Abjection and Jude

Nick Harris

25 July 2024

Abjection and Jude

Kristeva's theory of abjection outlined in Powers of Horror: An Essay on Abjection (1980), examines the human psychological reaction to what is considered impure, disgusting, or taboo. Of special interest in this examination is the role of the 'other' in societal constructs. She asks when “the other” exhibits traits which repulse the individual, traits that make “The other” horrific.

            Kristeva’s concern with application to literature becomes prominent from the beginning of her forming the theory of abjection. Most of Powers of Horror is an application of this idea of abjection to the literary works of Celine. This off-the-wall abstraction of connecting two ideas in a somewhat stream-of-consciousness fashion reflects what L. Kleinman calls Kristeva’s want to “swim through life”:

Kristeva describes herself…as “swimming through life,” that is, not having a plan or direction. This way both of living and of being an intellectual well describes the trajectory of  her life and thought. Par. 7

The literary application of abjection is justified in Kristeva’s defense of her position of swimming without direction. Abjection, dealing with the concept of horror, can be especially instructive in application to gothic literature. But other literatures (such as the novels of Celine which Kristeva approaches) benefit from the abjection lens also. Finding traits in “the other” that make an individual disgusted speaks to how that individual is expressing value judgments, for disgust is a value judgment. Abjection can help define an individual’s concept of bad versus good and, by extension, evil versus honorable.

            My application of Kristeva’s abjection allies it with Nussbaum’s ethics of literature. Thus, when I approach the literature of Thomas Hardy, whether the gothic short story “The Withered Arm” or amore traditional naturalistic novel such as Jude the Obscure, I do so from the point of view of how the characters are influenced by what they think of as disgusting, Jude’s opinion of his wife’s leaving him, for instance. This abjection influences that character’s sense of right and wrong, allowing him to eventually go into a relationship with a woman who is not his wife, who is indeed married to another man whom she has left due to his abuse of her, the suffragette (and Jude’s cousin) Sue Bridehead.

            The second major division of Hardy’s novel concerns the development of this relationship and its consequences to Jude’s goals. When he married, Jude had given up his goals of intellectual freedom, symbolized by the possibility of studying philosophy at the university in Christchruch, Finding himself set free of that marriage, at least in terms of his having to tend to it if not the legal marriage itself, he can pursue the goals once again. But his abjection to the notion of marriage creates the situation where he now finds himself having to support Sue, thus giving up his intellectual goals once again. Jude’s decisions based on an abjection caused by circumstances not of his doing (the leaving of the wife) lead him into a fated situation that will not let him succeed.

            This situation is only the beginning of Jude’s tragedies. But as the beginning, brought on by an ethical abjection, the reasoning to cling to Sue, despite society’s disapproval of married individuals living with each other outside of the legal marriage, is the bedrock of Jude’s tragedies. He is searching for an ethical thing to do that affords him the acquiring of his goals, which includes a life with Sue. He cannot, however, find anything but heartache on his path. He becomes disgusted at his own life, an abjection that overwhelms him.

_______

Kleinerman, L. (2022). Julia Kristeva: Perspectives on Her Life and Work. Journal of the American Psychoanalytic Association, 70(4), 763-774.  https://doi.org/10.1177/00030651221119062

Kristeva, Julia. Powers of Horror: An Essay on Abjection. Translated by Leon S. Roudiez, Columbia University Press, 1982.