winterson still seems to reject
the notion that gender categories are useless, and even sees some value in them. Indeed,
Winterson’s rebuttal to homophobes.
affirming that lesbians are still women is Winterson's
Winterson’s attitude to the idea of "natural"
“natural”
It would be useful to further explore Winterson's
Winterson’s project as an
or biologically determined gender. Though it is tempting to see Winterson's
attempt to subvert gender binaries partly through the use of the fantastic, Winterson does
not pit herself against the idea of heterosexuality or fixed gender categories per se. For
Henri’s mother and father
example, in The Passion, the heterosexual relationship between Henri's
(which has some fantastic elements) is represented as being supportive and loving. Also,
Villanelle’s cross-dressing may seem to work to conceal or to problematize her gender,
Villanelle's
but it may also be viewed as a way of drawing more attention to her femininity. The
Queen of spades, after all, easily sees through the disguise, whereas the Cook, a
villainous representation of the evils of patriarchal culture, is sexually attracted to
o f her androgyny. Here, gender ambiguity operates to make Villanelle
Villanelle because of
o f the patriarchal villain rather than as a means to escape his power. There is
a victim of
“natural” or essential gender. For example,
clear evidence that Winterson does believe in "natural"
“Mothers” (2002), she writes,
in a recent article for the Guardian called "Mothers"
child’s dependence on the mother is hardly news at all, but more
News of a child's
optimistic feminists have hoped that proper childcare and genuine co-parenting,
would even out this dependence. It seems likely that nature is going to be harder to
shift than nurture would allow. Babies don't
don’t know anything about feminism. They
do seem to know what a mummy is.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
permission.
84
“more optimistic feminists"
feminists” who would like to eradicate
If Winterson seems to reject the "more
“difference” feminist who is
gender difference, then perhaps Winterson is a pragmatic or "difference"
tempted by the idea of eradicating gender, but who has come to believe that gender
tempted
differences are real. In any case, Winterson does not condemn any gender role, not even
o f the traditionally beautiful and feminine Molly or that of Babel's
Babel’s obedient wife.
that of
Winterson’s work creates the potential for freedom and empowerment for
Jeanette Winterson's
women. Her novels are truly fantastic, however, and consistently refuse to have recourse
“compensatory, transcendental other-worlds"
other-worlds” (Jackson 180).
180). This
to utopian solutions or "compensatory,
“I don't believe in happy endings. All of my books end on an
is why she states, "I
ambiguous note because nothing ever is that neatly tied up, there is always another
beginning, there is always the blank page after the one that has writing on it. And that is
the page I want to leave to the reader"
reader” (Miller). In this passage, Winterson hints that the
Winterson’s novels
problem with utopian solutions is that alternatives become limited. Winterson's
work to display the importance of alternatives to accepted gender norms or consensus
reality.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further
Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
permission.
Reproduced
85
WORKS CITED
Afanas'ev,
Afanas’ev, Aleksandr. Russian Fairy Tales. Trans. Norbert Guterman. New York:
1973.
Pantheon, 1973.
“Subversion of Sexual Identity in Jeanette Winterson's
Winterson’s The
Asensio, Maria del Mar. "Subversion
Passion."
Passion.” Gender I-deology: Essays on Theory Fiction and Film. Eds. Chantal
Cornut-Gentille
Comut-Gentille D'Arcy
D ’Arcy and Jose Angel Garcia Landa. Atlanta: Rodopi, 1996.
1996.
265-77.
Bressler, Charles E. Literary Criticism: An Introduction to Theory and Practise. Upper
Saddle River, New Jersey: Prentice, 2003.
De Lauretis, Teresa. Technologies of
o f Gender. Bloomington: Indiana UP, 1987.
1987.
Doan, Laura. "Jeanette
“Jeanette Winterson's
Winterson’s Sexing the Postmodern."
Postmodern.” The Lesbian Postmodern.
137-155.
1994.137-155.
Ed. Laura Doan. New York: Columbia UP, 1994.
Farwell, Marilyn R. Heterosexual Plots and Lesbian Narratives. New York: New York
UP, 1996.
1996.
Woolf: To the Lighthouse, The Waves. New York: Columbia
Goldman, Jane, ed. Virginia Woolf
UP, 1998.
1998.
Gonzalez, Susana. "Winterson's
“Winterson’s Sexing the Cherry:
Cherry. Rewriting 'Woman'
‘Woman’ through
Fantasy.” Gender I-deology: Essays on Theory Fiction and Film. Eds. Chantal
Fantasy."
Cornut-Gentille
Comut-Gentille D'Arcy
D ’Arcy and Jose Angel Garcia Landa. Atlanta: Rodopi, 1996.
1996.
281-95.
Grimm’s Fairy Tales: Complete Edition. 1857.
1857. Trans.
Grimm, Jacob and Wilhelm. Grimm's
1948.
Margaret Hunt. London: Routledge, 1948.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
permission.
86
“Children, War, and the Imaginative Space of
o f Fairy Tales".
Tales”. The Lion and
Haase, Donald. "Children,
the Unicorn 24.3 (2000) 360-377.
<http://muse.jhu.edu/joumals/lion_and_the_unicom/v024/24.3haase.html>. 11
<http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/lion_and_the_unicorn/v024/24.3haase.html>.
March 2007.
Hartmann, Hudson T., William J, Flocker and Anton M. Kofranek, eds. Plant Science:
o f Cultivated Plants. Englewood Cliffs:
Growth, Development, and Utilization of
Prentice, 1981.
1981.
o f the Regiment: A Brief
B rief History of
o f the Vivandiers
Hughes, Susan Lyons. The Daughter of
and Cantinieres in the American Civil War. <http://ehistory.osu.edu/us cw/feature
s/art icles/0005/vivandieres.cfm>. 11 March 2007.
Hume, Kathryn. Fantasy and Mimesis: Responses to Reality in Western Literature. New
1984.
York: Methuen, 1984.
o f Subversion. London: Methuen, 1981.
1981.
Jackson, Rosemary. Fantasy: The Literature of
Childland: Victorians, Fairy Tales, and Femininity.
Knoepflmacher, U.C. Ventures into Childland:•
1998.
Chicago: Chicago UP, 1998.
“The Sea of Love."
Love.” New York Times. May 1,
1, 2005.
Kunkel, Benjamin. "The
<http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9402El DC1431F932A3 5756C0A
<http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9402E1DC1431F932A35756C0A
9639C8B63>. 11 March 2007.
“The Cartography of Passion: Cixous, Wittig and Winterson."
Winterson.” ReKutzer, M. Daphne. "The
Naming the Landscape. Eds. Jurgen Kleis and Bruce A. Butterfield. New York:
133-145.
1994.133-145.
Peter Lang, 1994.
Lang, Andrew, ed. The Red Fairy Book. 1890.
1890. New York: Grosset & Dunlap, 1928.
1928.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
permission.
87
o f Man. Trans. Jon Erickson.
Luthi, Max. The Fairytale as Art Form and Portrait of
1984.
Bloomington: Indiana UP, 1984.
“The Light Princess."
Princess.” 1864.
1864. The Golden Key and Other Stories.
MacDonald, George. "The
1979. 46-107.
London: Chariot, 1979.
Maldnen, Merja.
Meija. The Novels of
o f Jeanette Winterson. New York: Palgrave, 2005.
Makinen,
“The Power of Monstrous Women: Fay Weldon's
Weldon’s The Life and Loves of
o fa
Martin, Sara. "The
Carter’s Nights at the Circus (1984) and Jeanette
She-Devil (1983), Angela Carter's
Winterson’s Sexing the Cherry (1989)."
(1989).” Journal of
o f Gender Studies 8 (1999): 193193Winterson's
210.
210 .
May, Herbert G. and Bruce M. Metzger, eds. The New Oxford Annotated Bible with the
1973.
Apocrypha. New York: Oxford UP, 1973.
1997.
“Rogue Element."
Element.” The Salon Interview. April 28,
28,1997.
Miller, Laura. "Rogue
<http://Avww.salon.com/april97/winterson970428.html>. 11 March 2007.
<http://www.salon.com/apri197/winterson970428.html>.
“Teledildonics: Virtual Lesbians in the Fiction of
o f Jeanette Winterson."
Winterson.” Sexy
Moore, Lisa. "Teledildonics:
Bodies: The Strange Carnalities of
o f Feminism. Eds. Elizabeth Grosz and Elspeth
Probyn. London: Routledge, 1995.
104-127.
1995.104-127.
“Jeanette Winterson's
Winterson’s Politics of Uncertainty in Sexing the Cherry."
Cherry.”
Onega, Susana. "Jeanette
Gender I-deology: Essays on Theory Fiction and Film. Eds. Chantal ComutD ’Arcy and Jose Angel Garcia Landa. Atlanta: Rodopi, 1996.
1996. 297-313.
Gentille D'Arcy
Palmer, Paulina. Contemporary Women's
Women’s Fiction: Narrative Practice and Feminist
Theory. London: Harvester Wheatsheaf, 1989.
1989.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
permission.
88
—. "Foreign
“Foreign Bodies: The Grotesque Body in the Fiction of Jeanette Winterson."
Winterson.”
---.
Detsi-Diamanti, Katerina Kitsi-Mitakoy and Effie
Wrestling Bodies. Eds. Zoe Detsi-Diarnanti,
Yiannopoulou. Thessaloniki, Greece: Gramma, 2003. 81-93.
—. The Lesbian Gothic: Transgressive Fictions. London: Cassell, 1999.
1999.
---.
—. "The
“The Passion: Storytelling, Fantasy, Desire."
Desire.” "I'm
“Fm Telling You Stories":
Stories”: Jeanette
---.
o f Reading. Eds. Helena Grice and Tim Woods.
Winterson and the Politics of
Atlanta: Rodopi, 1998.
1998. 103-16.
103-16.
“Sapir-Whorf hypothesis."
hypothesis.” Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. 12
12 Nov 2006, 18:58
18:58 UTC.
"Sapir-Whorf
14 Nov 2006
Wikimedia Foundation, Inc. 14
<http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Sapir%E2%80%93Whorf
hypothesis
<http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Sapir%E2%80%93Whorf_hypothesis
&oldid=87376957>. 11 March 2007.
‘T o the Lighthouse by the Self Appointed Heir to Virginia Woolf."
Woolf.”
Sethi, Anita. "To
[London] Observer. Sunday May 2, 2004.
<http://books.guardian.co.ulareviews/generalfiction/0,6121,1207696,00.html>.
<http://books.guardian.co .uk/reviews/generalfiction/0,6121,1207696,00.html>. 11
March 2007.
o f Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde. 1886.
1886. Ed. Richard
Stevenson, Robert Louis. The Strange Case of
Dury. Edinburgh: Edinburgh UP, 2004.
—. Treasure Island. 1883.
1883. London: Cassell, 1900.
1900.
---.
“Journeying with Jeanette: Transgressive Travels in Winterson's
Winterson’s Fiction."
Fiction.”
Stowers, Cath. "Journeying
(Hetero)sexual Politics. Eds. Mary Maynard and June Purvis. London: Taylor and
Francis, 1995.
1995. 139-158.
139-158.
Thomas, Joyce. Inside the Wolf's
Wolf’s Belly: Aspects of
o f the Fairy Tale. Sheffield: Sheffield
Academic, 1989.
1989.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
permission.
89
Winterson, Jeanette. Art Objects. Toronto: Vintage, 1995.
1995.
2001.
—. "If
“If Only Lesbians Were Foxes."
Foxes.” Guardian. April 3,
3,2001.
---.
<http://society.guardian.co.uMiumanrights/comment/0,8005,467673,00.html>. 11
<http://society.guardian.co.uk/humanrights/comment/0,8005,467673,00.html>.
March 2007.
—. Lighthousekeeping. Toronto: Knopf, 2004.
2004."
—. "Lives
“Lives of Saints."
Saints.” The World and Other Places. Toronto: Vintage, 1998.
1998. 67-73.
—. "Mothers."
“Mothers.” Guardian. March 12,
12, 2002.
---.
<http ://www.j eanettewinterson. com/pages/content/index.asp?P ageID= 137>. 11
<http://www.jeanettewinterson.com/pages/content/index.asp?PageID=137>.
March 2007.
—. The Passion. Toronto: Vintage, 1987.
1987.
---.
---.
—. Sexing the Cherry. Toronto: Vintage, 1989.
1989.
—. Tanglewreck. London: Bloomsbury, 2006.
Wittig, Monique. The Straight Mind and Other Essays. Boston: Beacon, 1992.
1992.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
permission.