Az Eszterházy Károly Tanárképző Főiskola Tudományos Közleményei. 2004. Vol. 4. Eger Journal of English Studies. (Acta Academiae Paedagogicae Agriensis : Nova series ; Tom. 30)
ANGELIKA REICHMANN Reading Wolf Solent Reading
Reading Wolf Solent Reading 51 The bow-window as an opening might be symbolic of his ambiguous position: he is inside but would like to enjoy the pleasures of being a spectator, or to use a word with even more obvious sexual connotations, a voyeur 1 3. Conspicuously, the view of the sea from the window implies a very similar imagery to that of the "dark waters of [Wolf's] consciousness", which is more than reminiscent of the imagery of the oceanic 1 4 feeling related to the Freudian concept of the death wish. This symbolism is deepened by the relationship of the location with Wolf's 'mythology' and reading, which also seem to be metaphorically related to each other in their turn by sharing a number of common qualities. They lack any practical value according to the social norms and make Wolf, who indulges in them, an outsider and a transgressor; they yield solitary autoerotic pleasure; and they serve as an escape from the traumatic experience of his parents' stormy marriage, the "shameful scenes" which might correspond to the "page of shame" (Lacan, The Language of the Self 24) that seems to be forgotten but must return, and finally, they become the sublimation of his frustrated (incestuous) sexual desire 1 5. Thereby, Wolf's 'mythology', as it is also implied by the expression "secret vice" that he uses for it, turns out to be a metaphor for the "short circuit" of incest which closes narratives —and reading —prematurely and finally (Brooks, Reading for the Plot 109). It is the de(construction of this closed narrative —the story of Wolf Solent as a mythic hero in his own imagination —which he experiences as the tragic death of his 'mythology' and the annihilation of his identity. Significantly, the story does not end here. The third link to the unconscious is a metaphorical connection between looking out of the window and reading in the more general sense of the word, established here and developed in the rest of the text. Windows and words, language, seem to function in a very similar way for Wolf Solent, both providing frames that not only limit his vision and thereby slice out a portion of the world that is perceivable, but actually create signs from otherwise meaningless objects by the continuously changing and often "Beyond the Pleasure Principle", "The Ego and the Id" and Other Works, The Pelican Freud Library , Vol. 11, ed. Angela Richards, trans. James Stratchey (Harmondsworth, Penguin Books, 1984). 1 Cf. the reader as a voyeur in Roland Barthes, The Pleasure of the Text, trans. Richard Miller (London: Basil Blackwell, 1995), 17. 1 4 Cf. Sigmund Freud, Civilization and its Discontents, ed. and trans. James Stratchey (New York, London, W. W. Norton and Company, 1989). 1 5 Ibid.
