Heteronormativity and Phallogocentrism in Jeanette Wintersons Written on Body - Essay Example

Heteronormativity and Phallogocentrism in Jeanette Winterson’s “Written on Body” Introduction Gender study is basically related to the role of man and woman according to their gender. Gender role signifies all those things which are done or said by the human being to reveal him/her as being boy or a girl, a man or a woman. Basically the conception of gender role includes many things such as clothing, style of speech, occupation, physical movements and styles etc. This gender discrimination has created two classes in the society and those are male and female. But this discrimination hardly experienced the harmony between the two genders, male and female. Socially woman has always been regarded as an inferior person, an object while man has been regarded as a superior one and has been rewarded as a subject. And through this discrimination almost in every culture woman has been denied freedom and always been suppressed. After the exorbitant unjust and immense suppression of the female body and female mind, the women have been rebel enough now to fight against the hypocritical and pro-male social norms. They have literary defied all the male favored rules where the woman has no place at all. Occasionally they have defied the morality for the sake of getting intense love relationship. In the modern time many female writers through their writings focuses on the woman particularly from the point of view of gender discrimination and they have propounded the theory of female subjectivity in a very forthright way and challenged the conservative attitude of heterosexuality, heteronormativity and phallogocentrism. All of these feminist writers have unfolded the different facets of female psychology. Here in this paper we are going to discuss on the concept of heteronormativity and phallogocentrism in the novel of Jeanette Winterson called “Written on Body. This is a novel which gives importance to the emotions and sentiments. According to Christy R. Stevens “In sum, the ungendered narrator in Wintersons Written on the Body is not a mere gimmick, but rather is a device that challenges dominant constructions of gender and sexuality. Wintersons text constructs a world in which obtaining the status of subject is not contingent upon gendering, or assuming sex.” (Imagining Deregulated Desire Written on the Bodys Revolutionary Reconstruction of Gender and Sexuality Christy R. Stevens San Diego State University) Keywords: gender discrimination, heteronormativity, female psychology, phallogocentrism, According to the conception of Heteronormativity there are two genders. Heteronormativity expects that all the discussion regarding gender should be in the framework of dichotomy, i.e. division into two absolutely opposed parts. The term Heteronormativity has used to explore the traditional norms of gender identity as well as the role according to the gender, and the social implications of those institutions. In the novel “Written on Body” the writer has revealed the romance and intense love relationship between the bisexuality also. “Written on Body,” a novel by Jeanette Winterson is the best example of exceptional accomplishment of Jeanette Winterson. It is a quite unique device which allows Winterson to keep herself away from the binary determination of a heterosexual behaviour of the individual. Here the sexual affairs are revealed and the gender of the narrator of the novel who is indulged in the sexual affairs with many people is not mentioned by Winterson. Thus the narrator of Jeanette novel is bisexual who has the affairs with both the men and women. In the entire novel the gender of the narrator gets changed. Sometimes the reader feels that it is the male narrator and sometimes the female narrator. Heteronormativity in “Written on Body” The novel “Written on Body” is a love story but it is quite different from the other love stories that are generally based on the concept of heteronormativity. This novel had become the subject of attraction in critics’ circle because of its use of the queer narrative technique and that is the mystery about the gender of the narrator. It is an innovative experiment and genius way of narration. Through this novel Jeanette Winterson challenges how heteronormative society expects a categorization of gender as an assurance of identity. She has not mentioned the gender of the narrator in the novel. While we come to know about the love of the narrator with Louise it can be a general anticipation that the love is heterosexual. Hence the narrator must be male. It is again a question whether gender is important in the process of love. The technique of presenting the love theme and the romance in “Written on Body” is very novel and inimitable. Here we find the similarity between Jeanette Winterson’s views to that of Simone Beauvoir. Like Beauvoir Jeanette is multi faceted in her theory of love and romantic life. According to Beauvoir, ““Beauvoir insists that the promise of adolescence ought to be universal and the criteria of subjectivity ought to be phenomenologically neutral.”(Page 145, “Risking: An Ethic of the Erotic Second Sex.”) Thus Beauvoir is against the traditional norms of the society such as heteronormativity and phallogocentrism. According to heteronormativity the natural sex is the sex between man and woman and apart from this sexuality other type is supposed to be an abnormal. The same view is there when Jeanette hides the gender identity of her narrator. It’s again an uncanny relationship. First thing is that we don’t know the gender of the narrator and second thing is that the relationship between the narrator and his beloved Louise is not common and according to the social rule. Louise is shown as a married woman and still she engaged in the extra- marital affair with the narrator. It is adultery. There is a monologue in page 14 and 15 of the novel where a woman is lying on a bed naked and she is again and again saying her lover that whatever she is doing is wrong and she would not have done it. She through her monologue reveals that she cannot forget her husband but at the same time she wants her lover also. The novel thus is a fine example of the changing morals of the society and the entire novel shows us the extramarital affairs and homosexuality. If we consider the narrator as a male character the relationship is against the social rules because the narrator’s beloved is a married woman. And if we consider the narrator as a female character then only it explains both adultery as well as bisexuality which is supposed to be queer from the point of view of the society. Phallogocentrism in “Written on Body” While describing the gender relationship regarding the love Simone de Beauvoir in her chapter the “Woman in Love” says, “The single word love in fact signifies two different things for man and woman. What woman understands by love is clear enough: it is not only devotion; it is total gift of body and soul, without reservation, without regard for anything whatever. This unconditional nature of her love is what makes it a faith, the only one she has. As for man, if he loves a woman, what he wants is that love from her, he is in consequence far from postulating the same sentiment for himself as for woman; if there should be men who also felt that desire for complete abandonment, upon my word, they would not be men.” (Page 1, Chapter 11, “The Woman in Love”) Phallogecentrism is described by the narrator when h/she comment on the marriage and the behavour of the couple in public life. “I used to think of marriage as a plate glass window just begging for a brick” he/she further says, “the men walking together at the front and the women, trailing little way behind. The men fetching the gin and tonics from the bar, while the women take their handbags to the toilet.” (Page 13, Written on Body) The phallogocentrism is illustrated through the relationship of Louise and her husband Eglin. The character of Louise is very much feminist. According to the narrator, “She was more of a Victorian heroine than a modern woman. “A heroine from Gothic novel, mistress of her house, yet capable of setting fire to it and fleeting in the night with one bag.” (Page 49, “Written on Body). Louise is very energetic and vigorous woman. While describing this vigor and energy in Louise the writer uses the red colour as red is associated with exorbitant energy and vigor. It is when the narrator says, “If I were painting Louise I’d paint her hair as a swarm of butterflies. A million Red Admirals, in a halo of movement and light.” (Page 28, 29, “Written on Body”). Unlike Louise her husband Eglin is very passive. Louise’s husband Elgin is the indicative of phallocentric discourses. By profession he is a doctor and a very technical person. He had been a genius medical trainee, innovative, and concerned. Louise had helped him financially in the early years of his profession. Talking about his personality the narrator says, “I had met her husband, a doctor with just the right bedside manner. He was unremarkable but that is not a vice.” (Page 29, “Written on Body)He is quite familiar and comfortable with the science, mathematical numbers formulas and computer. But he is nowhere in the romantic world of Louise. He is very prosaic kind of man who has nothing to do with the romanticism and hence can never satisfy his wife emotionally as well as sexually. He is described as a small narrow- chested, short sighted and clever person. Because of his passive personality, Louise very well knows that she could easily control her husband. In this way Jeanette through her ungendered narrator has illustrated the femininity of Louis which is sometime opposite to the typical phallogocentric attitude where the women are always supposed to be passive, but sometimes she gets succumbed by the phallogocentrism where the woman has no voice and choice. In one incident through Louise’s dialogue the readers realize the typical phallogocentrism in the relationship of Louise and Elgin. “‘He doesn’t really want to live like this,’ she said, meaning the austere grandeur of their marital home. ‘He’d much be much happier in a 1930s mock Tudor with underfloor hot air.’ ‘Then why does he do it?’ ‘It brings him huge originality value.’ ‘Do you like it?’ ‘I made it.’ She paused. ‘The only thing Elgin’s ever put into his house is money.’” (Page 63, “Written on Body”) Here along with the novel “Written on body,” we are going to take two similar works. One is the novel by Leo Tolstoy that is “Anna Karenina” and the second novel is by R. K. Narayan, an Indian novelist. The name of his novel is “Guide.” In both Anna Karenina and Guide the integral part of the theme is extra marital affairs of the heroine. Both of these novels are a challenge to the conservative heteronormativity and the female has shown as a rebel and beyond conservativeness. Anna Karenina is the female protagonist, a beautiful lady who apart from being a married woman falls in love with a handsome Count Vronsky. First of all Anna tries to be far away from the count but becomes his victim. She is totally fed up of her cold blooded and cynical husband who is twenty years older than her. Like Louise in “Written on Body,” the husband of Anna also cannot satisfy his wife emotionally as well as sexually. And so she chooses another way of her happiness through the medium of the count. Same theme is adopted in the novel “Guide,” where Raju is the central character who meets Rosie, a beautiful dancer. Her husband Marco always remains cold and aloof with Rosie. He is interested in the research of cave paintings and totally neglects Rosie. Both Raju and Rosie fall in love with each other and when Rosie’s husband knows it, he shows a typical phallogocentric attitude and abandons her. What happened next with Raju, whether Raju and Rosie live a happy and accepted by the society, these questions are less important. The important thing which here is focused by R. K. Narayan is the extra marital affair which was no longer acceptable in contemporary, conservative Indian society where heteronormativity is still dominant. All these three ladies are the victim of Phallogocentrism and so they search the happiness in their life. There way of searching might be against the social rule but again love and emotional attachment cannot be imprisoned in the social rules. Anna, Rosie, and Louise are the representative of the new emerging society where phallogocentrism and the heternormativity can be challenged frequently. Like Winterson Beauvoir also has attacked on the institution of marriage. Vintage Karen writes about Beauvoir’s idea about love in her book “Place for Love.” Karen says “The idea of love as a fusion recurs through out Beauvoiur’s whole oeuvre. It also appears in The Second Sex. (which was published three years earlier than the Sade essay) although obliquely and more implicitly she criticizes the institution of marriage here as fatal for the fusion experience. But the main thrust on her argument in The Second Sex is that romantic ideals of love, in which fusion predominates, are insufficient; true love for another person requires generosity, and fusion also requires that generosity,” (Page 46, A place for love” by Vintges, Karen) The traditional restrictions imposed on her sometimes compel her to take the rebellious step because she has been suppressed for a long time. According to Luce Irigaray, “In term of Hegelian dialectic, this situation might be analyzed as the female remaining in the plant world without any chance of creating an animal territory for her. This female world would be paralyzed in its ethical developments.” (Page 107, “Love of Same, Love of other,” Ethics of Sexual Difference, Irigaray, Luce) In sexual relationship subject and object are the major factor and generally the subjectivity is bestowed to the male always. This phllagocentrism attitude where penis is given the subjectivity as it is visible. But according to feminist writer it is not only the penis which can play the role of the subject. Freud also describes his philosophy on gender basis and he thus gives weight to the male sex organ which according to Freud is supposed to be the symbol of power and subjectivity. While illustrating the views of Freud, Luce Irigaray in her book “Power of Discourse,” says “He does not invent female sexuality, nor male sexuality either for that matter. As a man of Science he merely accounts for them. The problem is that he fails to investigate the historical factors governing the data with which he is dealing.” (Page 70, “The Sex which is not one,” The Power of Discourse”) Rather the subjectivity never depends upon the gender. Winterson propound the same opinion. The ungendered character of Jeanette Winterson in this novel is a subject. This ungendered protagonist challenges the heterosexual imperative. The narrator is not anticipating the gender anywhere because he/she doesn’t required the legislative norms. But contradictory to the narrator his beloved Louise is portrayed excessive feminist. Conclusion Phallegocentrism and heteronormativity are the two theories which have made the gender relationship very restricted Jeanette through the uncommon way has illustrated a very modern concept of keeping love far away from the limited circle of gender. Rather she has brought the love out of this conservative attitude and compels the readers and critics to think over the idea. Whatever criticism she has received due to this bold love theme, she makes the readers to think it on a broader way. Knowingly or unknowingly the readers get involved in her theory and accept it. Because even though the theory was against the society rules and regulations, it is transparent and honest. The theory thus reflects the candidness, honesty of Winterson with every relationship. Sources 1. Winterson, Jeanette, "Written on the body", London : Vintage, 1993. 2. Irigaray, Luce. "This sex which is not one", translated by Catherine Porter with Carolyn Burke. Ithaca, N.Y. : Cornell University Press, 1985. 3. Beauvoir, Simone de. "The Woman in Love", The Second Sex, (trans H M Parshley) Picador, London, 1988. 4. Irigaray, Luce. "Love of Same, Love of Other", in An Ethics of Sexual Difference, (trans Carolyn Burke and Gillian C Gill), Cornell University Press, Ithaca,1993. 5. Vintges, Karen. "A Place for Love", in Philosophy as Passion: The Thinking of Simone de Beauvoir, Indiana University Press, Bloomington, 1996. 6. Bergoffen, Debra B. ‘Risking: An Ethics of the Erotic: The Second Sex’ in The Philosophy of Simone de Beauvoir: Gendered Phenomenologies, Erotic Generosities, State University of New York Press, Albany, 1997. 7. “Anna Karenina” by Leo Tolstoy, Bibliomania e-text and plot summary: Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy. www.bibliomania.com/0/0/52/95 http://www.bibliomania.com/0/0/52/95/frameset.html 8. “Guide” by R. K. Narayan, Publisher: Penguin Classics Read More