“Never before, I imagine, did a company of water-drinkers remain so entirely uncontaminated by the bad example around them; nor could I help wondering that it had not occurred to any freakish inebriate, to empty a glass of liquor into their lakelet. What a delightful idea! Who would not be a fish, if he could inhale jollity with the essential element of his existence!” (168)
Wow. Thank you, Coverdale, for this groundbreaking and extremely relevant observation.
I’m not supposed to post this week but I couldn’t help a quick stint on the purses. Their first description in on page 62. Coverdale claims that that their best attribute is the “the impossibility that any uninitiated person should discover the aperture; although, to a practiced touch, they would open as wide as charity or prodigality might wish” (62). He then goes on to question whether the purses are a symbol of Priscilla’s own mystery. We see her making these purses throughout the rest of the reading for today and then discover that the one Coverdale owns was also made by her. At one point he even states that they are the only contribution to the Blithedale society that she makes; but what do they mean?!? I agree with Coverdale that they are symbol but I don’t think it applies to Priscilla alone. This could be because I had just watched LOST last night and was in the puzzle solving mood but I began to think of the purse symbol and Hawthorne’s representation of feminine attributes thus far.
I’ve noticed that all of the female characters seem to have two sides to them. Priscilla, Zenobia, and even Nature have personalities that are like two sides of a coin. Priscilla comes to Blithedale as a wan and weak child but as she grows stronger the inhabitants begin to notice a wildness in her. However, these fits of wild elation are fleeting and she often retreats back into herself. This is seen when she begins to run to Hollingsworth returning from the field. She begins to run towards him then stops, her “animation [seeming] to have deserted her” (81). Coverdale comments that these mood changes become less common as Priscilla becomes stronger but I noticed that she is usually the most excited when she’s outside or with Hollingsworth. Are the outdoors and the philanthropist the mediums to which her purse opens? Zenobia also has also shown us two sides. Most of the time she is happy and plays the good friend to Priscilla but we are often privy to “a gleam of latent mischief… which seemed to indicate a slightly malicious purpose” in her actions (79). Also, when Priscilla and Zenobia head into the house, Zenobia has a smile on her face but when Coverdale takes another glance at her he sees a countenance “made [for] the fortune of a tragic actress” (95). And when she throws the “veil” over Priscilla during her story, that was mean. There are multiple layers to both of these women that I think we are only beginning to unravel because they are like the silk purse. Their whole person is seldom revealed and only under certain stimuli. I also mentioned Nature in the category of the mysterious purse-like female. I could have been reading too much into this paragraph, but Coverdale comments at one point that every now and then he catches “glimpses into the far-off soul of truth… in the visible scene of earth and sky” (85). He claims that at moments such as this it’s as if Nature “had been taken by surprise and seen at unawares” with no opportunity to “assume the mask with which she mysteriously hides herself from mortals” (85). Here too, Nature has two sides that she does not wish to reveal to man.
I think the male characters have some mysteries to them as well but I feel like the symbol of the purse applies to the feminine more than anything else. Anyways, that’s my ramble for the day! See you in class!
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