Mapping British Women Writers' Urban Imaginaries

Space, Self and Spirituality

Arina Cirstea

• Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan
• Year: 2016
• Print ISBN: 9781349565795, 9781137530905
• eBook ISBN: 9781137530912
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: European Literary Criticism
• Index: Social Sciences

This study provides an alternative to the postmodern tradition of writing about the city by exploring spatialized constructions of gender and spiritual identity through an integrative framework based on insights from Bachelard's topoanalysis, psychogeography, feminist cultural theory and comparative literature and religion.

1

Women’s Urban Modernity: Brontë, Gaskell and Woolf

This chapter proposes a fresh perspective on a firmly established theme in current modernity studies. It has been widely acknowledged that women writers like Elizabeth Gaskell and Virginia Woolf have held a key role in mapping the challenges and opportunities of urban modernity from a gendered perspective, and in the process laid the foundations of what came to be regarded as a tradition of British women’s urban writing. I approach this much discussed topic by drawing a parallel between two narratives of urban modernity, pertaining not only to different genres, but also to different spatial and temporal contexts. The first is a predominantly celebratory representation of spatial change in the industrial metropolis as presented in women’s early urban novels. The second is the theory of urban space advanced by postmodern theorist Fredric Jameson, which introduces the term ‘postmodern hyperspace’ to describe the feelings of malaise and disorientation produced by the ‘unprecedented’ spatial changes associated with the post-1960s Western metropolis.

In comparing these urban discourses, I address questions about the solidity of Jameson’s historical arguments, on the one hand, and the potential challenges brought to his theory by a tradition of women’s urban writing, on the other. Though Jameson’s theoretical perspective has already been questioned in a number of ways, this comparative approach shifts the critical focus to a new direction.

The metropolis in Jamesonian theory

In Postmodernism, Jameson uses the observation of contemporary Los Angeles as a starting point for his concept of ‘postmodern hyperspace’, which he defines as the ‘latest mutation of space’ that ‘has finally succeeded in transcending the capacities of the individual human body to locate itself’ (44). Jameson’s fundamental claim is that postmodern hyperspace engenders characteristic psychological effects – individual city dwellers perceive this new form of space as radically different, chaotic, discontinuous and bewildering.

While a considerable number of Jameson’s case studies¹ refer to the individual’s experience of postmodern architecture in the contemporary metropolis, the concept of hyperspace is additionally connected with the new type of spatial perception generated by state-of-the-art technology in the domain of communication and transport. In other words, in Jameson’s view, the metropolis is in every respect as unmappable and unfathomable as the virtual spaces generated by the global market, the World Wide Web and high-tech warfare. As a result, contemporary city dwellers live in a state of perpetual disorientation:

this latest mutation in space – postmodern hyperspace – has finally succeeded in transcending the capacities of the individual human body to locate itself, to organise its immediate surroundings perceptually, and cognitively to map its position in a mappable external world.

(Postmodernism 44)

Jameson goes on to link hyperspace with a specific stage in the development of human society. In Marxist theory, capitalism has traditionally been divided into three historical stages: merchant or commercial capitalism, industrial capitalism and finance capitalism (Engerman). Dwelling on the work of Marxist economist Ernest Mandel, Jameson adds one more stage, which he defines as post-1950 multinational, or late, capitalism (Postmodernism xviii–xxi 412–13). He postulates a ‘supplement of spatiality’, which distinguishes late capitalism from previous historical periods, or – in Marxist terms – modes of production:

postmodernism theory [sic], however, infers a certain supplement of spatiality in the contemporary period and suggests that there is a way in which, even though other modes of production (or other moments of our own) are distinctively spatial, ours has been spatialized in a unique sense, such that space is for us an existential and cultural dominant …

(Postmodernism 365)

In consequence, concludes Jameson, ‘even if everything is spatial, this postmodern reality here is somehow more spatial than everything else’ (365). By contrast, despite a certain interest in space, modernism is shown to favour the ‘experience of temporality’ – ‘existential time, along with deep memory’ – over the spatial present (154). Postmodernism does not tackle the issue of space in the industrial/early capitalist era, even though it includes a brief discussion of Theodore Dreiser’s Sister Carrie (1900). Jameson’s overview of this industrial novel rather disappointingly treads the beaten track of early Marxist criticism, in probing the text for clues as to the author’s position with respect to the capitalist establishment (200–3).

Jameson insists that the hyperspace represents a universal and typical rather than ‘exceptional’ and ‘marginalized’ spatial experience – more specifically, a defining feature of the current stage in the evolution of world economy (44). Moreover, while in his description of postmodernism he relied on a view of history as a series of catastrophes or abrupt transitions from one phase to another, he seems less inclined to acknowledge the disruptive potential of post-1990 political and economic developments. In a 2007 interview, he argues that, despite a number of significant changes, the postmodern era continues well into the twenty-first century:

It does seem to me, though, that when people say postmodernism is over, postmodernity is over, it all ended on 9/11 and so forth, this betrays a complete misunderstanding of what the term means: that a certain postmodern style and architecture has long since been replaced by other things in no way means that this whole new economic structure of postmodernity, with which I equate globalization, has changed. I don’t see that the rise in anti-American movements of the type that express themselves in the Twin Towers attack makes for a change in the situation either. Probably much that is deployed by al-Qaeda is really postmodern …

(Buchanan 213)

In sum, Jameson claims that the conceptualisation of postmodernism as a dominant, and self-sufficient, current is justified by a twofold historical primacy: the intense theoretical and empirical awareness of spatiality, and the (unfeasible) requirement of adapting to the shockingly new environment of the late capitalist era. The conclusions of this analysis are clearly influenced by the author’s acknowledged commitment to providing a coherent explanation of contemporary culture. Thus in his attempt to come up with a ‘total’ view of the subject in hand, Jameson relegates to the margin, or completely ignores, alternative descriptions of space, gender and the human psyche that have the potential to challenge his own theory.

To begin with, it is not quite clear why the recent affirmation of space in critical debates should be regarded as the monopoly of postmodernism, or any other particular movement. Alongside almost every other contemporary critical trend, recent feminism has also developed an extensive spatial literature without attempting to appropriate space for the purposes of self-definition. What is more, Jameson shows a complete disregard for the alternative approaches to living space – in contemporary architecture as well as in other disciplines – that overtly oppose the postmodern stance. One such example is provided by Anthony Vidler, who in a 1992 volume interprets the latest tendencies in Parisian urban architecture in terms of the demise of postmodernism, and a return to the strategies of ‘good modernism’ (219).

Jameson’s second claim requires more careful consideration. By resorting to architecture (Postmodernism 38–45; 108–29) and literature (367–71) to illustrate his point, Jameson claims that hyperspace is the one fundamental experience shared – at a global scale – by late-twentieth-century individuals. However, in a range of urban texts that will be discussed in this study, the contemporary metropolis is represented in different terms, through an engagement with history, gender and spirituality. While these fictions reveal a deep interest in urban space and its psychological effects upon individuals, there is little or no evidence of the type of spatial trauma that Jameson conceptualises.

Rather than portraying dramatic reactions to newly invented spaces and places, these texts focus on those aspects of spatiality that tend to remain relatively constant with the passage of time, exploring such issues as the formative potential of everyday spaces or the nature of the relationship between power and institutional space. Moreover, gender is seen as a central factor in determining individual perceptions of space, in conjunction with a number of other influences. In particular, Roberts and Maitland interpret the everyday space of the metropolis as an expression of the intimate correlations between architecture, community and spirituality. In a parallel vein, in Lessing’s The Four-Gated City, an attempt to come to terms with the reality of the metropolis generates an urban dream of a perfect harmony between spatial and spiritual identity, which will be further developed in her volumes of ‘space’ fiction.

In these fictions, there are also a number of alienating spaces, in which women feel uprooted or confused; however, these spaces are not necessarily a result of novelty. Quite to the contrary, the characters’ alienation often stems from the attempt to define their identities against rigid definitions of public and private space.² These women writers’ apparent lack of concern for the postmodern novum can be accounted for in a number of ways. It may be the case that London, the location of most of the fictional texts under discussion – as well as the authors’ hometown at various stages of their lives – represents a more traditional architectural space in comparison with Jameson’s Los Angeles. However, the great majority of European capitals pose similar problems; accepting these notable exceptions, therefore, would be tantamount to suggesting the parochialism of Jameson’s analysis.

A brief examination of mid-nineteenth-century, and early twentieth-century, British fiction casts a new light upon women writers’ engagement with the city. In many Victorian urban novels, both male and female authors sometime construe the new urban centre as an ambiguous, confusing space that threatens to annihilate individual identity. For women authors, the city space poses an additional challenge, as it brings about a novel sense of freedom alongside new and previously unsuspected dangers. In her study of the late Victorian and early modernist city, Streetwalking the Metropolis (2000), Deborah Parsons makes the following comment:

Women’s legitimate participation in city life was an extremely significant divergence from Victorian conventional belief and acquired a great deal of anxious attention from contemporary social commentators, who tended to regard women as becoming overwhelmingly present. Regarded as manifest in huge and growing numbers, the woman in the city was characterized, examined, and theorized into one or more male-authored stereotypical pathological states. (43)

What strikes us immediately in Parsons’ account is the intense sense of crisis caused by unprecedented spatial change, which bears a certain resemblance to Jameson’s theorisation of hyperspace. The useful way in which Parsons foregrounds the gender component of this transformation paves the way for an important conclusion: Victorian cities – among them London, which is fairly prominent in Parsons’ description – offered women authors the opportunity to stage a truly revolutionary narrative of spatial relations. The urban conglomerate represented a space where deeply entrenched patriarchal restrictions – and most notably women’s access to public space – could be challenged under the pretext of economic necessity, as well as under the influence of a climate of relative social change.

This enthusiastic account of spatial liberation does not in any way cover the sum of Victorian interpretations of social space. In addition to the male anxiety discussed by Parsons, the revision of spatial relationships was met with hostility by many categories of women, who passionately opposed what appeared as the enforced intervention of urbanisation and technologisation into their lives. In her 2007 volume Women Against the Vote, Julia Bush points out that Victorian city dwellers, and Londoners in particular, held conflicting views of women’s emancipation. For instance, London became the centre for both women’s suffragist and anti-suffragist movements (5–9). Some Victorian women writers joined the fight against what they saw as women’s enforced emancipation, and opted to cater for ‘a generation of socially conventional women readers by providing a view of womanhood which they enjoyed and with which they could empathize’ (Bush 5).

In consequence, Victorians’ relationships to urban space appear to be deeply problematic and caught between divergent interpretations. As recognised by more recent studies (for instance, Snaith and Whitworth’s Locating Woolf (2007)), this traumatic view of spatiality may be traced in the writings of a considerable number of Victorian and modernist women writers, from Brontë to Woolf. While the concrete – social and economic – context obviously differs from the spatial challenges of the late-twentieth-century metropolis, the series of fairly accelerated changes that affected the lives of women in the Victorian city bears comparison with the more recent challenge of adapting to virtual space. While it is certainly true that, to paraphrase Jameson, the velocities of the automobile are ridiculously low in comparison with those of spacecraft (Postmodernism 44), it can be argued that, for female city dwellers, it was the Victorian era that brought about a radical and swift launch into previously inaccessible spaces and places, initiating the struggle for equal opportunities that may be seen as emblematic of women’s urban modernity.

Women in the Victorian city: Villette and North and South

To refine the points above, I will examine briefly the representation of women’s urban experience in two Victorian novels, Charlotte Brontë’s Villette (1853) and Elizabeth Gaskell’s North and South (1855). Through it has gone largely unacknowledged until recently (Brown 350), the city represents a key theme of Villette. In addition to the town of Villette, which provides the novel’s title, Brontë introduces her heroine Lucy Snowe to the city of London. Arriving in a rather despondent state of mind, provincial Lucy is overwhelmed by London, which inspires her with a feeling of exhilaration at newly encountered freedom:

Prodigious was the amount of life I lived that morning. Finding myself before St Paul’s, I went in; I mounted to the dome: I saw thence London, with its river, and its bridges, and its churches; I saw antique Westminster, and the green Temple Gardens, with sun upon them, and a glad, blue sky, of early spring above; and, between them and it, not too dense a cloud of haze.

Descending, I went wandering whither chance might lead, in a still ecstasy of freedom and enjoyment; and I got – I know not how – I got into the heart of city life. I saw and felt London at last: I got into the Strand; I went up Cornhill; I mixed with the life passing along; I dared the perils of crossings.

(Brontë 64–5)

In a 2002 article, Kate Brown relies on Villette to make a strong case for an acknowledgment of Brontë’s status as ‘an urban novelist’ (352). Brown suggests that one of the main reasons for Brontë’s interest in the city is its promising potential for women’s emancipation: ‘In the space of Villette (city and novel) the governess’s irremediable historical and social dislocation is at once literalized and translated into a condition of historically visionary possibilities’ (354).

Gaskell’s North and South tells a slightly different urban story. The novel traces the evolution of an educated female outsider who is suddenly confronted with the world of industry and commerce burgeoning in a rapidly developing urban centre. Mixed sensations of amazement, disorientation and alienation dominate Margaret’s first encounter with Milton Northern, which due to smoke and congestion – of a type she had never come across before – evokes images of the Inferno:

For several miles before they reached Milton, they saw a deep lead-coloured cloud hanging over the horizon in the direction in which it lay. It was all the darker from contrast with the pale grey-blue of the wintry sky … the air had a faint taste and smell of smoke; perhaps, after all, more of a loss of the fragrance of grass and herbage than any positive taste or smell. Quickly they were whirled over long, straight, hopeless streets of regularly-built houses …

(Gaskel 66)

Later on, M...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Contents
• Acknowledgements
• Prologue: Mapping the Urban Imaginary
• 1. Women’s Urban Modernity: Brontë, Gaskell and Woolf
• 2. The Psychic Spaces of Michèle Roberts’ Paper City
• 3. Cartographies of Identity in Maitland’s Three Times Table and Lessing’s London Observed
• 4. The ‘Terror of This City’: Re-mapping The Golden Notebook
• 5. De Imitatione Mariae and the New Daughters of London
• 6. Unnerving the Secular Imagination: Spatial Politics in Lessing’s Sufi Utopia
• Epilogue – Revising Urban Geography
• Notes
• Works Cited
• Index