喬治•艾利略的《丹尼爾•德隆達》中的女性自我管理

Abstract

本篇論文探討喬治•艾利略的《丹尼爾•德隆達》中女主角關德琳對十九世紀物質生活困境中的自我管理。受到當時自由主義與「自救」文化的影響，關德琳透過計算利益與風險掌控生活。關德琳如此的自我管理機制象徵著初期女性經濟人的行為模式，透露資本經濟對於女性思維與自我管理的影響。使用「女性自我管理」一詞目的在於點出當時女性對於物質文化的意識覺醒，在此不僅幫助我們了解女性與男性的社會地位差異所影響的自我認同，同時也特別強調了女性對於物質社會的認知以及兩者間的互動。 我主張關德琳對於所處社會與其身分的認知是建構在她個人利益的狀態。某種程度上，我們可說關德琳象徵著十九世紀中葉開始出現的新女性，他們主動追求自我利益，帶給維多利亞時代父權極大的衝擊並使其企圖反制這樣的女性意識。《丹尼爾•德隆達》的敘事點出關德琳自我管理的契機來自於她受損的自我利益。一方面她不再以男性附屬品的角度來理解利益，利益對關德琳而言是身為一個獨立自主的女性的物質內涵；另一方面在維多利亞父權主義的影響下，關德琳的物質利益必須要與傳統性別意識妥協以避免風險。 在《丹尼爾•德隆達》中，休閒活動與婚姻為最主要女性自我管理的兩個項目。透過使用「表演的經濟利益」，關德琳得以利用展演維多利亞性別意識型態中理想的女性來滿足物質慾望。在她追求休閒活動權益的過程中，她宣傳自己的女性形象來確立利益，但是這樣的自我管理方式一旦進入婚姻的框架，她所商品化的女性身體便失去經濟價值。我認為小說的結尾似乎暗示了維多利亞時期的婚姻制度即是此時期女性經濟人發展的瓶頸，若關德琳的利益能夠如同男性經濟人一般不受社會輿論限制，她必須不再接受婚姻為女性自我利益的主要社會機制。

This thesis attempts to examine and theorize Gwendolen Harleth’s active intervention in her life characterized by incessant crises in George Eliot’s Daniel Deronda. Gwendolen, living under the influence of liberalism and self-help, aspired to take control of her life by speculating interests and risks. Representative of a prototypical female homo economicus (or economic woman), she manifested the ways capitalistic economy affects women in terms of the idea of self-interest. Incorporating this historical significance of such an awakening, the term “women’s self-management” used here is intended not only to distinguish women’s particular social position from men’s, but also to emphasize the aspect of her interaction with and perception of the material world. I argue that Gwendolen perceives the public world and her identity in relation to the status of her self-interest. What I find is that Gwendolen epitomizes the advent of a group of new women in the mid-century, who were active supporters of their self-interest and against whom Victorian society in this period began to confront and venture to contain. As the narrative shows, the need to self-manage is triggered by Gwendolen’s perception of her impaired self-interest. While being acutely aware of her interest as an “individual woman,” Gwendolen also has to consider the risk of offending the conventional gender ideology that is quick to deny women’s material desires. Featuring in the novel as two dominant sites of self-management, leisure and marriage provide rather opposite results of her effort. Resorting to what I call “economics of performing,” I believe Gwendolen constantly exploits the gender ideology to extract the value of her female body for her economic benefit. Whilst with leisure she is able to fulfill her desire through promoting her femininity, marriage on the other hand negates her marriageability and as a result her self-interest is forced to lapse into compromisation with the social norms. At the end of the novel, it is suggested that the marriage as governed by Victorian logic serves as the ultimate boundary for economic woman, whose self-interest must renounce marriage as its primary expression.