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Walt Whitman’s quote, within the title of this essay, is in essence a look into the self and how the self is multidimensional. The two novels that I have been studying and will be exploring throughout this essay – Virginia Woolf’s Mrs Dalloway and Toni Morrison’s ‘Beloved’ – also explore the concept of the multitudinal self (although not influenced by Whitman’s work). Throughout this essay, the aim is to discover how exactly Woolf and Morrison present the ‘multiple selves’ within their respective novels.
To begin, I will look at Virginia Woolf’s Mrs Dalloway. Dalloway unwinds on a single day in 1923 wherein, while preparing for a party, protagonist Clarissa reminisces on her past as a teenager and beyond. Thus, the entire premise of the novel promotes the idea of a ‘multiple self’ – the present self but yet the past self that is being reflected upon; Beloved, with a similar premise, explores the multitudinal self in the same way.
One of the most significant points within Mrs Dalloway where Clarissa’s fragmented self is explored comes early in the novel; specifically, Clarissa reminiscing of the kiss she shared with Sally Seton. This kiss is regarded as a near-religious experience for Clarissa; she states, ‘[she] felt that she had been given a present, wrapped up and told to keep it, not to look at it’ (Woolf, 1992 p.38); thus presenting her fragmented self. The kiss with Sally is something secret, something illicit; the impression is given that this kiss is not for this ‘present’ Clarissa to explore at that moment but for a different Clarissa. The kiss, for Clarissa, symbolizes possibility – a new exciting possibility for her to grasp at.
However, it is important to note that Peter Walsh is described in much the same way. Peter is condescending as he interrupts the ‘moment’ between Sally and Clarissa. Clarissa reacts to this interruption with great frustration; however, it can be argued that this reaction comes not because she wants to continue kissing Sally, per se – it is because he has interrupted their moment and thus taken that sense of exciting possibility away from Clarissa. Woolf proves this by having Clarissa’s perspective shift away from Sally’s explosive kiss to Peter Walsh.
Peter and Clarissa’s relationship is presented in a much less exciting way than that of Sally and Clarissa but still is implied to be regarded as a possibility to her – the repeated use of interrogatives, ‘What would he think when she came back? That she had grown older, would he say that or would she see him thinking when he came back, that she had grown older?’ (Woolf, 1992 p.39) show this. Woolf within this extract then shifts perspectives for a final time to show Clarissa reflecting on herself both literally and figuratively; literally, in that she regards ‘her self’, ‘her delicate pink face’, ‘her dart-like features’ (Woolf, 1992, p.40) in the mirror. How Woolf lists Clarissa’s features gives the impression of something mechanical – as if the fragmented Clarissa is bringing herself together one by one as one whole so she can host her impending party. Yet Clarissa reflects on herself figuratively; she sees herself not as whole but as a series of fragmented possibilities – perhaps with Sally, perhaps with Peter – continually reflecting on the possibilities of the past and the ‘selves’ she has left behind to become the self that she is in this moment. Deborah Guth reveals another possibility; that Clarissa’s selves are duplications of her artificial self which she reveals to those at the party; that we do not see the ‘real’ Clarissa throughout the narrative but continue to see the artificial and idealised version. This presents another artificial self – the ‘real’ self versus the artificial self. Guth’s point is emphasized during the mirror scene here; the mechanical nature in which Clarissa recalls herself is Clarissa’s method of ‘putting on a front’ rather than exposing her fragmented self.
Interestingly, past drafts of Dalloway only serve to emphasise Clarissa’s fractured self-identity further; initially for instance it was Clarissa who passed on at the end of the novel rather than Septimus. Of course, this idea has changed in the final version of the novel but remnants of that initial draft are shown countless times through the parallelism of Clarissa and Septimus; such as the two reminiscing about their lost possibilities – Clarissa with Peter, Septimus with Isabel Pole – and their homoerotic tendencies. Essentially, there is yet another set of ‘selves’ that haunt the novel in some way. Arguably, this also means that both Clarissa and Septimus can never be their whole selves as they will continue to be interlinked with one another. Thus, unless something can break their parallelism, a part of them is ‘lost’.
This concept of interlinked characters ‘haunting’ a novel is also, fittingly, explored throughout Beloved. The black slave protagonists throughout the novel are haunted both literally (by the ghostly character of Beloved) and metaphorically – through the ghosts of their past that they are unable to escape. The linkage between characters that are explored in Dalloway, above, is also explored in ‘Beloved’ between Sethe and Beloved herself. When Sethe first sees Beloved she is overcome by an uncontrollable urge to urinate. On the one hand, it is as though Sethe regresses to childhood – yet on the other, this uncontrollable urge symbolizes the waters of the womb – and the waters subsequently breaking. ‘But there was no stopping water breaking from a breaking womb.’ (Morrison 2007 pp.61)
As Sethe loses control just outside the outhouse, Beloved is said to be ‘drinking cup after cup of water’ (Morrison 2007 pp.61) thus placing her as the one responsible for Sethe’s urge and emphasizing that Sethe and Beloved are the same – two fractured souls that become united once more upon meeting. This is further backed up by Sethe’s ‘regression’ wherein she recalls her mother and unlocks that sensation of need once more. In this case, readers see Sethe both as a mother (to Beloved) and as a daughter, where Beloved takes on the figure of Sethe’s mother. It reinvigorates Sethe’s ‘ghosts’; not only the memory of her mother that she has locked away for so long but a reminder of her need to be something other than a ‘slave’; in this instance, it is to be a mother and to be mothered. This subsequently allows for the filial maternal role to be fulfilled and emphasizes Morrison representing the self both as fragmented yet united.
“The narrative into which life seems to cast itself surfaces most forcefully in certain kinds of psychoanalysis.” suggests Toni Morrison (1992) within her collection of essays, ‘Playing in the Dark’. This remark from Morrison links ‘Beloved’ to the subject of psychoanalysis. Psychoanalysis, specifically, is concerned with telling a story of the self, the ‘broken and fragmented’ self that appears as a result of trauma. Thus, the concept of psychoanalysis embodies ‘Beloved’ (and the subject of the self) on the whole. According to Morrison (1994;p.257) ‘Beloved’ explores “national amnesia […] about something that the characters don’t want to remember, I don’t want to remember, black people don’t want to remember, white people won’t want to remember.” – a dramatized representation of the ghosts that the marginalized characters hold.
But, most importantly, the titular protagonist of the novel is what truly embodies the fractured self; Beloved herself. Beloved is a ghostly figure who for many of the characters embodies a different thing. Her name, ‘Beloved’ can be taken literally; she is the beloved relation lost to history. She is also, as we have discussed, both Sethe’s daughter and her filial mother. For Denver, Beloved is the ghost of all she has lost (such as her siblings or grandmother) hence her strong feelings toward her – her sheer desperation for Beloved not to leave her in the cold house; ‘Don’t, don’t go’; ‘She wouldn’t put up with another leaving.’ (Morrison, 2007 pp.145-146) Denver feels that Beloved embodies her lost loved ones but by doing so Beloved also embodies some of Denver, as Denver too holds the memories of her loved ones. That is why, within this same extract, Denver ‘…is crying because she has no self’ – without Beloved, she relives the pain of losing her loved ones again but this time loses herself, too. From the moment Beloved arrives, Denver is fractured and even when Beloved is gone she cannot remain whole as she once was.
Most evidently however ‘Beloved’ embodies slavery – for the black slaves of the novel they are unable to partake in the aforementioned national amnesia as Beloved represents what they are trying to forget. Her rocking while with Denver in the cold house is reminiscent of the rocking of the Middle Passage ships wherein slaves were packed in tight. This is also reminiscent of the aforementioned psychoanalysis. Beloved is also repeatedly described as smiling; this is also symbolic of ‘the bit’, a punishment that was suffered by many black slaves forcing them to smile while simultaneously silencing them.
The concept of slavery on the whole presents the self as both one and as multiple simultaneously. There is the ‘slave self’ – the ghostly memories of slavery pre-abolition which haunt the characters of ‘Beloved’ through the ghostly figure herself – and there is the post-slavery self, now free from the shackles of slavery and able to restart and to re-memorise the past. However, just as the past of Septimus Smith haunts him in Woolf’s Dalloway, the characters within Beloved belong in the same predicament. Essentially, it can be said that Beloved shows the story of the multiple selves — both the past self which is continually reflected upon and cannot be forgotten, and the present self, attempting to heal from the traumatic events of slavery but always being brought back to the past in some way. Yet paradoxically slavery also blocks the ‘multitude selves’ from emerging. The act of being a slave encompasses your entire identity – you are nothing more, nothing less – but a slave. Any children born out of slavery are simply placed in the slave line; there is no chance for a slave to mother her children for, at the moment of birth, slavery snatches this away.
Thus in a sense, Sethe’s harrowing act of infanticide is a reclaiming of sorts. She has to kill her child because killing her child means the child will not be subjected to slavery as she is; it is ultimately an act of maternal love rather than hatred. Moreover, it is symbolic of Sethe having the ability to reclaim her subjectivity and become something more than a slave — to become a mother, even if it is only for a matter of moments. This scene, then, embraces the idea of the multitudinous self as Sethe becomes both slave and mother. The killing of her child does not mean however that Sethe reverts to simply being ‘oneself’ once her child has passed but rather cements her identity as a multitudinous self forevermore both a slave and a mother. This ‘reclaiming’ is also seen within Dalloway; Septimus Smith is tangled up in war-induced PTSD to the point that it swamps his identity, he cannot see the world for its beauty but only hallucinates – for instance toward the end of the sky-writing scene where he notes, ‘the elm trees, rising and falling’. (Woolf, 1992 pp. 22-24)
Thus, Septimus’ suicide is not only him escaping the horror of his PTSD, it is him cleansing himself of the PTSD that stole his sense of self. In death, Septimus becomes more than a PTSD-ridden soldier – he becomes a person again, just as Sethe reclaims her position as a mother despite harming her child. Interestingly, Septimus’ death also allows for Clarissa’s reclaiming — alluding to the parallelism aforementioned in this essay. This is why Clarissa can reconcile herself with the idea of her future and identify with the old woman she sees out of the window.
On the whole, it is evident that both novels explore the multiple selves to a great extent and with different views; Dalloway presents both the danger of the fractured soul and the possibilities it yields. Admittedly it is clear that the concept is explored to its full potential within ‘Beloved’ – a novel which could be said to be not a novel that talks of slavery, but a novel that talks of regaining and recomposing the fractured soul that slavery has left behind. Yet it is implied the ghost of Beloved still haunts the house of 124; emphasizing that the ghostly trail of slavery and all that Beloved embodies cannot be forgotten.
Mrs. Dalloway, too, implies a recomposing of the fractured self and ends with Clarissa as a whole as she can reconcile with herself and her future – in this case, the multiple selves are regarded as an exciting possibility. Septimus’ passing means he has reclaimed his fractured identity and, too, is whole. Yet there is no denying that both novels express that trauma, be it PTSD or slavery, will alter the self to become multiple. It is only in death that the soul has unity; in life, the soul will be (and will always be) multiple no matter what is done to prevent or conceal it.
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