著者

北村 紗衣

出版者

一般財団法人日本英文学会

雑誌

英文学研究. 支部統合号 (ISSN:18837115)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.3, pp.149-167, 2011-01-20

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In J.M. Coetzee's Waiting for the Barbarians, the barbarian girl, one of the main characters, suddenly begins to menstruate during the journey to the territory of her people, the barbarians. This scene of menstruation might seem irrelevant to the rest of the novel, which deals with the conflict between the Empire and the barbarians. Few critics have mentioned the menstruation in this novel, although Waiting for the Barbarians has been the subject of considerable commentary. However, if it is irrelevant to the novel's plot, why does Coetzee go out of his way to describe menstruation, even though literature seldom mentions it? In fact, some haunting images in Waiting for the Barbarians, such as children and blood, are closely linked to menstruation. This paper discusses how menstruation, a phenomenon that has many layers of meaning, works in this novel, focusing mainly on its physiological and symbolic meanings. On the physiological level of meaning, menstruation in Waiting for the Barbarians means that the barbarian girl is not pregnant; and it serves as a kind of foreshadowing of her clear break with the Magistrate, an officer of the Empire and the novel's narrator. After the Magistrate has sex with the barbarian girl, for a quick moment he dreams of making a family with her; but her menstruation shows that it is impossible for them to have children together. She leaves him and returns to her people just after menstruating. On the symbolic level of meaning, the barbarian girl's menstruation means that the "flow," which the Empire's control blocked, returns at the "margin," or the boundary, where the Empire's power intertwines with that of the barbarians. Under the Empire's control, blood is described as stagnant and clotted, and natural phenomena's flow is also disrupted. The flow, however, is visualized as menstruation when the barbarian girl reaches the boundary between the Empire and the barbarians' territory. Menstruation, the physiological phenomenon of blood leaking from a woman's body at its margin, symbolises boundary-crossing and overlaps with the act of geographic boundary-crossing, the barbarian girl's and the Magistrate's transition from the Empire to the barbarians' territory. Although both the Magistrate and the barbarian girl become boundary-crossers by being involved in geographic boundary-crossing and menstruation, the barbarian girl achieves greater fluidity than the Magistrate. This is because fluidity, a dangerous attribute, is traditionally ascribed to women in literature. In Waiting for the Barbarians, menstruation is used to symbolise the contrast between the Empire as a patriarchal, solid order and the margin where the Empire and the barbarians encounter each other, creating fluidity. It also symbolises the contrast between the woman who can achieve great fluidity, and the man who cannot escape from the Empire's solid order. Menstruation, which is fluid and cyclic, also symbolises the cycle of nature, especially reproduction, which the Empire hinders. In Waiting for the Barbarians, the Magistrate thinks that the Empire does not respect nature's cycle and that it deprives its people and its land of fertility. As Julia Kristeva points out in "Women's Time," the time of history is linear and often is ascribed to men, but the time of nature is cyclic and often is ascribed to women. The Magistrate feels antipathy toward the time of history of the Empire, and he hopes that the barbarian girl, who achieves great fluidity through menstruation, will have children and regain nature's cycle.

著者

藤野 功一

出版者

一般財団法人 日本英文学会

雑誌

英文学研究 支部統合号 (ISSN:18837115)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.12, pp.311-321, 2019 (Released:2020-12-05)

著者

北村 紗衣

出版者

一般財団法人日本英文学会

雑誌

英文学研究. 支部統合号 (ISSN:18837115)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.3, pp.149-167, 2011-01-20

---

In J.M. Coetzee's Waiting for the Barbarians, the barbarian girl, one of the main characters, suddenly begins to menstruate during the journey to the territory of her people, the barbarians. This scene of menstruation might seem irrelevant to the rest of the novel, which deals with the conflict between the Empire and the barbarians. Few critics have mentioned the menstruation in this novel, although Waiting for the Barbarians has been the subject of considerable commentary. However, if it is irrelevant to the novel's plot, why does Coetzee go out of his way to describe menstruation, even though literature seldom mentions it? In fact, some haunting images in Waiting for the Barbarians, such as children and blood, are closely linked to menstruation. This paper discusses how menstruation, a phenomenon that has many layers of meaning, works in this novel, focusing mainly on its physiological and symbolic meanings. On the physiological level of meaning, menstruation in Waiting for the Barbarians means that the barbarian girl is not pregnant; and it serves as a kind of foreshadowing of her clear break with the Magistrate, an officer of the Empire and the novel's narrator. After the Magistrate has sex with the barbarian girl, for a quick moment he dreams of making a family with her; but her menstruation shows that it is impossible for them to have children together. She leaves him and returns to her people just after menstruating. On the symbolic level of meaning, the barbarian girl's menstruation means that the "flow," which the Empire's control blocked, returns at the "margin," or the boundary, where the Empire's power intertwines with that of the barbarians. Under the Empire's control, blood is described as stagnant and clotted, and natural phenomena's flow is also disrupted. The flow, however, is visualized as menstruation when the barbarian girl reaches the boundary between the Empire and the barbarians' territory. Menstruation, the physiological phenomenon of blood leaking from a woman's body at its margin, symbolises boundary-crossing and overlaps with the act of geographic boundary-crossing, the barbarian girl's and the Magistrate's transition from the Empire to the barbarians' territory. Although both the Magistrate and the barbarian girl become boundary-crossers by being involved in geographic boundary-crossing and menstruation, the barbarian girl achieves greater fluidity than the Magistrate. This is because fluidity, a dangerous attribute, is traditionally ascribed to women in literature. In Waiting for the Barbarians, menstruation is used to symbolise the contrast between the Empire as a patriarchal, solid order and the margin where the Empire and the barbarians encounter each other, creating fluidity. It also symbolises the contrast between the woman who can achieve great fluidity, and the man who cannot escape from the Empire's solid order. Menstruation, which is fluid and cyclic, also symbolises the cycle of nature, especially reproduction, which the Empire hinders. In Waiting for the Barbarians, the Magistrate thinks that the Empire does not respect nature's cycle and that it deprives its people and its land of fertility. As Julia Kristeva points out in "Women's Time," the time of history is linear and often is ascribed to men, but the time of nature is cyclic and often is ascribed to women. The Magistrate feels antipathy toward the time of history of the Empire, and he hopes that the barbarian girl, who achieves great fluidity through menstruation, will have children and regain nature's cycle.

著者

時崎 久夫

出版者

一般財団法人 日本英文学会

雑誌

英文学研究 支部統合号 (ISSN:18837115)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.14, pp.5-15, 2022 (Released:2022-02-13)

著者

松本 舞

出版者

一般財団法人日本英文学会

雑誌

英文学研究. 支部統合号 (ISSN:18837115)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.4, pp.393-400, 2012-01-20

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The aim of this paper is to examine Henry Vaughan's use of alchemical expressions through a close reading of Silex Scintillans (1650, 1655). Considering that a Rosicrucian manifesto, The Fame and Confession of the Fraternity of R: C: of Rosie Cross, was translated by Thomas Vaughan, Henry's twin brother, in 1652, the emblem attached to the first edition of Silex Scintillans should be read in the context of the movement of the alchemical renaissance. From the viewpoint of alchemy, the flashing flint of the title-page suggests the situation of a heart of stone waiting to be softened and cleansed by the power of fire, which represents God's sword. In this paper, I will reconsider Vaughan's emblem more in detail, by examining the meaning of God's light, the silex [Philosopher's stone], tears and blood in the context of alchemical writings. First of all, this paper argues that Vaughan's expression of light can be read as a strong condemnation of the 'New Light', of which Puritan boasted. Moreover, it shows that the theory of alchemy became so widely recognized that the Philosopher's stone was described as a form of medicine. In addition, tears and blood could symbolize the 'Quintessence'. As Paracelsus had argued, 'the reason why [the] Quintessence cures all disease' is because of its 'great cleannesse and purity'. Furthermore, Paracelsus also compares Christ to the Philosopher's stone. Vaughan, too, recognizes that not only is Christ the Good Physician, he is the Good Alchemist, as well. Moreover, the poet redefines the Passion of Christ as God's Alchemy and he attempts to gain some medical benefit from it. The paper concludes that, for Vaughan, the praise of God's Alchemy is a paradoxical criticism of the actions arising from the Puritans' religious corruption.

著者

松本 舞

出版者

一般財団法人日本英文学会

雑誌

英文学研究. 支部統合号 (ISSN:18837115)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.2, pp.467-478, 2009-12-15

著者

高橋 愛

出版者

一般財団法人 日本英文学会

雑誌

英文学研究 支部統合号 (ISSN:18837115)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.7, pp.229-236, 2015

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Moby-Dick has been considered to be the most masculine of Herman Melville's novels. However, few studies have extensively considered the masculinity of those on board the Pequod despite the possibility that Melville had worked hard to express masculinities that deviated from the norms of American society in the nineteenth century. This paper discusses Queequeg, a harpooner from the South Seas, as a character onto whom Melville projected a facet of his multiple ideas of masculinity, by examining his body and his behaviors. First, Queequeg's race and ethnicity are ambiguous, though he is introduced as a Pacific Islander. His tattooed body characterizes him as non-white, but at the same time he transgresses the color line with his phrenologically excellent skull. His tattoos do not reveal any ethic characteristics, though it is said that he is based on a real Maori chief. Additionally, Queequeg's sexuality and gender are also ambiguous. He has a cordial friendship with Ishmale, a common sailor and the narrator of the novel. However, their friendship often seems too sensual to presume that they are just friends: Queequeg caresses his friend many times and his actions anticipate the homoerotic ecstasy that Ishmael experiences later. There also seems to be indications that Queequeg is transgender: for instance, his affectionate huging of Ishmael and his rescue of Tashtego, another harpooner. Given these points, Queequeg seems to be portrayed as an amorphous man who transgresses the boundaries of race, ethnicity, sexuality, and gender. It is possible that his amorphous self is a projected image of what Melville regards as masculine.

著者

鈴木 達也

出版者

一般財団法人 日本英文学会

雑誌

英文学研究 支部統合号 (ISSN:18837115)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.10, pp.139, 2018 (Released:2019-02-16)

著者

難波 雅紀

出版者

一般財団法人 日本英文学会

雑誌

英文学研究 支部統合号 (ISSN:18837115)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.9, pp.67-77, 2017 (Released:2017-05-02)

著者

鶴田 学

出版者

一般財団法人 日本英文学会

雑誌

英文学研究 支部統合号 (ISSN:18837115)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.14, pp.231-239, 2022 (Released:2022-02-14)

著者

平林 美都子

出版者

一般財団法人 日本英文学会

雑誌

英文学研究 支部統合号 (ISSN:18837115)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.9, pp.115-122, 2017 (Released:2017-05-02)

著者

堀 智弘

出版者

一般財団法人 日本英文学会

雑誌

英文学研究 支部統合号 (ISSN:18837115)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.11, pp.63-70, 2018 (Released:2019-02-07)

著者

鶴田 学

出版者

一般財団法人 日本英文学会

雑誌

英文学研究 支部統合号 (ISSN:18837115)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.14, pp.231-239, 2022

著者

滝口 智子

出版者

一般財団法人 日本英文学会

雑誌

英文学研究 支部統合号 (ISSN:18837115)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.6, pp.17-24, 2014-01-20 (Released:2017-06-16)

著者

石田 由希

出版者

一般財団法人 日本英文学会

雑誌

英文学研究 支部統合号 (ISSN:18837115)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.1, pp.381-393, 2009-01-10 (Released:2017-06-16)

著者

板倉 宏予

出版者

一般財団法人 日本英文学会

雑誌

英文学研究 支部統合号 (ISSN:18837115)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.9, pp.15-26, 2017 (Released:2017-05-02)

著者

下楠 昌哉

出版者

一般財団法人 日本英文学会

雑誌

英文学研究 支部統合号 (ISSN:18837115)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.11, pp.251-254, 2018 (Released:2019-02-07)

著者

鈴木 雅之

出版者

一般財団法人 日本英文学会

雑誌

英文学研究 支部統合号 (ISSN:18837115)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.14, pp.139-147, 2022

著者

山口 和彦

出版者

一般財団法人 日本英文学会

雑誌

英文学研究 支部統合号 (ISSN:18837115)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.8, pp.67-76, 2016-01-20 (Released:2017-06-16)

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Cormac McCarthy's Blood Meridian, or the Evening Redness in the West has been highly evaluated as a counter-history of the borderland, or as an epic novel. A number of critics, however, have pointed out its lack of ethical substance due to its abundant descriptions of violence, blood, and death. This essay examines the thematics of violence, and reinterprets BM as a work of fiction that explores the whereabouts and possibility of ethics in the postmodern and in the posthuman. The kid's characterization as a mother-killer is associated with the violence of American historiography, reflecting the rhetoric of America's expansion as biological development. It, in turn, defies the conventions of the Western-Bildungsroman genre: the building of American character through frontier experiences. Thus, BM foregrounds ontological problems of human existence and free will in the apocalyptic borderland. The desert in BM functions as a topos in which the judge practices his hyper-rational, hyper-nihilistic violence, which relativizes every system of values to the single purpose of life: "war," that is, "the truest form of divination." The kid, the judge's biggest rival, rejects being a subject of the "war," and, as a result, is cannibalized by the judge himself (not as a sacrifice for the common good or belief). His death, however, is presented as the unrepresentable, which demonstrates that this death itself is not usurped by the judge, who attempts to be the suzerain of the earth. The biggest dilemma the story presents is the kid's rejection of opportunities to kill the judge by exercising his own violent nature. This, paradoxically, leads to the possibility of a counter-ethics that continues to reject the judge's philosophy of violence. The counter-ethics (in the posthuman), in this sense, might be represented as one always already in a germinal stage, as shown in the epilogue.

著者

沢田 知香子

出版者

一般財団法人 日本英文学会

雑誌

英文学研究 支部統合号 (ISSN:18837115)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.7, pp.167-174, 2015

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Marina Warner tells us that "the fairytale transformations of Cinders into princess represnt what a girl has to do to stay alive." When a girl transforms, themes of female survival and construction of self vividly emerge. Moreover, women's situation and problems present themselves in various guises. Focusing on contemporary fiction which deals with transformations of women, this paper examines images of women and explores new ways and possibilities for a woman to tell her story. This paper first looks into Angela Carter's heroines who transform themselves into predatory animals and survive, and considers the influence of Carter and her rebellious heroines on contemporary retellings of fairy tales. It will then examine Ursula Le Guin's "Daddy's Big Girl" to illustrate women's narrative strategy and Aimee Bender's "The Color Master" based on "The Donkey-skin" as a story of a woman's attempt to capture true colors and to weave her own text/textiles. Both stories are discussed, focusing on other important and relevant themes such as father-daughter relationship, mother-daughter relationship and women's body. These analyses unveil the guise of an innocent girl, revealing a defiant narrative and female figure.