危命行走街頭：維吉妮亞·吳爾芙的身體受弱性與基進平等

Abstract

本論文主要以茱蒂絲・巴特勒的危命與身體受弱性概念為框架，開展維吉妮亞・吳爾芙行走街頭之美學、倫理與政治意涵。以身體受到各種無法自主掌控的街頭環境氛圍和偶然遭逢的影響為出發點，本論文試圖概念化吳爾芙的「危命行走街頭」，並重新思考陽剛男子氣概與人本中心定義下的主體性。本論文認為吳爾芙暴露行走主體閾限的同時，不僅擁抱一種新型態的受弱主體性，也重新想像危命共群的可能性，藉以批判政治力量造成之危命不平等分配與父權邏輯下的性別指派。 雖然吳爾芙對於父權社會不公不義的批判與巴特勒有諸多不謀而合的面向，然而，有別於巴特勒從街頭抗爭政治發展而來的理論概念連貫性，本文認為吳爾芙行走街頭的美學思路更加充滿不確定性與開放性，更能體現身體受弱性。除了探討其字面意涵，本論文更以危命行走街頭為轉喻，討論吳爾芙美學游離不定、偏移常規的被動性書寫與抵抗潛能。本論文共有四章節。第一章以巴特勒「出離」的雙重概念，探討吳爾芙短篇散文〈街頭閒逛〉中行走倫敦街頭的敘事者如何出離自我與家屋場景，成為觀看各種驚嚇街頭場景之「巨大之眼」。本章認為，此「巨大之眼」展示的並非視覺器官之陽剛優越性，而是一種身體受弱性的主、被動性辯證與凝視苦難的倫理回應。第二章以巴特勒探討生命的可哀悼性，凸顯《達洛威夫人》的行走街頭敘事中，個人與共群之間的分合辯證。本章將著重討論街頭氛圍如何作用在角色之感官接收性（尤其是聽覺），並挑起愛國主義式的共群情感。本章認為該小說不僅批判建立於國族認同的共群概念，更藉由對於生命消逝之未來完成式哀悼，提出另類的危命共群想像。第三章以「這條狗就是這條路」的創造性連結，討論吳爾芙狗傳記《福樂喜》中人命與狗命之價值認定，並論證人與非人動物之情動平等。本章以德勒茲的流變概念與巴特勒身體受弱性概念，討論書中英國與義大利城市氣候與街頭氛圍之差異，以及其對於人與非人動物之影響。第四章以身體受弱性重新思考《自己的房間》中提出的「雌雄同體」寫作概念。敘事者行走街頭時所遭逢的人事物，不斷迫使她經歷思想變化更新，並修改原先關於男女兩性對立之預設，轉而關注事物本身之關係性。如同敘事者所示，倫敦街上有極其無名隱匿的生命，尚未被人類歷史記錄。吳爾芙的負擔即書寫這些不被認可為生命的生命。本章試圖論述，雌雄同體書寫模式不僅是美學的表現，更與吳爾芙對無名隱匿生命之倫理關注息息相關。 簡言之，本論文認為探討吳爾芙危命行走街頭的多重意涵，有助於重新思考其美學實踐、倫理關懷與政治批判的關聯性。本論文認為吳爾芙的文本在探問生命價值認可框架背後的權力部署時，亦展現了非人本中心之危命平等體認。而此危命平等的體認，則攸關著我們在遭逢他者時的倫理回應，以及可能由此延伸出保護他者生命的倫理責任。有別於以往評論所建立的病弱吳爾芙形象，本論文不僅試圖消解強弱之二元對立，更希望藉由新型態的受弱主體性，凸顯吳爾芙美學所欲勾勒的基進平等。

This dissertation intends to unfold the aesthetic, ethical and political significance of Virginia Woolf’s streetwalking with Judith Butler’s theoretical framework of precarious life and bodily vulnerability. By conceptualizing precarious streetwalking in Woolf, this dissertation argues that a body’s unwilled susceptibility and openness to street milieus and chance encounters have called into question the masculinist and anthropocentric definition of subjectivity. In exposing a subject’s limit in the midst of walking, Woolf not only embraces a new mode of vulnerable subjectivity but also reimagines the possibilities of a precarious community that is oriented toward a political critique of the unequal distribution of precarity and gender assignment induced by the patriarchal society. While Woolf shares similar concerns with Butler in her political critique of patriarchal society, this dissertation contends that Woolf’s aesthetics of streetwalking, unlike the conceptual consistency in Butler’s politics of street protesting, is more uncertain, open, and vulnerable. Apart from dwelling upon the literal sense of streetwalking, this dissertation also treats it as a metonymy of Woolf’s aesthetics, which is characterized by its vulner-ability to write its own passivity and to deviate from the im/proper place. This dissertation is structured into four chapters. In chapter one “‘We Are No Longer Quite Ourselves’: Dispossession and Ethical Responsiveness in ‘Street Haunting: A London Adventure,’” I will discuss the question of subjectivity through Judith Butler’s dual explication of “dispossession.” In the midst of streetwalking in London, the narrator becomes “an enormous eye” in the face of alterity and street shocks. By problematizing the perceiving eye, this chapter argues that the enormous eye does not reiterate the primacy of vision; rather, it reveals the tension between agency and passivity in bodily vulnerability and the possibilities of ethical responsiveness regarding the suffering in the streets. In chapter two “‘Odd Affinities’: Toward an Ethics of Precarious Community in Mrs. Dalloway,” I will demonstrate Woolf’s ironic treatment of the capacity of the street milieus to affect the characters’ sensory receptivity (especially auditory) and to mobilize patriotic sentiments and communal spirits. In light of Butler’s thoughts on mourning and grievable life, I attempt to unravel the novel’s embrace of an alternative idea of community, which is based upon the ecstatic relationality rather than the exclusionary matrix of patriotic community, gender assignment or class. In chapter three “‘This Dog Is the Road’: Affectivity and Vulnerability as Radical Equality in Flush,” I attempt to investigate the relation between human and animal, their mutual enfolding/unfolding with the external environment, and the contrasts between London and Italian city milieus through the lens of both Deleuzian becoming and Butlerian vulnerability. This chapter argues that the equality of human and animal lies in their respective affectivity and vulnerability in the world. In the final chapter “‘Infinitely Obscure Lives’ in the Streets: Rethinking Androgyny in A Room of One’s Own,” I will examine Woolf’s ethical concern with the infinitely obscure lives in the streets and the gradual shift of her concern from women to the thing in itself during walking. As Woolf urgently points out, there are “infinitely obscure lives” in the streets of London, which remain unrecorded in human history. To give life to the lives that are denied life, or simply to make them appear in her writing thus turns out to be Woolf’s burden. That is also the reason why Woolf suggests that the best mind for writing is the androgynous mind. Overall, this dissertation reconsiders the connections between Woolf’s aesthetic practice, ethical concern, and political critique through the discussion of precarious streetwalking. By interrogating the power deployment behind the frames of recognition regarding whose lives are more valuable, this dissertation demonstrates Woolf’s non-anthropocentric tendency to apprehend life as equally precarious. In this sense, our shared precariousness also establishes a basic principle of equality, which in turn may awaken our ethical responsiveness to alterity—which is not absolutely different from but cohabits with and co-constitutes our lives—and induce certain responsibility for the preservation of lives. Departing from certain criticisms’ construction of Woolf as a mentally-ill invalid, this dissertation not only challenges this dualist divide between strength and weakness but also hopes to affirm Woolf’s embrace of radical equality in vulnerability.