Supplemental Essay: "Gender Personas" in
Chapter 9 of Sexual Personae

[Note 1] 

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe wrote most of his stories and plays (The Sorrows of Young Werther, Wilhelm Meister’s Apprenticeship, Venetian Epigrams, and Faust) in the period 1775-1832. That corresponds with High and Late Romanticism (1750-1830). Paglia defines Goethe as a Romantic author with roots in the classical Enlightenment, and a disciple of Rousseau. (p. 248)

 

[Note 2] 

Concerning Paglia's analysis of The Sorrows of Young Werther: Initially it seems as though Paglia is describing Werther as a possible Androgyne: She says that Werther is "a double-sexed adolescent" (p. 248) and a product of Rousseauist sensibility that "hermaphrodizes the European male persona in emotional fluidity." (p. 249) But in the end she describes Werther much like a Dionysian Romantic male: I mentioned in the notes to Chapter 8 that Dionysian Romantic males exhibit passive, feminine, and often masochistic features and attract (or are attracted to) strong, punishing Apollonian mother figures, usually Androgynes, Apollonians, or Femmes fatales. In reference to Werther, Paglia says, "In Romantic creativity, the male waits in spiritual passivity, acted upon by internal and external forces. The feminized inner self is the Muse who becomes increasingly ferocious as Romanticism goes on." (p. 249) She describes Wilhelm in Wilhelm Meister's Apprenticeship similarly. She says that Wilhelm Meister's Apprenticeship is a Romantic work modeled on Rousseau's Confessions, with transvestism, a feminized male, and masculine women. Paglia stresses the passivity of the male hero: "Wilhelm Meister is not as feminine as Werther, but Goethe swamps him sexually by surrounding him with viragos and transvestites. [...] Goethe's novel-heroes seek self-subordination. Goethe hastens the evolution of Rousseauist sensibility into Romantic masochism." (p. 249-250) So I have listed Werther and Wilhelm as Dionysian males in the Romantic mode.

 

[Note 3] 

Concerning Paglia's analysis of the lead character Faust in the play by the same name: Faust undergoes a transformation across the play. In Part 1 of the play Faust is under the influence of Mephistopheles and the seduction of Gretchen is the centerpiece of that portion; in Part 2 of the play, Faust is increasingly redeemed by love and good deeds and eventually rescued from the clutches of Mephistopheles by the spirit of the dead Gretchen. So the play revolves around Faust's relations with Gretchen: Faust as active seducer of Gretchen in Part 1, and Faust as penitent and redeemed by Gretchen's example.

 

In both cases Faust appears to be a Dionysian male in thrall to a Great Mother figure in the person of Gretchen. The difference between the two parts is the influence of Mephistopheles in Part 1. Paglia seems to suggest that Mephistopheles represents a daemonic Apollonian influence that lies repressed in Faust (and potentially in every man) and can manifest itself as the aggressive western eye engaged in sexual voyeurism: "Faust in league with Mephistopheles is Goethe yielding to his own cannibal impulses. [...] Lust sharpens the aggressive, predatory western eye, making it prelude and coda of touch. Faust and Mephistopheles, watching, are voyeurs at Gretchen’s stalking, capture, soiling, and imprisonment." (p. 254) So the play taken as a whole represents a transformation of Faust from lusting Dionysian seducer in Part 1 to passive Romantic male seeking the intervention of the Great Mother on his behalf in Part 2. Both are variations on the basic theme of the Dionysian male, so I have put the persona of Faust in that category.

 

In a way, the transformation of Faust across the play resembles Goethe's own ambivalence toward women. Paglia says that Goethe is a disciple of Rousseau and a Romantic author (p. 248), but toward the end of the chapter she provides a number of anecdotes showing that Goethe spent much of his youth in rebellion or flight from mother figures in his own life. Paglia says that the scene in Faust with the Mothers "represents a confrontation and perhaps reconciliation with a mode of experience he had cast out of his youthful imaginative life." So perhaps the same thing could be said of the play as a whole, in other words, that the play Faust is Goethe's effort to reconcile himself with the Feminine influence in his own life.

 

[Note 4] 

Concerning Goethe's Androgynes: Mignon, Bettina, Boy Charioteer, Euphorion, Paris, Mephistopheles, The Scraggy One, Homunculus, and the Mothers (p. 250-258). Androgynes were a subject of fascination for Romantic writers. As I said in Note 2, male Romantics and Decadents are captivated by women who tend toward androgyny or toward masculinity; as passive males, Romantics seek a partner who demonstrates male assertiveness rather than traditional femininity. Thus, double-sexed characters are seen as unnatural and worthy of attention; Mignon is the product of incest; Mephistopheles and the Mothers are chthonic; Homunculus is artificially produced, etc. As Paglia says, "[T]he Mothers have an appetite for quivering Faust. He is Everyman frozen before his maker. Faust’s angelic and infernal androgynes were produced by an imagination both fascinated and repelled by the mystery of sex." (p. 257)

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[Note 5]

Penthesilea is queen of a tribe of Amazons; she has come to the Trojan war leading a small army of Amazon warriors to support the Trojans against the Greeks. Hence repeated references to Amazon mastectomies (p. 262-263). Paglia describes Penthesilea as a "normally Apollonian Amazon" and compares her to the Androgyne Radigund in Spenser's The Faerie Queene (p. 261). However, the main focus of Paglia's analysis of Kleist's play is on the conclusion where Penthesilea defeats Achilles: Penthesilea indulges a fit of "titanism," which turns her into a Femme fatale for the moment. She slaughters Achilles in a fairly gruesome manner, causing Paglia to call her "a Romantic vampire"; Paglia says that Penthesilea "castrates" Achilles and calls the killing of Achilles "rape-like." Paglia notes that "All Romantic femmes fatales are avatars of daemonic mother nature." (p. 261-262) So I have labeled Penthesilea a Femme fatale.

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[Note 6]

Achilles was Greece's greatest and most famous warrior in the Trojan War. However in Kleist's play he falls in love with Penthesilea and submits to her in combat, resulting in his own destruction. As I said of Penthesilea, the main focus of Paglia's analysis is on the conclusion of the play where Penthesilea defeats Achilles; in that context Achilles is castrated and "feminized" by the manner of death, turning him into an Androgyne. Paglia twice compares Achilles to Tiresias, "the nurturant male," who is one of Paglia's main personae for the male Androgyne (see p. 261-262 and 46). So I have categorized Achilles as an Androgyne.

 

It's worth noting that, in the context of Achilles' submission and death, Achilles becomes another Romantic male who exhibits passive, feminine, and often masochistic features and attracts (or is attracted to) strong, punishing Apollonian mother figures. Kleist projects his own masochistic fantasies onto Achilles. Paglia says, "Kleist’s Achilles, lying in streams of blood under a pack of dogs, is glamourous with masochistic ecstasy. [...] Woman cradles the victim, but only after she has batted him down and crushed him. The romance of the male heroine is a dream of disordered receptivity, in which there is a transsexual impulse." (No comment on Paglia's following remarks on the sexual practice of "fisting.") (p. 264)

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In the context of the passivity of Achilles, Paglia talks about the mechanics of expansion of the ego to the point of collapse into Decadence, passivity, and sadomasochism. Society was mostly hierarchical and Apollonian in the past. The Apollonian structure of society was upheld by the church and by traditional values in society. But in modern times democratic reforms have resulted in greater freedom and a shift toward Dionysianism. People crave ever-greater freedom, but as a result they end up testing the limits of Dionysianism, checking to see how far they can go. As people approach extremes of Dionysianism, Dionysian free fall becomes fearful, resulting in nihilism and anxiety. Repressed Apollonianism increasingly appears in daemonic form as a need for closure, boundaries, and hierarchy. As I said in my notes for Chapter 6: The more we consciously strive toward one extreme, the more we end up repressing the opposite extreme; the repressed opposite extreme then haunts us unconsciously in "daemonic" form as a fear or temptation. In healthy Apollonianism, closure, boundaries, and hierarchy are positive concepts related to differentiation and analysis: Things are picked apart, isolated, and studied as part of science and the building of civilization. But in daemonic form they become a fear and a temptation, a craving. So when Apollonian closure, boundaries, and hierarchy are realized and implemented in daemonic form at the extremes of Dionysianism, they become Decadence: Closure turns into passivity, boundaries turn into claustrophobic entrapment, and hierarchy turns into sadomasochism. Dionysianism combined with daemonic Apollonianism turns into the Great Mother's entrapping and enclosing womb of Decadence.

 

Applying this concept to the realm of culture, Paglia says that society expands into Romanticism but then finds itself in free fall and collapses into Decadence and sadomasochism: "The dissolution of hierarchical orders permitted personality to expand so suddenly that it went into a free fall of anxiety. Hence, the self has to be chastened, its boundaries redefined, even by pain. The self must be reduced in size. [...] Romanticism, swelling, contracts itself in Decadence." (p. 263) 

 

This becomes a main theme of Paglia's in future chapters. To sum up: Dionysian freedom, permissiveness, and lack of boundaries and hierarchies in western culture allows for endless expansion of the ego; but sooner or later Dionysian free fall triggers repressed/daemonic Apollonianism in the form of nihilism and anxiety and a need for closure, boundaries, and hierarchy; and then society contracts into the passivity and self-punishment of Decadence and sadomasochism in order to re-establish some measure of reassuring closure, boundaries, and hierarchy. Paglia says, "Sadomasochism will always appear in the freest times, in imperial Rome or the late 20th century. It is a pagan ritual of riddance, stilling anxiety and fear." (p. 263) This goes back to what Paglia said at the start of her book: "When the prestige of state and religion is low, men are free, but they find freedom intolerable and seek new ways to enslave themselves, through drugs or depression. My theory is that whenever sexual freedom is sought or achieved, sadomasochism will not be far behind. Romanticism always turns into decadence." (p. 3)

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[Note 7]

The Monk is a Gothic novel which follows the Romantic pattern of a passive male (the abbot Ambrosio) who ends up in sexual thrall to an Androgyne or masculine female. Paglia describes the demon who tempts Ambrosio as a double-sexed Androgyne: The demon first appears as a male monk named Rosario, then turns into the seductress Matilda, and finally appears as a male demon. Paglia refers to the demon's "hermaphroditism" and describes him as a "triumphant drag-queen demon." (p. 266)

 

Satan himself appears in the novel in similar double-sexed fashion. His normal form is "chthonian," hence Dionysian: "blasted limbs, taloned hands and feet, snaky Medusan hair." (p. 267) However he also makes an appearance as an "Apollonian angel." Thus Paglia refers to the "Apollonianism of Lewis' androgyne." (p. 267) So I have put Satan and his demons in the Androgyne category. 

 

As I noted above (see note 4), male Romantics and Decadents are captivated by partners who tend toward androgyny or toward masculinity; as passive males, Romantics seek a partner who demonstrates male assertiveness rather than traditional femininity. Hence Ambrosio's attraction to the Androgyne demon and the realm of double-sexed Satan.

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Link: Return to Notes on Sexual Personae

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~Posted September 4, 2024, updated September 9, 2024