The
Seamstress is what I would characterize as the very best a
melodrama has to offer. Good characters are really good, society is full of
awful people, and our heroine honorably struggles through many trials and
tribulations. As one might expect the heroine is all things good and she has an
impossible description of her physical appearance to match. I was very struck
by the detailed and lengthy descriptions of Virginia’s beauty in the early
chapters as well. As Hannah has already pointed out, she seems existence as an
unattainable example of beauty that speaks the purity of her interiority. In my
experience, when the leading lady is impossibly beautiful and the world around
her is dank, dark, and chilling, this leads me to consider the Gothic implications of the text.
A writer who skillfully
employs the use of the Gothic in his writings on capitalism is Karl Marx,
specifically in his descriptions of capitalism as a vampire. Jason J. Morrissette, author of "Marxferatu: The Vampire Metaphor as a
Tool for Teaching Marx's Critique of Capitalism," explains Marx’s vampire
analogy as the “Capitalists are, in effect, draining away the value of their
workers’ labor to enrich themselves—just as supernatural vampires drain their
victims’ life force to grow stronger” (639). The opening scenes of the text
strongly indicate a vampiric relationship between Virginia and Mrs. Jackson.
Virginia works on a dress for 21 hours only to have her efforts and skill
undervalued significantly. Described as an invalid, Mrs. Jackson seems to be
stronger once Virginia gives her the red dress, as Virginia’s labor is
literally rejuvenating her. Jane, another servant of Mrs. Jackson’s, is
surprised at Virginia’s work ethic and the little regard she seems to have for
the longevity of her life: “But you won’t keep it up long miss—you’ll see you
won’t. It will kill you right off in a few years if you do “ (7). As Virginia
is set upon an errand by Mrs. Jackson that then escalates into her following
the exchange of money for the product she has created, she is able to see just
how much Mrs. Jackson has taken from her and how little she receives in return.
What is most striking is the description of Virginia’s labors over the dress.
The description seems to be similar to one affected by the power and attack of
a vampire (we’ll say Dracula for a contemporary reference):
But suddenly she starts from that waking trance:
the toil is over—the work is done . .
. The reaction now commences: the ebb of the tide of energies so unnaturally
forced in the same channel for so many hours, begins in terrible earnest. The
sensation is as if the warm blood were receding from the heart and flowing out of
the veins, bearing away all the vital powers on its crimson current. A feeling
of languor, painfully deepening into exhaustion, comes over the maiden. (6)
I
do not really know where to go with this Marxist vampire lurking about the
text, but I think I will be exploring it further in the longer paper.
Excellent observation! You're right to see both melodrama and the gothic at work here, and the connection you make to vampirism is astute. Reynolds's definitely represents the wealthy, as well as the middlewomen, as growing healthy as Virginia loses her health. The emphasis on her body, both its beauty and its deterioriation highlights the material effects of the economic system and the vampire dynamic. Great choice of passage. PS: It may be worth noting that Reynolds also intersects with Marx in seeing profit as representing labor rather than the risk of the investor.
ReplyDeleteKadee,
ReplyDeleteI think you make a fascinating connection between Gothic elements of the novel and Marx's usage of the vampire metaphor when discussing capitalism. I'm particularly interested in how this insight could work toward exploring Mrs. Jackson's power as employer as connected to her status as this "living-dead" invalid. It is interesting to see how what should be a weakness, her reliance on Virginia and her inability to do or make for herself, is transformed into a kind of strength or power over Virginia. This transformation would seem to not only provide a curious paradox at the heart of the novel, but also at the very heart of capitalism itself. I think this power of the "undead" over the living, how it arises and how it operates, would be a very fruitful direction to take this in.