Sarah Weaver on Copperfield

Sarah Weaver: A critical response to 'In Search of Beein’: Nom/Non du Père in David Copperfield’ (Virginia Carmichael).

'In Search of Beein’: Nom/Non du Père in David Copperfield' furthers a traditional psychoanalytical reading of David Copperfield by considering ’David’s development in terms of his desire to experience and express the Imaginary in a Symbolic Order of differential value.’

Carmichael’s essay argues that David’s marital relationships seek firstly the image of his Mother, and later the comfort of a Mother. As well as this, many of David’s other relationships are created with those who represent a father-figure in some way. Indeed, she begins by addressing David’s ‘old unhappy loss’ of mother which leads to ‘partial identification with surrogate father and mother figures and alter egos.’ We immediately identify the image of Dora’s bouncing curls with that of his Mother, Clara. Dora becomes an escape for David, she is a way of returning to the past and from resisting self-development. This is evident in David‘s confession that ‘the more I pitied myself, or pitied others, the more I sought for consolation in the image of Dora.’

Dora then is just that, an image of what used to be, and what never was; an indulgence in the imagination. Dickens’s protagonist reflects on ‘what an idle time it was! what an unsubstantial, idle time.’ On the other hand, Carmichael identifies Agnes as the comforting image of the mother. Indeed, Agnes is David’s calming influence, she is, as Dickens so often reiterates, David’s ‘good angel.’ However, although David seeks comfort in ‘the remembrance of her clear clean eyes and gentle face came stealing over me, it shed a peaceful influence on me…,’ his relationship suffers a different loss in that it is desexualised.

Virginia Carmichael points to the many broken relationships in the novel, and the triangulations which complicate straightforward relationships. She draws on the likes of Steerforth and Heep who, in their dark doubling of David, complicate his sense of self. Another example that Carmichael draws upon is that of Miss Murdstone, yet another warped motherly interference who recurs in the novel- initially as a third party between David and Clara, and later between David and Dora. Here too Dickens draws together, and morphs the wife with the image of the mother An alter ego that the article does not make much of is that of Uriah Heep who embodies the sexual desire for Agnes which David lacks. Dianne F Sadoff notes the way in which ‘Uriah Heep also appears as a dark figure for David’s desire for success and self creation.’ Indeed, David cannot escape Uriah’s presence, he exclaims the the way in which ‘he knew me better than I knew myself.’ In a way, it necessary for David to quash any sexual feeling for Agnes in order to free himself from the grasp of Uriah Heep. In a similar way, Carmichael notes how David has to reject Steerforth in order to progress towards becoming a writer. Whilst Steerforth’s name appears to offer guidance, it becomes clear that David must take a different route in order to become both socially productive and happy. David’s drunken slurring to his friend, declaring ‘Steerforth-you’retheguidingstarofmyexist ence,’ is reminiscent of another warped guiding star: Estella in Great Expectations. In this novel, the protagonist never frees himself from the influence of his misguided star whereas David must reject this route of the alter-self and instead seek a motherly guidance in Agnes, ‘pointing upwards.’

Carmichael concludes that ‘the imaginary and the triangulated structures of the narrative, as well as the transcendental language, betray this ending tone of resolution, showing David still firmly imprisoned in the realm of the imaginary.’ I would suggest that, whilst with Agnes , David is able to become a productive being in the eyes of society, he has not free of his psychological loss. Indeed, the novel portrays the need to be both willing and able. Whilst Berkis is willin’, he is not able to continue in the novel, as is the case with Dora. This leads the reader to the somewhat melancholy conclusion that David does not replace the loss of his childhood, but that he follows his Aunt Betsey’s advice to ‘act the play out.’