‘…the Utopian impulse must respond to specific dilemmas and offer to solve fundamental social problems to which the Utopian believes himself to offer the key’ (Fredric Jameson, Archaeologies of the Future). To what extent do you agree that this is what Cavendish seeks to achieve in The Blazing World?
In a preambled note ‘To all Noble and Worthy Ladies’ Margaret Cavendish outlines the structure of The Blazing World by declaring “The First Part is Romancical; the Second, Philosophical; and the Third is meerly Fancy”. Through the agency of misdirection, Cavendish disregards two important ideologies which epitomise any reading of the Blazing World. These two unspoken dominant discourses are; the concept of seeking a utopia through feminism and …show more content…
In Marina Leslie’s essay Gender, Genre and The Utopian Body, Leslie critiques the existence of a ‘pathological profile’ which is presented by Frank and Fritzie Manuel. However, Leslie neglects this argument and the important question it raises. Is the Blazing World a depiction of Cavendish’s pathological profile as opposed to the reality of Cavendish’s utopian impulse? A pathological profile refers to a person who is compulsively motivated, often regarded as abnormal and is likely the symptom of a mental or physical disease. The existence of a pathological profile as opposed to a utopia is favourably supported by examples within The Blazing World. During one occurrence, The Empress destroys the bear men's telescopes announcing that the telescopes "instead of discovering the truth, delude your senses.” This compulsive and domineering statement communicates the Empress as having elements of a pathological profile. Additionally, the Empress’ declaration parallels both Margaret Cavendish's personal ideology and the novel’s historical context. Written during the period of the scientific revolution The Blazing World was originally produced as an appendix to another of her notable works 'Observations Upon Experimental Philosophy'. Within her philosophical novel she criticised the shortcomings of modern science, particularly focusing on the …show more content…
However this is within the confines of their mind. This presented ideology is self-restrictive and arguably contradicts the position that Cavendish's seeks to achieve an end goal of utopia and importantly hints at an absence of a utopian impulse. Despite her proud claims that she endeavours to be ‘Margaret the 1st’ within her notes to reader, she contradicts this earlier statement by weakly proceeding that everybody is capable of creating a utopia within their mind, a vast contrast from the strong imagery of Cavendish ruling and providing a fundamental solution to society in order to create a utopia. In Margaret Cavendish and the Exiles of the Mind, author Anna Battigelli suggests that rather than a literal ‘extravagant expression’ of desire for fame and power, Cavendish instead has “a philosophical positioning of the “self” that allows for an exploration of the problem of subjectivity”. Furthermore, by Cavendish’s claiming that The Blazing World is ‘fancy’ and as a creation solely made within her own mind. She exempts herself from any ‘objective certainty regarding the outside world’. Furthermore, there is no possible way of stating with objective certainty whether Cavendish has a utopian impulse as she prevents this discussion by cowaring from the statements which as she frequently
In a preambled note ‘To all Noble and Worthy Ladies’ Margaret Cavendish outlines the structure of The Blazing World by declaring “The First Part is Romancical; the Second, Philosophical; and the Third is meerly Fancy”. Through the agency of misdirection, Cavendish disregards two important ideologies which epitomise any reading of the Blazing World. These two unspoken dominant discourses are; the concept of seeking a utopia through feminism and …show more content…
In Marina Leslie’s essay Gender, Genre and The Utopian Body, Leslie critiques the existence of a ‘pathological profile’ which is presented by Frank and Fritzie Manuel. However, Leslie neglects this argument and the important question it raises. Is the Blazing World a depiction of Cavendish’s pathological profile as opposed to the reality of Cavendish’s utopian impulse? A pathological profile refers to a person who is compulsively motivated, often regarded as abnormal and is likely the symptom of a mental or physical disease. The existence of a pathological profile as opposed to a utopia is favourably supported by examples within The Blazing World. During one occurrence, The Empress destroys the bear men's telescopes announcing that the telescopes "instead of discovering the truth, delude your senses.” This compulsive and domineering statement communicates the Empress as having elements of a pathological profile. Additionally, the Empress’ declaration parallels both Margaret Cavendish's personal ideology and the novel’s historical context. Written during the period of the scientific revolution The Blazing World was originally produced as an appendix to another of her notable works 'Observations Upon Experimental Philosophy'. Within her philosophical novel she criticised the shortcomings of modern science, particularly focusing on the …show more content…
However this is within the confines of their mind. This presented ideology is self-restrictive and arguably contradicts the position that Cavendish's seeks to achieve an end goal of utopia and importantly hints at an absence of a utopian impulse. Despite her proud claims that she endeavours to be ‘Margaret the 1st’ within her notes to reader, she contradicts this earlier statement by weakly proceeding that everybody is capable of creating a utopia within their mind, a vast contrast from the strong imagery of Cavendish ruling and providing a fundamental solution to society in order to create a utopia. In Margaret Cavendish and the Exiles of the Mind, author Anna Battigelli suggests that rather than a literal ‘extravagant expression’ of desire for fame and power, Cavendish instead has “a philosophical positioning of the “self” that allows for an exploration of the problem of subjectivity”. Furthermore, by Cavendish’s claiming that The Blazing World is ‘fancy’ and as a creation solely made within her own mind. She exempts herself from any ‘objective certainty regarding the outside world’. Furthermore, there is no possible way of stating with objective certainty whether Cavendish has a utopian impulse as she prevents this discussion by cowaring from the statements which as she frequently