Sugar, Fantasy, and Construction of Self in George Eliot’s “Brother Jacob”
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This essay examines the ways in which the colonial fantasies evoked by sugar help construct British selves in the mid-nineteenth-century Britain portrayed in “Brother Jacob.” As a precious item only the privileged had access to, sugar was one of the Empire’s major motivations for expanding and maintaining its colonies. As its price dropped over time, however, this commodity became much more common. Such a tendency reached a climax in 1850 when the lower classes began to consume more sugar than the higher classes did. Attached to the growing consumption of the lower class were colonial fantasies that by consuming this food item, one could raise one’s social status to that of a colonial hero. Once inspired by this fantasy but failing to realize it in the West Indies, David Faux induces and spreads similar fantasies through his confectionery shop. The sugar products he sells influence Grimworth’s people in their imaginative formation of selves. When they encounter the colonial realities, however, they expel David from the community. This is their psychic strategy in the hope of maintaining their fantasies and protecting their selves. The didactic and all-is-well ending of “Brother Jacob” conceals a capitalist desire of the people, a desire that has already become part of their selves.
Abstract
This essay examines the ways in which the colonial fantasies evoked by sugar help construct British selves in the mid-nineteenth-century Britain portrayed in “Brother Jacob.” As a precious item only the privileged had access to, sugar was one of the Empire’s major motivations for expanding and maintaining its colonies. As its price dropped over time, however, this commodity became much more common. Such a tendency reached a climax in 1850 when the lower classes began to consume more sugar than the higher classes did. Attached to the growing consumption of the lower class were colonial fantasies that by consuming this food item, one could raise one’s social status to that of a colonial hero. Once inspired by this fantasy but failing to realize it in the West Indies, David Faux induces and spreads similar fantasies through his confectionery shop. The sugar products he sells influence Grimworth’s people in their imaginative formation of selves. When they encounter the colonial realities, however, they expel David from the community. This is their psychic strategy in the hope of maintaining their fantasies and protecting their selves. The didactic and all-is-well ending of “Brother Jacob” conceals a capitalist desire of the people, a desire that has already become part of their selves.
참고문헌 (11)
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