Morbid Science & Monstrous Literature: Degeneration & Eugenics in R.L. Stevenson and Oscar Wilde.

摘要

The Victorian fin de siecle was a tempest of scientific discovery. These findings were largely set in motion by Charles Darwin's research, but they were propelled by a vast number of scientists and writers who were constantly pushing the boundaries of what it meant to be human. My research explores the tension between these scientific and literary discourses. I argue that the locus for monstrosity of both Mr. Hyde and Dorian Gray is in that very tension. Many scholars have attempted to locate this monstrosity in other places, and I do not undercut their findings. However, I do suggest that the monstrous becomings of these characters are located deeper within the fin de siecle Victorian culture. It stems from the simultaneous rejection and reification of these scientific discourses through Gothic literature. In this way, the monstrous bodies of Mr. Hyde and Dorian Gray stand as allegories through which a critique of Victorian scientific and medical practices can be made. They are representations of a body politic at war with itself, one struggling desperately to assert its normality in a world where "normal" is ever-evolving.