‘the_Sublime_Escapes_the_Limits_of_Representation’_(Nicola_Trott)._Discuss_the_Role_of_the_Sublime_in_Romantic_and_or_Gothic_Writing.

‘The sublime escapes the limits of representation’ (Nicola Trott). Discuss the role of the sublime in Romantic and/or Gothic writing. The aim of this assignment is to research and discuss what the sublime is and how it can be applied to Frankenstein by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley and The Rime of the Ancient Mariner by Samuel Taylor Coleridge. Edmund Burke believes that ‘whatever is fitted in any sort to excite the ideas of pain and danger, whatever is in any sort terrible, or is conversant about terrible objects, or operates in a manner analogous to terror, is a source of sublime’. It could be argued that he believes anything that causes someone extreme pain or terror that cannot be described, or that cannot be put into words as it is beyond their imagination is the sublime. Immanuel Kant however believes that ‘the sublime is not an attribute of the object but an attribute of the mind’s response to it’. He could be suggesting that it is not the object that causes the horror but how the individual’s mind responds to it. It could be argued that each person is different and will be affected by things differently. Freud states that ‘people differ greatly in their sensitivity’. For example what one person finds horrific, another may not. According to Dr. Amy Culley, ‘for Burke, the beautiful is associated with feelings of pleasure and social relationships, that it is characterised by smallness, smoothness and delicacy and inspires love and also that in ‘contrast to this, the sublime association with feelings of terror or pain by the solitary individual, it is characterized by huge size and infinite space’. It could be suggested here that anything small or beautiful would not be considered sublime as it could be believed that it would not be possible to have something so beautiful or magnificent that it could not be put into words, however this may not always be the case when speaking about nature. Burke states that ‘Magnificence is likewise a source of the sublime. A great profusion of things, which are splendid or valuable in themselves, is magnificence’. He also states that ‘we can become amazed and confounded at the wonders of minuteness; or can we distinguish in its effect of littleness from the vast itself’. It could be suggested that it escapes representation because to be amazed or horrified beyond speech would not enable our minds to comprehend it and therefore becomes unrepresentable. It could be suggested that within Frankenstein the sublime could be applied to the monster due to his deformity. Burke states that ‘deformity is opposed not to beauty, but to the complete, common form’ . It could be argued that it is the human form we know and see every day that is the ‘norm’. Therefore when a deformity is present, like the hugeness and ugliness of the monster, this then becomes a deformity to the form we know. Burke gives an example as ‘ if the back be humped, the man is deformed; because his back has an unusual figure....we say he is deformed in that part, because men are not commonly made in that manner’. The sublime could be applied to the first description given of the monster. Shelley writes: ' his yellow skin scarcely covered the work of muscles and arteries beneath; his hair was of a lustrous black, and flowing; his teeth of a pearly whiteness: but these luxuriance’s only formed a more horrid contrast with his watery eyes, that seemed almost the same colour as the dun-white sockets in which they were set, his shrivelled complexion and straight black lips'. It could be argued that this gives the familiar description we would expect for certain parts of a human but at the same time we are told of unfamiliar and horrific features which could make the mind think it is seeing something terrible. It could be argued that there is a fine line between the sublime and the uncanny. It could be suggested that the uncanny is something with which we are familiar with but at the same time have unfamiliar feelings or fears about. Ed Cameron states that ‘critics have always noted the close relation between the sublime monstrosity of Gothic fiction and the uncanny as a particular form of the frightening’. He believes that: ‘Harold Bloom blatantly claims both that Freud’s essay The Uncanny outlines Freud’s theory of the sublime and that Freud’s essay is the only major contribution that the twentieth century has made to the aesthetics of the sublime’. It could be argued that when attempting to describe the sublime in literature, it may be something that is familiar to the surroundings or familiar within everyday life, but at the same time becomes frightening or fearful to us due to an unfamiliar addition or fearful feeling that suddenly becomes apparent. Again this could be the case with the monster in Frankenstein: the human form being the familiar and the deformities become the unfamiliar. When applying the sublime to Frankenstein, and attempting to describe unexplainable horror, it could be argued that it becomes apparent when the monster is first invented. Shelly writes, ‘I saw the dull yellow eye of the creature open; it breathed hard, and a convulsive motion agitated its limbs. How can I describe my emotions at this catastrophe...’ . This could be Frankenstein’s way of trying to say that he did not know how to put his emotions, horror and feelings into words and is therefore an example of the sublime being used within the text because it has escaped the limits of representation: his mind cannot find the words to express his feelings. A further example of the sublime being applied within Frankenstien is when the monster is telling his story and how he became able to speak and understand human people. He observes a family, hidden in a shelter, and becomes self taught in how to live, speak and read. He finds some books from which he learns about the humans, Shelly writes, ‘I can hardly describe to you the effect of these books. They produced me an infinity of new images and feelings, that sometimes raised me to ecstasy, but frequently sunk me into the lowest dejection’. This could be emotions being felt that are beyond words however it could also be that the monster is not human and is therefore incapable of feelings and emotions and not able to find words to describe anything. Therefore it is beyond representation not because of the horror and terror but because of the strangeness as his mind is unable to comprehend anything. When applying the sublime to The Mariner, it could be argued that when Coleridge writes ‘The Wedding-Guest sat on a stone: He cannot choose but hear;’ he is attempting to say that the wedding guest was in such terror of the Mariner that he was unable to speak. We have already been told he can speak when he states ‘Hold off! Unhand me, grey-beard loon!’. We know he has the ability to speak but Coleridge is attempting to tell us that he is in some kind of trance and unable to do anything but listen through sheer terror of the man in front of him. Fred Botting states that ‘objects which evoke the sublime emotions are vast, magnificent and obscure’. He goes on to state that ‘loudness and sudden contrasts, like the play of light and dark in buildings, contributed to the sense of extension and infinity are associated with the sublime’. It could be argued that the sublime can be applied to the landscape in both texts. In the beginning of Frankenstein, Shelley writes about the vast landscape. She writes ‘we were nearly surrounded by ice, which closed in the ship on all sides’ and also ‘about two o’clock the mist cleared away and we beheld, stretched out in every direction, vast and irregular plains of ice, which seemed to have no end’. It could be suggested that no matter which direction they looked in, they could see nothing but ice. They say that it was vast and seemed to have no end and therefore it could be presumed that ice is the only thing the eye could see but at the same time be a magnificent sight to see. This could be interpreted in the same way when in The Mariner Coleridge writes, ‘the ice was here, the ice was there, The ice was all around’. The repetition of the words could be showing that it is beyond representation as it symbolises that Coleridge could not find any other words to describe the vastness or amount of ice that could be seen. It could also be suggested that the sublime could be applied to such terror as a storm occurring at sea. This could be applied to The Mariner when Coleridge writes ‘ And now the STORM BLAST came, he was tyrannous and strong: He struck with o’ertaking wings, And. It could be suggested here that the storm is being emphasised when written in capital letters, which could also be an indication that Coleridge himself was unable to find the words to describe the storm. The storm is described as being tyrannous and strong, almost dinosaur and monster like. When a death occurs within literature it could be argued that when attempting to explain or describe how a person feels and their emotions are also when the sublime could be applied. Death occurs on a number of occasions throughout Frankenstein and also as a mass death scene within The Mariner. When applying the sublime to the death scene of his mother in Frankenstein, Shelly writes ‘I need not describe the feelings of those dearest ties are rent by the most irreparable evil..’. It could be argued that both the writer and the character are unable to describe how they feel due to this sudden and painful death. It could be suggested that the sublime becomes apparent in The Mariner at the apparent death of all the shipmates on the ship. The Marnier describes the death of the shipmates by stating, ‘One after one, by the star-dogged Moon, Too quick for groan or sigh, Each turned his face with a ghastly pang, And cursed me with his eye’. It could be argued that the word ghastly suggests he is unable to put into words how terrible the scene actually is. It could be argued that to describe death he attempts to use language associated with terror and horror to represent death. On reflection of the sublime it could be argued that there are no boundaries as to when the sublime occurs or that there is no one thing that would cause the sublime to occur. It could be argued that it is a paradox to represent something that is unrepresentable and therefore if we are to believe Burke in that the sublime goes beyond representation as it cannot be put into words or expressed, how then do authors represent the sublime within their texts' Writers still find a way of describing what they want to say to the readers. This would follow Kant’s theory that it is the individual’s mind that makes the representation. If the mind is able to think of ways to express or describe then this would enable something to be represented, it is only when the mind is unable to comprehend something that it becomes beyond representation, imagination and therefore it would become the sublime. Word Count: 2201 Bibliography Bloom Harold, Freud and the Poetic Sublime: A Catastrophe Theory of Creativity, in Freud: A Collection of Critical Essays, ed. Perry Meisel (Englewood Cliffs: Prentice Hall,1981), p. 218. Botting Fred. Gothic. The New Critical Idiom. (Oxon, Routledge, 1996) Burke Edmund. A Philosophical Inquiry into the Origins of our Ideas of the Sublime and Beautiful. (Dover: Kessinger Publishing, 2008). Cameron Ed. Ironic Escapism in the Symbolic Spread of Gothic Materialist Meaning. University of Texas Pan-American (2008) Carson Jamin, ‘The Sublime and Education’, The Journal of Aesthetic Education, 40 (2006) Coleridge Taylor Samuel. The Rime of the Ancient Mariner. (United States:Doverpublications, 1834). Culley Amy. Lecture on the Sublime and Frankenstein. (University of Lincoln, 2013) Fredricks N, ‘On the Sublime and Beautiful in Shelley’s Frankenstein’, Essays in Literature – Illinois, 23 (1996) Freeman Barbara, ‘Frankenstein with Kant: A Theory of Monstrosity, or the Monstrosity of Theory’, Substance, 16 (1987) Freud Sigmund. The Uncanny. (London:Penguin Books, 2003). Freud Sigmund, The Uncanny, in The Standard Edition of the Complete Psychological Works of Sigmund Freud, trans. and ed. James Strachey (London: Hogarth Press, 1955),Vol. XVII, pp. 217–55. Kant Immanuel, Critique of Pure Reason (London: Penguin Modern Classics, 2007) Padley Jonathan, ‘Frankenstein and (sublime) creation’, Romanticism, 9 (2003) Shelly Wollsteonecraft Mary. Frankenstein. (London: Wordsworth Editions, 1993) Vine Steve, ‘Mary Shelley’s Sublime Bodies:Frankenstein, Matilda, The Last Man’, Oxford Journals,55 (2006) -------------------------------------------- [ 1 ]. Samuel Taylor Coleridge ‘The Rime of the Ancient Mariner’. (United States:Doverpublications, 1834): The version of this poem that will be used throughout this assignment is the text of 1834. Subsequent references are to this edition and incorporated in the text. All subsequent references will be referred to as The Mariner [ 2 ]. Edmund Burke. A Philosophical Inquiry into the Origins of our Ideas of the Sublime and Beautiful. (Dover: Kessinger Publishing, 2008) p82 [ 3 ]. Dr Amy Culley. Lecture on the Sublime and Frankenstein. (University of Lincoln, 2013) [ 4 ]. Sigmund Freud. The Uncanny (London:Penguin Books, 2003) p124 [ 5 ]. Amy Culley. Lecture on the Sublime and Frankenstein. (University of Lincoln, 2013) [ 6 ]. Amy Culley. Lecture on the Sublime and Frankenstein. (University of Lincoln, 2013) [ 7 ]. Edmund Burke. A Philosophical Inquiry into the Origins of our Ideas of the Sublime and Beautiful. (Dover: Kessinger Publishing, 2008) p117 [ 8 ]. Edmund Burke. A Philosophical Inquiry into the Origins of our Ideas of the Sublime and Beautiful. (Dover: Kessinger Publishing, 2008)p 113 [ 9 ]. Edmund Burke. A Philosophical Inquiry into the Origins of our Ideas of the Sublime and Beautiful. (Dover: Kessinger Publishing, 2008)pp138-139 [ 10 ]. Edmund Burke. A Philosophical Inquiry into the Origins of our Ideas of the Sublime and Beautiful. (Dover: Kessinger Publishing, 2008)p138 [ 11 ]. Mary Wollstonecraft Shelly. Frankenstein. (London: Wordsworth Editions, 1993). Ch 5. Para 2. Lines 2-4 [ 12 ]. Ed Cameron. Ironic Escapism in the Symbolic Spread of Gothic Materialist Meaning. University of Texas Pan-American (2008) [ 13 ]. Ed Cameron. Ironic Escapism in the Symbolic Spread of Gothic Materialist Meaning. University of Texas Pan-American (2008) [ 14 ]. Mary Wollstonecraft Shelly. Frankenstein. (London: Wordsworth Editions, 1993) Ch. 5. Para 1. Line 3 [ 15 ]. Mary Wollsteonecraft Shelly. Frankenstein. (London: Wordsworth Editions, 1993) Kindle loc 1580 [ 16 ]. Samuel Taylor Coleridge ‘The Rime of the Ancient Mariner’. (United States:Doverpublications, 1834) Part 1, Line 17-18 [ 17 ]. Samuel Taylor Coleridge ‘The Rime of the Ancient Mariner’. (United States:Doverpublications, 1834), part 1, Line 11 [ 18 ]. Fred Botting Gothic.(London: Routledge, 1996) p39 [ 19 ]. Fred Botting. Gothic. (London, Routledge, 1996) p39 [ 20 ]. Mary Wollstonecraft Shelly. Frankenstein. (London: Wordsworth Editions, 1993) Letter 4, para 4 lines 1-2 [ 21 ]. Mary Wollstonecraft Shelly. Frankenstein. (London: Wordsworth Editions, 1993) Letter4, para 3,Line 1 [ 22 ]. Samuel Taylor Coleridge ‘The Rime of the Ancient Mariner’. (United States:Doverpublications, 1834) Part 1, Lines 55-60 [ 23 ]. Samuel Taylor Coleridge ‘The Rime of the Ancient Mariner’. (United States:Doverpublications, 1834)Part 1, Lines 41-44 [ 24 ]. Mary Shelly Wollstonecraft. Frankenstein. (London: Wordsworth Editions, 1993) ch.3 para 2. [ 25 ]. Samuel Taylor Coleridge ‘The Rime of the Ancient Mariner’. (United States:Doverpublications, 1834) part III l. 70-74