Bras, ravages et barrages dans The Mill on the Floss
The word « arm » seems to be a key-signifier in the novel : it appears for the first time in the introductory chapter, in the shift from the arms of the narrator resting on the cold stone of the bridge to the arms benumbed with pressing on the arms of the chair. The letters of « arm » may also be tr...
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| Vydáno v: | URI:https://journals.openedition.org/cve, |
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| Hlavní autor: | |
| Médium: | Article ou chapitre numérique |
| Jazyk: | Français |
| Vydáno: |
Cahiers victoriens et édouardiens
2025
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| On-line přístup: | Accès Université d'Orléans et IFPM Accès Université d'Orléans et IFPM |
| Shrnutí: | The word « arm » seems to be a key-signifier in the novel : it appears for the first time in the introductory chapter, in the shift from the arms of the narrator resting on the cold stone of the bridge to the arms benumbed with pressing on the arms of the chair. The letters of « arm » may also be traced in the word « embrace », which announces the doom that awaits Maggie and Tom. As the narrative unfolds, it repeatedly focuses on the arm, Maggie’s arm in most cases, in the series of love mainly. A study of this paradigm helps us to understand what is Maggie’s true desire when she foresakes Stephen and chooses a life of self-renunciation such as the one praised by Thomas à-Kempis. The joy-in-death, the ecstatic moment when Maggie and Tom become one, is the consummation towards which the narrative has been tending from the very beginning. An unspeakable « jouissance » is released, but the conclusion comes to restore order and bar « jouissance ». The poetics of the text are the marks left by this lost « jouissance » and its ravages, the only audible and visible trace left on the face of the text by the deadly embrace in which Maggie and Tom have disappeared. |
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