{"id":1271,"date":"2016-11-04T03:11:49","date_gmt":"2016-11-04T03:11:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/?p=1271"},"modified":"2016-12-07T21:54:33","modified_gmt":"2016-12-07T21:54:33","slug":"orientals-and-goblin-men","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/2016\/11\/04\/orientals-and-goblin-men\/","title":{"rendered":"Orientals and Goblin Men"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"IMG_3730\"<\/a><\/p>\n

collections.troutgallery.org\/Obj14636?sid=80770&x=945214<\/p>\n

During our recent visit to the Trout Gallery, the image that intrigued me the most was the one entitled\u00a0Salammbo. <\/em>\u00a0In this image, a pale naked woman is lying across a bed while being entangled by a giant snake. \u00a0Off to the side, a fully clothed, swarthy looking man conceals himself in the shadows, starting at her ominously while playing his musical instrument. \u00a0The setting appears to be in an foreign land due to the black snake, the apparel of the swarthy man, and the pictures\u00a0on the wall that resemble ancient Assyrian engravings. \u00a0While examining this image, two things come to mind: an obvious sexual tone and exotic themes.<\/p>\n

The sexual tone is pretty evident due to the nudity of the woman, the snake (a phallic symbol) being wrapped around her, and her suggestive body language; she does not appear to be attempting to fight off the snake since her\u00a0right arm is thrown over head and because of her closed eyes and pleasurable facial expression. \u00a0In terms of exoticism, there are certain aspects of the setting that make the image exotic such as the snake, the swarthy man, and the wall engravings. \u00a0Both the giant black snake and the Assyrian images are certainly not from England, or from the West in general. \u00a0The clothing and dark skin of the man seem to indicate that he is also non-European. \u00a0I also interpreted the setting of the image to\u00a0be an intentional implication of\u00a0orientalism since all the foreign objects are displayed in a bizarre and sexual way that implies that it is a stereotypical critique of the East. \u00a0A Westerner would probably view the image and think, “This setting is obviously foreign! \u00a0Who else but the orientals would lie with wild beasts in a strange room while others look on?”<\/p>\n

The sexual and exotic themes of\u00a0Salammbo\u00a0<\/em>reminded me of Laura and Lizzie’s encounter with the goblin men in Christina Rossetti’s poem\u00a0Goblin Market. \u00a0<\/em>When Laura buys fruit from the goblins, the language seems overtly sexual. \u00a0Her consumption of the fruit is described as thus: she “sucked their fruit globes fair or red…she sucked and sucked and sucked the more, fruits which that unknown orchard bore, she sucked until her lips were sore” (Rossetti 4). \u00a0The instance in which the goblins swarm and try to force feed Lizzie can also be interpreted as being sexual because the scene eerily mirrors a gang bang\/orgy since she “would not open lip from lip lets they should cram a mouthful in: but laughed…to feel the drip of juice that syrupped all her face…and streaked her neck” (Rossetti 12).<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, the goblin men are described as possibly being foreign since Laura asks the question, “Who knows upon what soil they fed their hungry thirsty roots?” (Rossetti 2), hinting that the goblins are from other lands or “soils.” \u00a0Either way, the goblins men are clearly not human and are strange,\u00a0which is similar to the exotic themes of\u00a0Salammbo. \u00a0<\/em>By being foreign like the figures of Salammbo,<\/em>\u00a0the goblins are portrayed in a dangerous, bizarre, and “sexual” manner. \u00a0The woman in Salammbo<\/em>\u00a0lies with a snake, a dangerous animal, and the goblin men, who are vicious and animal-like, have a “sexual” encounter with Laura and Lizzie. \u00a0The goblins are therefore outsiders who cannot be trusted by the sisters, much like how Westerners of the Victorian Era deemed foreigners such as Asians as “orientals”, strange violent folk from the edges of the world. \u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

collections.troutgallery.org\/Obj14636?sid=80770&x=945214 During our recent visit to the Trout Gallery, the image that intrigued me the most was the one entitled\u00a0Salammbo. \u00a0In this image, a pale naked woman is lying across a bed while being entangled by a giant snake. \u00a0Off to the side, a fully clothed, swarthy looking man conceals himself in the shadows, starting … Continue reading Orientals and Goblin Men<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3299,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[111423,135948],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1271","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-fall-2016","category-trout-gallery-collection"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1271","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3299"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1271"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1271\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1271"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1271"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1271"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}