{"id":1771,"date":"2021-10-22T02:26:50","date_gmt":"2021-10-22T02:26:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/?p=1771"},"modified":"2021-10-22T03:05:21","modified_gmt":"2021-10-22T03:05:21","slug":"1771","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/2021\/10\/22\/1771\/","title":{"rendered":"Snakes, Mice, and Birds, oh My!"},"content":{"rendered":"

The etching, “Salammbo,” depicts a naked woman, presumably dead, as an anaconda wraps itself around her body. There is also a man sitting behind the woman with a sitar or similar instrument in hand, presumably charming or controlling the snake. The woman is pale, with her hair billowing out behind her head. The setting is somewhere in the east, based on the clothing of the man and the background of the image. This etching portrays the “dangers” of the east, as a snake charmer possesses a snake which is wrapping itself around a defenseless, naked, exposed, and dead woman. We can assume this woman is supposed to be from the west because of her incredibly pale skin.<\/p>\n

In The Woman in White<\/em>, Count Fosco has a strange relationship with his animals. he has birds and mice which he calls his “children” and he either has them very well trained, or has some sort of mystic power over them. Count Fosco is from Italy, a foreigner in the context of this novel as it takes place in England. It is also worth mentioning that Count Fosco is arguably the main antagonist in this novel and the most threatening character to Laura, the stereotypical pale and fragile female character. Count Fosco is the mastermind behind the scheme to take Laura’s money as he manipulates everyone else. There is also a common rhetoric of Count Fosco being able to “tame anything” reinforcing the idea of him having control of people, but also animals in this story (Collins 217).<\/p>\n

There is a common theme between “Salammbo” and the character of Count Fosco as an obsession with “the other” in relation to animals. In both cases, the foreigners have power or control over animals in a mystic or mysterious way. The English obsession with “the other” as a threat with mystic abilities was a common trope in art and literature. The snake charmer and Count Fosco’s similar ability to “tame” animals reinforces the idea of foreigners having power over animals, bringing in themes of “the exotic” as well.<\/p>\n

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The etching, “Salammbo,” depicts a naked woman, presumably dead, as an anaconda wraps itself around her body. There is also a man sitting behind the woman with a sitar or similar instrument in hand, presumably charming or controlling the snake. The woman is pale, with her hair billowing out behind her head. The setting is … Continue reading Snakes, Mice, and Birds, oh My!<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4788,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[135983],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1771","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-fall-2021"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1771","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\/4788"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1771"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1771\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1771"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1771"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1771"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}