Thornton: The Man who Claims the Right of Expressing His Feelings

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4.2.1. Thornton: The Man who Claims the Right of Expressing His Feelings

Thornton, in her early encounter with Margaret, is depicted as an ideal embodiment of hegemonic masculinity. He is an ambitious and self-made man who works his way up from a ‗draper‘s assistant‘ 404 to the top of industrial society as a successful manufacturer ‗known and respected amongst all men of business‘ 147. He is ambitious and competitive to gain his reputation not ‗in England only, but [also] in Europe‘ 147. He is a ‗hard man‘ 215, rational, determined, decisive, man who thinks that judgment must not be swayed by sentiment. He refrains from self-revelation and withholding personal information which Margaret thinks complicates the antagonism of industrial relations. He strictly adheres to separation of sphere. He is able to compartmentalize his life. In talking about religion and personal matters, he is willing to talk ―in a subdued voice, as if to [Margaret] alone‖ 152. Yet, in talking about public matters, such as strikes, labors, marketplace, rate of wages, and capital, he maintains a public manner by treating those matters with sound and logical economical principles unswayed by sentiment. He is sure of his own rightness in economic matters which causes ‗Margaret‘s whole soul rose up against him while he reasoned in this way –as if commerce were everything and humanity nothing‘ 197. Thornton, described by Mr. Hale as ‗not so much unjust as unfeeling‘ 215, embodies hegemonic masculinity through his refusal of emotions and affective behaviors which he considers as human weakness and traditionally considered feminine behaviors. However, the novel reveals that this is not the whole of Thornton‘s potential. Through Thornton‘s constant dialogic encounter with Margaret, Thornton‘s transformation in defying hegemonic masculinities or ‗masculine lie‘ 240 , as Stoneman calls it, is highlighted. The novel depicts how through his encounter with Margaret, Thornton is led to a full self-realization of his humanity when he starts to embrace what at first he considers as human weakness and claim for the right of expressing his feeling, 240 Stoneman, p. 79. 132 and lets his judgment to be swayed by the sentiment he feels for the plights of working class. Thornton‘s personal transformation later also leads to the transformation of industrial relations beyond financial relationship. Cultivation of sympathetic caring relations requires the acknowledgment of the permeability and vulnerability of human corporeal subjectivity. Here, Thornton‘s transformation into humane manufacturer also requires similar acknowledgments. To be able to acknowledge human vulnerability, Thornton has to undergo the torment of love. It is depicted in the novel that to initiate the transformation of industrial relations beyond cash nexus, Thornton has to undergo personal transformation by being unmade by tenderness and vulnerability. Thornton realizes his love for Margaret after Margaret protects him during the riot. Since then he develops genuine affection for Margaret. He soon confesses his feeling and proposes to her. Yet, he is harshly refused by Margaret. Margaret‘s harsh refusal, however, does not make him refrain from expressing his feeling for Margaret. He is unhesitant to declare that ‗I claim the right of expressing my feelings‘ 253. By doing this, Thornton has defies hegemonic masculinity that does not expect men to talk about feelings at all. Moreover, hegemonic masculinity requires for restrained and controlled emotions. Yet, Thornton defies it by showing his powerful emotions which he is unable to control: One word more. You look as if you thought it tainted you to be loved by me. You cannot avoid it. Nay, I, if I would, cannot cleanse you from it. But I would not, if I could. I have never loved any woman before: my life has been too busy, my thoughts too much absorbed with other things. Now I love, and will love. But do not be afraid of too much expression on my part. 254 So intense his agony for Margaret‘s harsh refusal, he cannot hold back his tears, so that Margaret notices , ‗the gleam of washed tears in his eyes‘ 254. The tears emphasize on the leakiness or permeability of body. Though Thornton tries hard to control his excessive feelings, the body subversively betrays and fails his attempt. His body resists to be controlled 133 by hegemonic masculinity that encourages men to deny and repress any feelings, bodily experiences and vulnerability. By depicting Thornton‘s inability to control his bodily reaction the novel shows that it is not necessarily unsuitable for men to experience powerful emotions over which they cannot always control as posited by hegemonic masculinity. Seeing Margaret‘s intense grievance due to the death of her mother, Thornton‘s hardheartedness is further tempered into tenderness which subsequently leads him to assume motherly qualities. The motherly qualities he shows for Margaret will foreshadow his social mothering to his workers in the end of the novel. He shows maternal longing to give comfort to Margaret who grieves over the death of her mother: In the first place, there was selfishness enough in him to have taken pleasure in the idea that his great love might come in to comfort and console her; much the same kind of strange passionate pleasure which comes stinging through a mothers heart, when her drooping infant nestles close to her, and is dependent upon her for everything. 348-9 His desire to be close to Margaret is described in motherly terms. The above quotation shows that the maternal love is subversively fused with sexual desire. Patriarchal institution of motherhood deems the practice of maternal love as asexual and pure. Yet, the rigid separate of sexual from asexual is challenged by depicting how Thornton equates the pleasure he will get by providing comfort to Margaret with a mother‘s passionate pleasure in the dependency of child to her love and care. Due to his affection for Margaret, Thornton‘s hardheartedness is tempered. The novel depicts how Thornton shows his affection to Hale family by defying hegemonic masculinity. He goes to ‗the busiest part of the town for feminine shopping‘ 278 to buy fresh fruits for the ailing Mrs. Hale. He occupies himself to carry the fruits by himself. This scene invokes quizzical glance from young ladies of his acquaintances because a wealthy manufacturer occupies himself like ‗a porter or an errand boy‘ 278. Thornton ignores those quizzical glances, because ―I will not be daunted from doing as I choose…I like to take this fruit to the 134 poor mother, and it is simply right that I should ‖ 278. Through this scene Thornton‘s potential to be caring and kindhearted is highlighted. Similar to Margaret, Thornton does not want to be limited by gender and class appropriateness in doing what he thinks as morally right. The novel also describes how Thornton is mentally and physically destabilized by his unrequited love for Margaret. The emphasis on the strong effect of emotion to body might be read as a challenge to the rigid separation between mind and body. These are proposals for the notion of embodiment of mind and corporeality of subjectivity in the novel: …he was almost blinded by his baffled passion. He was as dizzy as if Margaret, instead of looking, and speaking, and moving like a tender graceful woman, had been a sturdy fish-wife, and given him a sound blow with her fists. He had positive bodily pain, – a violent headache, and a throbbing intermittent pulse…It would have been a relief to him, if he could have sat down and cried on a door-step by a little child, who was raging and storming, through his passionate tears, at some injury he had received…His greatest comfort was in hugging his torment; and in feeling, as he had indeed said to her, that though she might despise him …he did not change one whit. She could not make him change. He loved her, and would love her; and defy her...268 Intense passion felt by Thornton for Margaret affects strongly to his body and makes him vulnerable. Instead of denying the vulnerability, he embraces instead the bodily pains caused by the torment of love by keeping his love for Margaret. Due to the torment of love he feels for Margaret, Thornton eventually acknowledges his vulnerability. He allows intense emotions which he previously thinks as weakness to penetrate into his hardened-shell, self- contained and detached self. He allows himself to be permeable, to be influenced by others, by Margaret and eventually by his workers. Here, the novel depicts how torments of love open up Thornton‘s capacity to sympathize with working class. He finally lets himself to be permeable and touched by the sufferings of working class. Thornton‘s powerful feelings for Margaret have destabilized his masculine identity as tough, unfeeling, and hardhearted man into affectionate and passionate man not only for personal matters, but also for public matters. If in the beginning of the story, he is able to 135 compartmentalize his life by treating public matters with a sound and logical economic principles unswayed by sentiment, now he can no longer do the same. Margaret has destabilized his tendency to compartmentalize his emotional responses. It is clearly depicted in the scene where Higgins, encouraged by Margaret, goes to Thornton to ask for a new job opportunity. At first, Thornton appears to be aloof and hardhearted when Higgins approaches him. He doubts and remains untouched by Higgins‘ reason that he needs the job to feed his friend‘s children. Yet, after hearing that Higgins has been waiting for five hours to speak him, Thornton is impressed by Higgins‘ patience, Five hours…its a long time for a man to wait, doing nothing but first hoping and then fearing 415. Thornton cannot deny that, he felt that he had been unjust, in giving so scornful a hearing to any one who had waited, with humble patience, for five hours, to speak to him. That the man had spoken saucily to him when he had the opportunity, was nothing to Mr. Thornton. He rather liked him for it; and he was conscious of his own irritability of temper at the time, which probably made them both quits. 420 He spends two hours of his time to verify ‗the truth of Higgins‘story, the nature of his character, the tenor of his life ‘ 420. Finally Thornton is convinced that all that Higgins had been said is true. He directly goes to Boucher‘s house to find Higgins and to tell him that he will give him work. In Boucher‘s house he directly witnesses the sufferings and impoverished lives of the working class. He is now totally convinced and impressed by Higgins‘ generosity that he tries hard to find a new job to take care of his friend‘s children. Thornton apologizes to Higgins for having doubted the truthfulness of his story, ‗I did not believe you. I could not have taken care of another mans children myself, if he had acted towards me as I hear Boucher did towards you. But I know now that you spoke truth. I beg your pardon 421. Having impressed by Higgins‘s generosity, Thornton suddenly feels that [t]he conviction went in, as if by some spell, and touched the latent tenderness of his heart; the patience of the man, the simple generosity of the motive for he had learnt about the quarrel between Boucher and Higgins, made him forget entirely the mere reasonings of justice, and overleap them by a diviner instinct. 420 136 Through above description, as stated by Jill M. Maltus, Gaskell depicts the change in Thornton‘s attitude to Higgins as the effect of a spell to emphasize the mysterious ways in which feelings unconsciously act upon judgment and in so doing ―overleap‖ justice with mercy and humanity. 241 Here, the emphasis on the process of Thornton‘s transformation suggests that the rigid separation between reasonemotion and consciousunconscious are challenged in the novel. Thornton is no longer able to compartmentalize his life by managing public matters of his workers with a detached, abstract morality of justice and logical economical principles. If Thornton is merely directed by his sound and logical judgment unswayed by sentiment, he will never offer a job to the enemy, a leader of the strike that has caused him lost some of his best workers who leave him to join with Higgins in the strike. The novel depicts that Thornton‘s benevolence to give work to Higgins is not merely prompted by his sense of justice, but also by his heart, his compassion, tenderness and sympathy for the sufferings of working class which he witnessed with his own eyes. This depiction suggests that it is through the engagement with the tenor of life, direct involvement and interpersonal relations; instead of abstract reasoning and distanced engagement that class stereotype can be overcome. These ideas resonate well with feminist relational thinking which perceives that truth can only be found in the tenor of life. As stated by Bartlett, ―feminists have also challenged the validity of principles abstracted from a supposedly universal reason, claiming instead the truth of the concrete realities of our lives.‖ 242 The novel depicts how Thornton undergoes radical change as he comes to experience the tenor of Higgins‘ life. At the beginning of the story Thornton still holds a stereotypical view toward working class as a bunch of weak people lack of decency, sobriety and dutifulness to work hard and raise themselves into a position of master like what he has done. He disapproves their strikes as their unlawful claim of mastership and 241 Maltus, Jill M. Shock, Memory and the Unconscious in Victorian Fiction. Cambridge: Cambridge UP. 2009, p. 77. 242 Bartlett, pp. 32-33. 137 ownership of other people‘s property. However, after direct engagement with the tenor of their life and communicate with them face-to-face, he realizes the misleading stereotypes he has hold toward the working class. He finally recognizes the patience and simple generosity of the motive behind Higgins‘ request of job. Finally, he can express sympathy and compassion for the working class. The novel also further shows that genuine sympathy and compassion can only be achieved if one acknowledges human‘s vulnerability. As Thornton has acknowledged his own vulnerability and witnesses directly the vulnerability of working class life, he is able to response to the working class plights. Thornton‘s personal transformation shows that Thornton‘s masculine traits are not innate qualities, but it is socially constructed. The novel reveals that Thornton has to lead a practical life from a very early age which calls upon the exercise of sound judgment and self- control after his father committed suicide and procured a large amount of debt from gambling. Since that day, Thornton became the man of the family ―…was taken from school, and had to become a man as well as [he] could in a few days…[he] went into a small country town, where living was cheaper than in Milton, where [he] got employment in a draper‘s shop…‖ 108. He worked long hours and saved three shillings a week from fifteen to repay his father‘s debts. Eventually, he brought Marlborough Mills and became a Master in Milton. The exploration on Thornton‘s personal history shows that Thornton‘s hardheartedness, aloofness, and self-righteousness in his conviction to economic and public matters is due to condition, instead of innate traits. Here, the novel proposes that the acquaintance of one‘s personal history through interpersonal communication is important to overcome gender and class prejudices. The ability of Thornton to defy hegemonic masculinity that requires man to disassociate with emotions, tenderness and vulnerability, and to let go his self-contained and detached self from the plights of his workers has led him to undergo personal transformation. PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI 138 Now he is able to develop meaningful communication and sympathetic interpersonal relationships with his workers which will lead him further to develop caring relations grounded in the ethics of care manifested in the scheme of communal catering arrangement and the institution of common dining room. This personal transformation eventually leads to improvement of industrial relations beyond commercial relationship.

4.2.2. Higgins: The Mothering Person