Camille's Voyeurism

Michel Foucault, in The History of Sexuality, argues that the concepts of power and pleasure are intertwined. In the given excerpt from Herculine Barbin, both narrator Camille and her “sister”/lover, Sara, are teachers at a religious boarding school in nineteenth-century France, thus being forced to keep their relationship a secret. One religious figure of authority at the school, Abbé H., plays a significant role in the dynamic between the two women as confessor and religious guide. The codependent nature of power and pleasure makes it so that Abbé H. derives pleasure from the power he holds through his voyeurism and by knowing the truth; Camille experiences pleasure from the secret, sometimes even bordering on overt, relationship she has …show more content…
plays a crucial role in engaging in and fueling the dynamic of power and pleasure among all three individuals. Camille’s confession to the curé, to which he reacts scornfully, brings about rumors and close scrutiny from the students. However, Camille’s reaction is unexpected, yet also completely expected considering Foucault’s argument: “The false exceptional situation in which I found myself made me feel this ferocious inflexibility all the more, because I had the greatest need of indulgence” (Barbin 55). Instead of being deterred and ashamed after the situation with Abbé H., she feels a strong need to continue to indulge in her affair with Sara, almost out of stubborness, it seems. The abbé, as a religious and therefore moral figure of authority, has the option to tell Madame P., or any other adult in the school, about Camille’s confession, but he does not. Instead, he chooses to spy on them. She writes, “To make up to himself for our silence toward him, he had invented a form of espionage, the most painful of all…. he adroitly succeeded in having [the children] give him a detailed account of all our activities” (Barbin 65). His power over them gives him more pleasure than calling them out would. This behavior, aside from being creepy, is odd considering how disgusted he seemed when Camille confessed to him. Perhaps it is that he takes great pleasure in having power or control over them, as one of the few to know of their relationship. The need to know exactly what they are doing gives him pleasure as well because as the confessor and moral authority, he feels he can judge them for their actions and feel morally superior. Still, the addition of having children as mediators in this situation is just as creepy as it is strange. Maybe that, too, is something which brings him pleasure - the power he has over the children to do his bidding. Anyway, this constant form of