Count Fosco, as discussed in class, is a sleazy, grimy, Robert-California-esk character. In \u201cSugar\u201d by Laura Eastlake, she describes Count Fosco as \u201cboth unmasculine and distinctly un-British\u201d using his child-like approach to sugar to cover for his commanding attitude and mesmerism over many of the characters. She then goes on to contradict herself stating that \u201csugar and chocolate were proffered as fuel for masculine performance, from the physical endurance\u201d and sugar was a \u201cmasculine endeavor whether physical, commercial, or imperial\u201d which directly followed her description of The Count. By contradicting herself, she is now stating that chocolate and sweets are both childlike as they offer a sense of wonderment, but mainly because they help the physical being of a man. And by following up Count Fusco\u2019s reading, it almost feels like she is describing him as childlike but also a man with power, who knows how to use his childlike innocence to get what he wants.<\/p>\n
To then circle back to Count Fosco (ew), he is described as the man who could \u201ctame anything\u201d and has a \u201crod of iron with which he rules her\u2026it is a private rod, and is always kept upstairs\u201d. Following this quote, he is described as a \u201cgood-humored father, ” juxtaposing the \u201crod\u201d image. Using the lens of the Laura Eastlake piece, these paints Count Fosco in an even worse light. If we are assuming that sugar made The Count \u201cunmasculine\u201d and \u201cun-British\u201d she is pointing out his \u201cotherness\u201d in being a foreigner, implying he is not masculine as he enjoys sugar just a little too<\/em> much and those around him may not accept him because he is not British. But if we are then using her contradictory statement, the \u201crod\u2026with which he rules her\u201d insinuates a dominatrix-type attitude, where he is ruling over his wife and other women in his company. This imagery within itself is disturbing as he is now painted as this father figure who likes sugar just a little bit too<\/em> much and rules over women in bed with a rod. This now changes the way in which I personally read Count Fosco, as I didn\u2019t like him before, but I certainly don\u2019t like him now. This may be completely incorrect, but I would like to know if this somehow connects back to Collins, as we had discussed in class that he has some ties to the story, as well as hypnotism as a cure for various issues. Did he personally relate to Count Fosco? Was he writing Count Fosco based on someone he knew or who he wished he could be? Overall, The Count is not a pleasant person, but I would like to know how he connects back to Collins<\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Count Fosco, as discussed in class, is a sleazy, grimy, Robert-California-esk character. In \u201cSugar\u201d by Laura Eastlake, she describes Count Fosco as \u201cboth unmasculine and distinctly un-British\u201d using his child-like approach to sugar to cover for his commanding attitude and mesmerism over many of the characters. She then goes on to contradict herself stating that … Continue reading Is Count Fosco…Robert California??<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5608,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[135984],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2124","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-2025-posts"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2124","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\/5608"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2124"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2124\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2124"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2124"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2124"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}