Authors are artists. They create worlds and can depict anything the imagination fancies, all with a pen and paper. However, is the role of an author that of ego or benevolence? This question is examined in both Charles Brockden Brown’s Wieland and Catharine Sedgwick’s Cacoethes Scribendi. Carwin’s confession to Clara and the emphasis on the act of writing, as demonstrated through the epistolary aspects of Wieland, reveal Brown’s own metaphorical commentary on the role of an author as one of both vulnerability and authority while he too mimics unfamiliar voices. This question is similarly seen in Sedgwick’s Cacoethes Scribendi through Mrs. Courland and Alice, where Sedgwick criticizes certain styles of writing while also depicting the adverse
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In the opening of the novel, Clara writes, “Listen to my narrative, and then say what it is that has made me deserve to be placed on this dreadful eminence, if, indeed, every faculty be not suspended in wonder that I am still alive, and am able to relate it.” (Brown 6) As the author, she is bearing herself to her audience, presenting them with an acquisition to judge the author, her, as to whether the events she has experienced were deserved or not. She expects judgement from the audience, and capitalizes on it by welcoming differing perspectives and judgements. Clara’s role as an author is further defined by Carwin, when he says to her, “’You have written. You know that in this volume the key to your inmost soul is contained.’” (Brown 235) He tells Clara that she had written her soul into her work, suggesting that the role of the author is to write what speaks to one’s soul and allow oneself to be captured within their work. At least, this is what Clara has done in her writing. This notion is further explored through Clara’s other proclamations about her writing, especially she says, “Let my last energies support me in the finishing of this task. Then will I lay don my head in the nap of death.” (Brown 252) She defines the act of writing as a final duty before death, attesting to the tangibility, finality, and cathartic …show more content…
Courland’s sentimental writing about the village H and its inhabitants (Sedgwick 174 and 178) reveal another aspect of the relationship between author and subject— the ability to make what one depicts as favorable or gruesome as possible, despite reality. The author is as much an artist as any other, either polishing or contorting their subjects at will. This is reinforced when it is revealed that for Alice, “Every act of kindness, every deed of charity, she had ever performed, were produced to the public.” (Sedgwick 175-176). She is a spectacle. Alice is trapped in her mother’s writings, while Mrs. Courland also merely imitates life, rather than innovating and creating with her own imagination. She can only depict what she knows concretely. Sedgwick offers a critique of realism in this, suggesting that time would more fruitfully be dedicated on more engaging works of fantasy, similar to Brown’s critique of Clara as an author.
Alice changes due to being depicted unwillingly. She, “grew afraid to speak or to act, and… she became as silent and stiff as a statue.” (Sedgwick 176) Alice’s private life being made public leaves her almost catatonic and unable to approach any literature (Sedgwick 176). This is the suffering of the subject portrayed unwillingly, scared that their next action will be documented and
In the opening of the novel, Clara writes, “Listen to my narrative, and then say what it is that has made me deserve to be placed on this dreadful eminence, if, indeed, every faculty be not suspended in wonder that I am still alive, and am able to relate it.” (Brown 6) As the author, she is bearing herself to her audience, presenting them with an acquisition to judge the author, her, as to whether the events she has experienced were deserved or not. She expects judgement from the audience, and capitalizes on it by welcoming differing perspectives and judgements. Clara’s role as an author is further defined by Carwin, when he says to her, “’You have written. You know that in this volume the key to your inmost soul is contained.’” (Brown 235) He tells Clara that she had written her soul into her work, suggesting that the role of the author is to write what speaks to one’s soul and allow oneself to be captured within their work. At least, this is what Clara has done in her writing. This notion is further explored through Clara’s other proclamations about her writing, especially she says, “Let my last energies support me in the finishing of this task. Then will I lay don my head in the nap of death.” (Brown 252) She defines the act of writing as a final duty before death, attesting to the tangibility, finality, and cathartic …show more content…
Courland’s sentimental writing about the village H and its inhabitants (Sedgwick 174 and 178) reveal another aspect of the relationship between author and subject— the ability to make what one depicts as favorable or gruesome as possible, despite reality. The author is as much an artist as any other, either polishing or contorting their subjects at will. This is reinforced when it is revealed that for Alice, “Every act of kindness, every deed of charity, she had ever performed, were produced to the public.” (Sedgwick 175-176). She is a spectacle. Alice is trapped in her mother’s writings, while Mrs. Courland also merely imitates life, rather than innovating and creating with her own imagination. She can only depict what she knows concretely. Sedgwick offers a critique of realism in this, suggesting that time would more fruitfully be dedicated on more engaging works of fantasy, similar to Brown’s critique of Clara as an author.
Alice changes due to being depicted unwillingly. She, “grew afraid to speak or to act, and… she became as silent and stiff as a statue.” (Sedgwick 176) Alice’s private life being made public leaves her almost catatonic and unable to approach any literature (Sedgwick 176). This is the suffering of the subject portrayed unwillingly, scared that their next action will be documented and