Pity and Fear Images of the Disabled in Literature and the Popular Arts
Past Sierra Armor
Especially within classical literature, it is difficult to find characters with disabilities who are not written-off as villains or confined to the periphery of the narrative. Unfortunately, there has been a long tradition of authors using descriptions of inability to cheaply elicit shock and fearfulness, or, alternately, to generate pity. While many characters with disabilities are villainized, others, typically in Victorian-era and early on 20th century children's literature, are depicted as supernaturally innocent or naive. The latter stereotype is too harmful– in add-on to being condescending past promoting an image of people with disabilities as artless, the saintly characters that make upwardly this trope are 1-dimensional, but serving as objects of pity, used to complicate an able-bodied protagonist's sense of morality.
In an article, Susan Nussbaum, a playwright and activist, identifies several frequently-used literary formulas which middle around disability. I of these formulas points out that, within popular narratives, a character with disabilities is often used a foil for a "cocky-involved non-disabled protagonist," and so that, at the terminate of the story, the character with a disability is miraculously "cured," mirroring the protagonist's redemption. To illustrate this formula, she uses Dickens'A Christmas Ballad, where Tiny Tim is a foil for Ebenezer Scrooge. Tiny Tim, who uses a crutch, though his disability is unspecified, is described every bit being on the brink of expiry as a result of poverty and lack of medical care. Dickens gives Tiny Tim'south character no depth beyond descriptions of his frailty and innocence, and his existence only serves to enhance Scrooge's guilt.
It'south rare to find a narrative centered effectually a person with disabilities, where the story focuses on the grapheme's personhood, rather than the disability itself. So often, a visible disability is made into an exploitative spectacle to be used as a metaphorical device or a symbol within the story. Co-ordinate to Naussbaum, characters with disabilities normally "fit into one or more of the following stereotypes: Victim, Villain, Inspiration, Monster," and these characters' storylines are typically resolved "in one of a few ways: Cure, Decease, Institutionalization." She concludes that these well-worn formulas must be subverted, allowing for newer, more authentic accounts of people with disabilities to accept eye stage.
For far too long, characters with deformities, scars, or missing limbs have populated literature as villains, with their non-normative bodies used, unjustly, as symbols of evil and moral rot. Recall, for instance, of the persistent trope of the combative pirate inside childhood classics likePeter Pan andTreasure Island, where the pirates' missing limbs are used to elicit shock and fearfulness out of immature readers. The outdated stereotype goes across children's tales— other villains with disabilities includeMoby Dick'south Captain Ahab, whose missing leg serves to signify his obsessive, maniacal beliefs, and Shakespeare'due southRichard Iii, whose deformity is depicted as directly connected to his villainy and hatred. Additionally, many characters with deformities are featured within the gothic horror genre, in novels such every bitFrankenstein. InJane Eyre, sudden blindness occurs every bit a shocking gothic trope. Even inOedipus Rex, the loss of sight happens at the height of the story and becomes linked with the tragic fall of a family unit.
Historically, inability in literature perpetuates the twisted myth that disability is somehow linked with punishment for wrongdoing. The nigh prominent example of this is Sarah Chauncey Woolsey'southwardWhat Katy Did (1872,) which features a twelve-year-quondam girl, Katy Karr, who is unable to walk afterwards falling off a swing. Katy'south injury is fabricated out to be a divine penalization for pushing her sis downward a flight of stairs before that day and a direct result of disobeying her aunt, who has forbidden Katy's employ of the swing. Only at the end of the book, when Katy is morally "redeemed," does she regain the power to walk.
Narratives similarWhat Katy Did, along withA Christmas Ballad, and others, link bodily divergence with moral unwellness, creating a problematic metaphor. These stories assume that characters with bodies that don't await or function like standardized "normal" bodies, must, at the cease of the book, conform, and be "fixed." At the end of these narratives, the characters almost always find themselves miraculously "cured." This is because, rather than focusing on the development of the character's personality, these tales accept a bad habit of using the disability itself to generate a platitude conflict and resolution. It is extremely hard to find stories that contrast this formula, ones that depict a social club adjusting to accommodate people with diverse abilities.
Another nonsensical myth well-nigh people with disabilities, often told in early twentieth century children'southward classics, is that a child with a disability but needs to socialize and get fresh air in order to be "cured." At the climax or very cease of stories like Frances Hodgson Burnett'sThe Secret Garden (1911,) Joanna Spyri'southwardHeidi (1880,) andPollyanna (1913,) the characters magically shed their disabilities. InThe Secret Garden, Colin, a male child who hasn't walked for ten years because of a spinal condition, is depicted equally having a bellicose personality, until he undergoes a transformation. Subsequently continued exposure to the outdoors, Colin'due south personality softens, and, simultaneously, he regains the ability to walk. Burnett portrays his physical inability every bit if it were simply a issue of his mental attitude towards life, and, apparently, this connection between disagreeability and disability is harmful and incorrect.
There are, of course, relatively recent books offering more nuanced and complex characters with disabilities. Two that I've encountered are Katharine Dunn'southGeek Loveand Mark Haddon'due southThe Curious Incident of a Domestic dog in the Dark, which seem to have been viewed somewhat favorably by reviewers, disability theorists, and activists. While Haddon's novel is a portrayal of a protagonist with Asperger'south Syndrome, Geek Love is both a satirical exaggeration of the spectacle that gild makes out of departure and a celebration of those differences. Although these stories are an comeback from Victorian era cliches and the cruel stereotypes of the gothic horror genre, both have their criticisms also. For instance, Mark Haddon admits that he'southward not an expert on Asperger's Syndrome, and some people fence thatGeek Love leans too heavily on using inability as a metaphor for general outsiderdom. Hopefully, even better stories centered around protagonists with disabilities will achieve mainstream consciousness, and, now, more always, it's important to pay attending to narratives written by authors with disabilities themselves.
Sierra Armor is a Creative Writing and Literature student at Bennington College, who is originally from New Hampshire, simply resides office-time in Austin. This winter, she's interning with Fine art Spark Texas and collaborating on two new Fine art Spark Volunteer Orientation videos.
Source: https://www.artsparktx.org/2022/01/20/its-time-to-disentangle-disability-from-metaphor-and-put-characters-with-disabilities-at-the-center-of-the-narrative/
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