More questions on Onegin (plus Bosie)

[Francoise Rosset]

> On the other hand, perhaps we are all very sick of Eugene Onegin.

Possibly, but I thank the list nevertheless. This discussion sent me 
back to EO to reread it all -- which is what I hope our students would 
do when confronted with an unfamiliar theory. That's the main point of 
this post. As professor of Russian lit (especially since I teach 
undergraduates), I feel professionally obligated to at least introduce 
the students to a variety of critical approaches. So why not at least 
indicate that one trend sees latent bisexual traits in Onegin's 
behavior?
Critical theories can be older or more recent than psychoanalysis, and 
they may well conflict. It then becomes the obligation of the students 
to follow up.

Some more picky/specific points ... feel free to skip.

Onegin as metrosexual or mirror man.
That's a terrific analogy, esp. in light of the long explicit 
description of Onegin's toilette. One caveat: is Onegin truly 
exceptional here, or is he merely (as with everything else) aping 
current, extreme fashions which necessitated lots of primping?  A 
quick survey of men's fashions from 1800 to 1821 shows that they 
changed little from the elaborately "foppish" styles of the early 
Regency. If anything, by the 1820s things were more pronounced -- more 
men's corsets, bigger shoulder pads, a more exaggerated silhouette.

Byron in Onegin's cell.
Yes, as Svetlana Grenier notes, EO repeatedly emphasizes Tatiana's 
"simple" country nature, a fairly conventional characterization. And 
no, as Daniel R-L points out, we should not therefore assume she is 
wholly ignorant of sexuality. Unlike Onegin, Tatiana evolves, and much 
of that evolution is tied to and encoded in her reading (see Olga 
Peters Hasty!). So if the younger Tatiana is characterized by her 
reading of sentimental epistolary novels, why can we not assume it 
also means something that a slightly older and wiser Tatiana notices 
the Byron in O's library and starts reading and a new world opens up? 
She may even realize how trite and predictable Onegin's explicitly 
limited choice of reading was, and that Onegin himself may be but an 
"imitation," an "senseless phantasm," a "Muscovite in Harold's cloak," 
a "full lexicon of faddish words"
... a "uzh ne parodiia li on?"
(sed'maia, XXIV)

Those are the words immediately preceding
>Uzhel' zagadku razreshila?
>Uzheli slovo najdeno?

>No, because there was no (printable) word.  What she sensed was "the Love 
>that dare not speak its name" (to quote Lord Alfred Bruce Douglas, great
>friend of Oscar Wilde).

Well, why not, but the previous section suggests Onegin is merely an 
empty parody of Byron.
  
Bosie.
However, let me add a bitchy aside about Lord Alfred Bruce Douglas, 
aka the beautiful and thoroughly creepy "Bosie." Bosie's dysfunctional 
relationship with his father finally landed his great friend Wilde in 
jail. Bosie later turned and published vicious anti-homosexual 
tirades, only to recant at the end. For good measure, it seems he also 
advocated the "Protocols of the Elders of Zion" and never recanted 
those. One lovely internet source of anti-semitic rants, jewwatch.com, 
lists Lord Alfred "Bosie" Douglas as British editor of the 
"Protocols."

Dreams and dances
The theory of latent bisexuality/homosexuality DOES provide a cogent 
explanation for the climax of Tatiana's dream and Onegin's behavior at 
Tatiana's name-day. Clearly it's not to make Tatiana jealous, so his 
flirting with Olga -- a woman he finds insipid -- is either perversely 
gratuitous, or directed at Lensky. "Envy" is not enough. This is 
repeatedly called "revenge." For dragging Onegin into a overcrowded 
party of bumpkin neighbors, or for not acknowledging Onegin's 
interest?

So ...
So why not juxtapose the bisexual Onegin to the nexus of literary 
references, to Onegin as pure literary cypher (only style, no 
substance), to more traditional interpretations ("superfluous man") 
that Onegin is caught in a pointless social order and motivated by 
utter, ultimately malicious boredom, "cette espece d'orgueil qui fait 
avouer avec la meme indifference les bonnes comme les mauvaises 
actions."

My students and I may or may not fully accept the psychoanalytical 
approach, but it often opens up new lines of inquiry. And it provokes 
discussions and arguments ... just like our list.
-FR


Francoise Rosset
Russian and Russian Studies
Interim Chair, Women's Studies
Wheaton College
Norton, Massachusetts 02766
Office: (508) 285-3696
FAX:   (508) 286-3640

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