Blog 7: Patchwork Girl
As we discussed in class, Patchwork Girl has numerous narrative threads and voices, often switching between voices or stories without any clear reason. Discuss the narrative threads that you encountered while reading and analyze the narrative for themes. What is the ideology (or world view) of Patchwork Girl? How does Jackson use her story (as well as the stories of L. Frank Baum, Mary Shelley, and other authors) to create this theme/ideology. Use specific examples from the text to support your reading.
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The numerous stories of Mary Shelley, Baum, Jackson’s characters and Jackson herself vary, but all come together at various threads along the seam, as represented by her Patchwork Girl piece. To me, it was like The Heart of Darkness’ story within a story, though much more exaggerated. Jackson questioned what truth and identity were throughout her characters, through her use of other texts, and as representative of real people’s identities. She worked through a new literary medium to “bring to life” “new species from other patches.” In some stories, characters were creating their identity through piecework, and in others, they were dying, falling apart at the seams and losing their identity. In all of the stories that I read, there was always a female protagonist, though which Jackson questioned her identity through her constructed gender and roles. Sometimes she seemed to question how America shapes women, but since she uses Shelley’s text, she comments on other western cultures. There are many references to “the proper woman,” sanity/insanity, the woman who belongs in the house, different genders, different sexualities, beauty/perfection/imperfection, horror. She references quotations about what a woman “should” be: ““thirty components of complete beauty,” “women shouldn’t talk,” “belonging to the male,” “men write and women quilt.” But just as she defies traditional writing just, she defies traditional feminine roles by fragmenting them, and piecing them together to make a new identity. In one story, she creator doesn’t want her girl to become alive, for fear of her “appetite for knowledge and experience.” The creator asks, “What will happen once she’s completely stitched up?” Throughout her various narratives, whatever identity her characters take, Jackson is taking a critical stance on what is the “correct” identity. Her fragmented stories reflect on her fragmented patchwork girl, which then reflect on women in real society.
Due to the openness and freeness of Shelley Jackson’s hypertext novel, Patchwork Girl can be interpreted in a variety of ways, resulting in numerous themes. As I read the novel, I paid particular attention to the way the monster views herself, and the context in which she is described. For example, when Mary, the creator, describes her monster in the section titled, “She Stood”, Mary says that “the various sectors of her skin were different hues and textures, no match perfect”. Each part of the monster’s body is stitched together from other peoples’ body parts. In a way, the monster is like a mutt. She does not belong to one particular group, or category of beings. I believe Jackson creates this monster to portray a person who feels as though they do not belong in society. Like many people in the world, the monster is unsure as to where she belongs, or who she truly is. The monster also expresses her view of herself. In the section titled, “Why Hideous?” , the monster says that “they tell [her] each of [her] parts is beautiful and [she] knows that all are strong…yet [she] is a monster-because [she] is multiple, and because [she] is mixed, mestizo, mongrel”. After reading many passages like these in which the monster expresses her concerns or doubts of her being, I concluded that a major theme of this novel could be the way “different” people are portrayed in today’s society. The monster is symbolic of a person who feels like an outcast because of either a physical deformity or any other aspect that labels that person as “different”. Jackson shows how difficult it can be to live as a person who differs from the norm, yet she also portrays how unique and special it is as well.
The overall themes of the story lines were about interpretations and searching of identity. Due to the nature of the hypertext and the scattered feeling of the pieces being put together was a pretty salient element. Jackson uses scattered plots points, other text, and jumps in narrative voice to give an unorganized feeling, that suits the pursuit of identity. Each part goes back to this general idea, but tackles slightly different but related issues. The path following the creation was about gender and identity. For the creation, “women and men alike mistake [her] gender and both are drawn to [her].” In this story, the monster does not have a clear identity for her since she is made of different pieces or other people. Each or her body parts, on the other hand, had an identity, which “graveyard” told of. Not only identity is at question, but gender identity as well. She has a “groin” but also had relationships with at least two different women. For the creator and the creation’s thought, the theme seems to be about different interpretations of a mixture. The creator is in awe and believes that “she was beautiful.” While at times the creation thought she was disgusting as seen in ”falling apart” and her scattered thoughts in the “dreams” section. Finally, the quilt holds small excerpts that talk about female “roles” and a sense of identity. The variety also fits well with the motif of things patched together creating something, true mixed.
In response to general: I didn’t follow those themes while reading, but I see how they make complete sense. Though I think there are so many interpretations of what potential themes were in then novels. Out of curiosity, how would those themes fit with the ending with the creation becoming a “yeti?” I think the outcast one would fit well, but what about the one about the image of women?
Although it’s true that every individual interprets a given piece of literature differently, Shelley Jackson’s hypertext novel Patchwork Girl makes it quite literal. In my reading of the story, I came across two different narrative threads: the creator’s story and the monster’s story. The first was that of the creator. Her story was told from a first-person perspective via her journal. She recounts how she created the monster and her worries about her creation’s journey to America. She also describes the lessons the monster learns and the thing she is and is not able to teach her. This is similar to a baby journal. The monster’s story is paralleled with her creator’s as she describes her feelings about the world she’s in and her longing to explore new things. Consequently, exploration is a running theme throughout the novel. Just as the creator is exploring her the monster she’s created, the monster herself is exploring her own capabilities and desires. In her travels to America, she also seeks to explore “a new country” and more about herself. Gender issues are also raised upon the monster’s arrival in America. Finally the theme of monstrosity is introduced when the monster compares herself to America. She notes that monstrosity is almost embraced by the country in terms of the size of the city and its buildings. Furthermore, in referencing other famous works such as The Patchwork Girl of Oz and Frankenstein, Jackson is counting her work among theirs. In using the hypertext medium, she is able to literally convey a piecemeal version of a conventional story.
I found many themes in Patchwork Girl. The two that were the most concrete are: making yourself into who you are despite others’ views of you and many parts becoming a whole, despite their individuality & differences. Shelley Jackson’s character of the “female monster” takes a different view than that of the one created by Mary Shelley in Frankenstein. Patchwork Girl is about the strong bond between creator and creation. The “monster” in Jackson’s work embraces her many parts. The stories of the people whose parts make her up are taken into consideration and accepted with a softness and love. Instead of denying her body parts’ individual characteristics, she puts them together to them make her into who she is. Mary, the creator doesn’t try to change her. In fact she even gives a piece of her skin to her creation which the Patchwork Girl embraces and gives the one part of herself that is all herself back to her creator. The so called monster lets herself become her own person and Mary lets her; going to America on her own even helps the “monster” become her own person. In Frankenstein the creator tries to keep his monster from being his own person. Thru the whole story the repression of self and the insecurity resulting from the lack the monster being to be accepted for being pieces made into a whole leads to violence. Jackson’s formation of self in the Patchwork Girl is peaceful. This makes a big social statement, and the second major theme. The Patchwork Girl is a creation from many parts. They all end up working together to form a cohesive person. All the differences that seemingly would end in conflict end up actually result in a peaceful, goodhearted, curious individual. America is supposed to be represented by the “monster” in this story. So many different pieces come together to be a peaceful working whole. Shelley Jackson uses the theme to point out how we have fallen apart as a whole in America, and how if we don’t let ourselves accept that we’re so many pieces of a whole that need to work together we will result in violence like the monster in Frankenstein. By switching between voices without warning the creator and creation share a commonality and bond.
Patchwork Girl’s layout as a hypertext allows for an interesting style in which there are several different plot lines that can be navigated in different ways depending on the way that the reader chooses to navigate them. I would say that the main ideology of Patchwork Girl deals with exploring the differentiation between what is real and what isn’t, and incorporates an exploration of gender roles in this theme. The monster’s journey to America and her presence there provides a comparison between the girl and the country. It seems that Jackson is implying that America is basically a patchwork in and of itself. The country was established upon the entry of people from various countries and remains a “melting pot” to this day. There are few other countries that exist in such a way with a history that combines the histories and cultures of other countries and nationalities. The monster, a girl made up of random parts collected by her creator is similar in that she has no real identity or history of her own but is a combination of different people’s particular characteristics. Along with this theme, Jackson explores the idea of gender and the female’s capacity to give birth and how this “special” and “magical” act is actually quite grotesque. Our society shines such a great light on the fact that giving birth is a beautiful and natural thing, which it certainly can be. However, the physical process of actually giving birth is very bloody and gruesome. Her creation of the monster encourages the reader to question the typical understanding of things that we normally take for granted or rarely think about at all.
The design of Shelley Jackson’s Patchwork Girl allows the reader to interpret the themes and plotline of the story in a variety of ways. By using the different routes of the story, for example choosing to follow the map’s pathway or just by navigating randomly, the reader is able to determine what I believe is the main theme of the story, which is the discovery of the monster’s identity. Jackson uses the works of L. Frank Baum, Mary Shelley, and other authors to solidify the characteristics of her monster. Jackson mainly focuses on Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, or The Modern Prometheus to compare and contrast her monster’s characteristics with Frankenstein. From the graveyard section we read “You can resurrect me, but only piecemeal. If you want to see the whole, you will have to sew me together yourself.” This suggests that Jackson is telling the reader that he or she can create who and what they want the monster to be or represent. Jackson uses an unusual and unique writing style to stimulate the reader’s imagination and encourage deeper thinking about what the monster represents compared to everyday American life. Patchwork Girl is a complex story in which the reader must take time to examine from all angles the complexity of what the monster portrays.
The ideology of Patchwork Girl could be that no matter how one person goes through life trying to find his or her identity, there are several different points of view of this journey. And like a quilt, all these several experiences from an individual’s point of view are patched together in this hypertext. Each individual will see a certain event in a different way because every person is unique as to their own thought processes. In Patchwork Girl, if the reader can interpret the “monster’s” journey to America in two different ways. In one sense, the experience from the female monster’s point of view is very external. If the reader follows one set of events, the monster is more focused on the public around her, “[noticing] the curious, half-appalled looks directed [her] way.” The other set of events is focused inwards to her own thoughts. She is in pursuit of the exploration of her new identity. “[She] did not know who [she] was [nor] did [she] want to know.” “[She] wanted to be someone new: [She] wanted to be human, and seamless.” Although these thoughts were not mentioned in the other pathway, they were still thought although only seen by one point of view. Although there are several points of view in this text, they all seem to suit each other and come together as a whole, just like a quilt. For example, right after both of the aforementioned set of events that the reader could follow, they both merge to come to one event involving the meeting with Chancy. Also, both of the set of events have the common theme that everyone else is repulsed by her. Like this, all events may have different points of view, but they still make sense and can relate to each other in some holistic manner. In her two interpretations of America, one suggests that in America, “everything was monstrous” and therefore she would fit in just fine and the other interpretation goes in the opposite direction, postulating that nothing would be monstrous. For both interpretations, money is the seam that binds them together in process of being monstrous, or not.
Response to azeto:
I think the female monster wants to find her own identity rather than the one made by her creator by the several different pieces that have their own identity as you mentioned. Because of this, she is looks forward to her explorations in America so that she can find her own wants. It is easy to find so many interpretations of her journey because she herself has not found herself and has all these opposites to her rather than having only one side to a certain idea. However it is possible that a person does not fit into just two choices of one “category.”
In a world of modern literature and hypertext where everything is ‘different’, ‘more innovative’, and I think more confusing, I find it very difficult to achieve a running analysis of theme without finding something in the real world to compare to the theme. In Patchwork Girl, Jackson makes such a comparison extremely easy by using America as the general setting for the Journal section of the story. The main theme that I was able to discern from the scattered and convoluted readings was the theme of discerning one’s identity when society does not accept someone of similar ‘composition’. More specifically, the Patchwork Girl views herself as a horrible “monster” made of many parts when she struggles to find a view of herself. Jackson eludes to this theme further and expounds on it by focusing on America as the setting and by setting up the hypertext in the way that it is. Merely reading the story gives one a feeling of confusion, brokenness, and uncertainty not unlike what Patchwork Girl clearly feels throughout the novel. The continuous similarity between Patchwork Girl and America itself is remarkably complete throughout the novel, with both being “melting pots,” made up of many parts to create one whole. Much as America did during it’s creation and massive expansion, Patchwork Girl continues to struggle with her own sense of identity, as many parts, and as a whole.
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