Audio Transcript Auto-generated
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Hey there.
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So today we're gonna be talking about the awakening by
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kate Chopin and I'm going to be presenting a framework
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for understanding Edna's awakening.
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And those awakening is about, as the book says, coming
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to the realization of the human experience in reclaiming her
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bodily autonomy, in carving out space for herself and in
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expressing her feelings of passion and desire, and now realizes
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that her internal experience will never match her external experience.
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The gap between her vision of existence and her actual
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lived experience is what drives her towards the sea.
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This presentation will assert that Edna's first awakening is towards
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Adele Rotten, you'll and that her nature as an artist
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establishes early in the novel, the disconnect from the life
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created in the life desired.
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So you're going to hear vocabulary from deconstruction from psychoanalysis
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and from queer theory throughout this presentation.
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And again, once more is just my thesis statement that
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we're going to be looking at both the character Adele
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retinal as Edna's first, you know, drive towards self determination
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and self expression, and then also how her role as
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an artist helps us understand the gap that exists within.
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So looking at the critics which are all pulled from
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the Norton critical edition you see here in the center
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first percival Pollard in 19 oh nine wrote an essay
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called the unlikely awakening of a married woman in which
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he says of course she went and drowned herself.
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She realized that you can only put out fire with
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water. His assertion remains that once her desire is awakened
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this sexual desire, she realizes that no man will ever
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be enough to quench it.
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He argues that whether it's our Iban or robert or
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her husband, they're all interchangeable to Edna.
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The danger of a woman awakening to her sexuality is
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that she will become so engulfed in her desire that
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the only way to put out that fire is by
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death, which we are really going to argue against Louis
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Leary in 1971 wrote an essay called Kate Chopin and
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Walt Whitman, where he argues or explores Chopin's inspiration by
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Whitman and how we can make connections between their writing.
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This quote here, though it was foundational in how I
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began to view the novel.
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So the awakening is not a problem novel.
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If it seems inevitably to invite questions, these are subsidiary
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to its purpose, which is to describe what might really
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happen to a person like Edna Ponti earlier being what
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she was living when she did and where And I
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agree using leary's argument, we can read edit as a
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woman out of time, surrounded by those who are content
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to have things remain as they are, instead of pushing
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towards the horizon of possibility.
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Finally, an M.
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Heilmann in 2008 wrote an essay called the awakening and
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new woman fiction, and I like Hillman's focus on Edna's
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self determination.
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I'm going to also pick up on that.
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Hammond also claims that neither Mademoiselle Rise nor Madam rotting
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Hull's version of being a woman quote, offer Edna and
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adequate model for an alternative existence.
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And I do agree in some ways.
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So I do think that Edna is not so much
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an artist that she feels compelled to give over everything
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to her craft, and she certainly isn't interested in being
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the model mother wife like madame renewal is however, I
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would disagree that Madam Rossignol doesn't offer her an alternative
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script reform, I think she does, but I will get
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into that a little bit later.
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So, first I'm going to focus on Madam Rossignol, and
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again, I think that she is Edna's first object of
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desire. So, my critical turn here, um jules Polonetsky states
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that the question in this novel is how to be
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free in one self and for one's self, but still
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meaningfully connected to others.
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And I think this last part, this meaningful connection to
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others is what Edna comes to realize she's never going
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to be able to do.
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Um and so then leary also pinpoints the novels focus
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on self determination, arguing that is awakened to the possibilities
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for self expression.
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But because of, you know, she is what she is,
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circumstances are what they are, society is what it is.
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This self expression cannot be realized, which I think connects
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back to the previous quote about not being able to
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meaningfully connect with others.
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So, obviously sexual and physical awakening are central to her
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character and to the novel in general.
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But another reading would broaden that scope to allow for
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reading. That doesn't affirm the antiquated notion that a woman's
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sexual awakening leads to her death.
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I do think the suicide can be read not as
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a decision of hopelessness, but rather as a commentary on
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the space available to women who fully know themselves within
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the patriarchy that particularly in this time period, to know
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yourself, was to be made fully aware of just how
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limited you are by the world.
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The novel is filled with moments where the image or
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the idea of something that is desired is unfulfilled by
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the reality.
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The thing that we construct in our minds cannot ever
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be fully and truly brought to life, as Derrida puts
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it, the written signifier is always technical and representative.
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The notion of the sign always implies within itself the
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distinction between signifier and signified, and it is that gap
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that Edna comes to exist in.
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Okay, so, I'm first going to again talk about how
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admit exerts her gaze over madame Rossignol, and the novel
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states that once Edna's eyes were locked on some object.
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It was as if she were quote, lost in some
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inward maze of contemplation or thought, and the gazes at
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Madame rot in your quarters.
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She might look upon a faultless Madonna.
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Edna's idealized woman.
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The woman who holds her gaze even with robert and
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company, is the perfect picture of the ideal woman that
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many critics argue.
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Edna tries to break from.
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Adele is the quote embodiment of every womanly grace and
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charm. A picture of the quote bygone heroine of romance,
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and the Fair lady of Our Dreams, pregnant with her
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fourth child, and in the seventh year of her own
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marriage, she is the maternal foil to Edna.
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She is sociable and loved by those around her.
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and it is this woman, the picture of feminine virtue
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that Edna holds in her gaze.
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The women differ on their ideas of motherhood.
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So I wouldn't argue that Edna wants to be like
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Adele in that regard.
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However, I do think the initial stages of Edna's awakening
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are directed towards Adele, even though the reader has been
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alerted to conversations and now has with robert and his
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first true divulge its itself is with Adele.
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I believe Adele's sense of self draws and his desire
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and attention and the desires to know herself to be
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more aware of her lived experience.
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And the proof for that comes actually in this scene
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just before this.
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So in the scene before Edna steals away to her
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balcony after a disruptive night with her husband.
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The text states, quote, she could not have told why
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she was crying.
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Such experiences as the foregoing were not uncommon in her
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married life.
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This moment of her crying isn't proof that she is
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suddenly unhappy in her marriage and is just now realizing
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it because of robert.
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The text states, she often finds herself like this, but
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doesn't know why the not knowing is significant, and I
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argue, is the thing that begins to change at grand
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deal, quote, an indescribable oppression which seemed to generate in
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some unfamiliar part of her consciousness filled her whole being
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with a vague english.
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She was just having a good cry all to herself.
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Her husband here is not abusive.
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He pouts when he doesn't get his way, and, you
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know, he does obviously uphold the societal expectations of marriage
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and motherhood, But time and again.
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The reader is reminded of how devoted he is to
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her, and she also recognizes his devotion and care of
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her. The oppression is the lack of understanding herself.
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Of not knowing why she needs to cry, not understanding
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why she can't feel at home in the life she
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created. And the text does go out of its way
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to note that she chooses her husband.
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Despite her family's objections, I grant Hill, she is surrounded
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by Creole people, including Madonna Netanyahu's quote, freedom of expression
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was at first incomprehensible to her.
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And I think it is that freedom of self expression
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that ignites Edna's awakening Madam.
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Rossignol captures Edna's attention and affection in this quote, right
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here, it's talking about what is drawing the two together.
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And so says the excessive physical charm of the Creole
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had first attracted Edna, then the candor of madame rotten
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apples, whole existence which everyone might read in which formed
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so striking, in contrast to her own habitual reserve.
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This might have furnished a link.
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who can tell what medals the gods use in forging
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the subtle bond, which we call sympathy, which we might
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as well call love Madam Rotten y'all's way of existing
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precisely as she wants to and as she is meant
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to draws Edna to her and it doesn't want to
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be her in the way society would have her be.
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But rather senses Madam rotting Hull's command of self and
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is drawn to that.
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The text goes so far as to use the word
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Love speaks of these two women as being drawn together
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by the gods fused medals.
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In a link in exploring gender as social performance, Judith
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Butler discusses how we cannot perform a script we haven't
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seen before.
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I think Edna sees madame, retinal script as a woman
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in command of herself, which then allows her to see
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the possibility of being that woman, she can repeat Madam
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regionals performance now that she has seen a woman fully
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be herself.
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Except that Edna is going to add to that script
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and now wants to be fully herself.
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But outside of the boundaries of society, she doesn't want
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it to have to include motherhood or being a wife.
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She just wants to fully exist as a human and
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his first divergence of self.
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Her first step towards that command of expression is towards
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madam Rossignol.
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After naming her thoughts and sharing the memory of walking
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through the Kentucky grass and even how she feels about
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that memory.
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The text states quote, she was flushed and felt intoxicated
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with the sound of her own voice and the unaccustomed
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taste of candor.
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It modeled her like wine or like a first breath
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of freedom.
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The exposing of her true feelings and self to her
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female friend emboldens her and makes her drunk with self
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power. Then combined with this move towards self expression.
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We have to look at how she expresses herself as
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an artist.
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Edna's artistic nature also helps the reader understand the gap
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between the world inside herself.
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In the world outside of herself, we're told that even
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as a child, she lived her own small life all
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within herself.
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The dual life that outward existence which conforms the inward
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life, which questions Edna brings those inward questions out into
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her life, but is met with the limitations of her
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time. So, as her artistic skill takes on a greater
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role in the novel, she does provide her some financial
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independence. It provides her excuse for space and time to
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herself. You know, Edna is described as having a quote
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natural aptitude for painting and quote sensuous susceptibility to beauty.
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Well, Madam, Rossignol, Anna and robert are sitting together and
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talking. Edna drops Adele as a quote sensuous Madonna, but,
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quote, the picture completed bore no resemblance to Madame Rotten.
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You'll so Edna destroys it.
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She had had a vision in her mind and she
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had the means to communicate that vision.
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However, when completed, it does not meet the expectation that
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gap between what is in her mind and what is
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in reality will continually frustrate her.
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Well, it could be read as her being overly critical
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of her own work.
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It is also an example of how the signifiers are
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always at a distance from the signified.
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Even the ice cream at a dinner party later on
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is treated in a similar way.
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Dinner guests conclude that the ice cream was quote, a
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great success, but would be better if it had, quote,
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had only contained a little less vanilla or a little
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more sugar if it had been frozen a degree harder,
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and if the salt might have been kept out of
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portions of it at a table of high born society
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members, it's easy to read this scene as a critique
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of those who are never satisfied with what they have.
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And that's true.
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But it can also be read as the things we
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desire and esteem.
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Desert is often look forward to.
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And even anticipated.
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Those things are never quite actually what we want them
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to be.
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And it is surrounded by those who have accepted this
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gap and are content to live in that reality, to
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live in the picture of a thing rather than the
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thing itself.
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But once Edna is awakened to her senses, once she
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connects her emotions, mind and body, she cannot go back
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to living in the muted version of her life.
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So ultimately, again, I'm focusing really just on the beginning
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of the novel.
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Because I think if we can then establish this new
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framework for reading the novel as we carry that forward
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as it progresses, we can start to see things in
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a broader scope that it's not just about sexual desire
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and physical intimacy.
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It is about a woman who is trying to connect
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her inner world to her outer world and is continually
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met with the gap that exists between those two.
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So it's just a new way of looking at the
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novel. It's just one perspective, um and hope you guys
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enjoyed it.