Descriptions of physiognomies in English fiction from realism to modernism


Diploma Thesis, 2003

181 Pages, Grade: very good


Excerpt


TABLE OF CONTENTS

List of abbreviations

1. Introduction: Descriptions of physiognomies in (English) literature and their significance

2. Definitions of the terminology: ‘physiognomy’, ‘pathognomy’ and ‘body language’

2.Descriptions of physiognomies in mid-19th-century realist fiction as a reflection of the period’s norms and worldviews

3. The general importance of physiognomy in the realist context: the dominance of ‘readable’ physiognomy as a confirmation of an objective, transparent world

4. Descriptions of physiognomies in Elizabeth Gaskell’s North and South (1854-55): strong confirmation of a transparent, ‘readable’ world
4.1. Introduction
4.2. The narrative transmission of physiognomic descriptions
4.2.1. Transparent portraits of characters transmitted by an authorial narrator
4.2.2. Characters as successful ‘readers’ of physiognomies and the functioning of non-verbal communication
4.3. The ‘message’ of transparent faces
4.3.1. General remarks
4.3.2. Physiognomy as an indicator of a hereditary background: family likeness
4.3.3. Physiognomy as a reflection of influential circumstances: events, milieu (‘local origin’) and social class
4.3.3.1. General remarks
4.3.3.2. Physiognomy as an indicator of influential events
4.3.3.3. Physiognomy as an indicator of the milieu or local origin
4.3.3.4. Physiognomy as a class indicator
4.3.4. Physiognomy as a moral indicator
4.4. Occasional opacity of faces and its (plausible) reasons
4.5. Conclusion

5. Descriptions of physiognomies in George Eliot’s Adam Bede (1859): confirmation of a transparent world partly undermined by critical authorial remarks
5.1. Introduction
5.2. The narrative transmission of physiognomic descriptions
5.2.1. Transparent portraits of characters transmitted by an authorial narrator
5.2.2. Characters as successful ‘readers’ of physiognomies and the functioning of non-verbal communication
5.3. The ‘message’ of transparent faces
5.3.1. General remarks
5.3.2. Physiognomy as an indicator of a hereditary background: family likeness
5.3.3. Physiognomy as a reflection of influential circumstances: events, milieu (‘local’ and ‘racial’ origin) and social class
5.3.4. Physiognomy as a moral indicator
5.4. Doubts about a ‘readable’ world: instances of opacity (and their reasons) and critical authorial remarks
5.4.1. General remarks
5.4.2. Opacity in Adam Bede ’s faces and critical authorial comments on a ‘readable’ world
5.5. Conclusion

3.Descriptions of physiognomies in early modernism as a reflection of the period’s new norms and changed worldviews

6. Early modernism: the gradual rejection of realist norms, new modernist aesthetics and the consequences for descriptions of physiognomies

7. Descriptions of physiognomies in D.H. Lawrence’s Lady Chatterley’s Lover (1928): partial continuation of the realist tradition and the growing importance of subjective perceptions of physiognomies
7.1. Introduction: the peculiarity of D.H. Lawrence’s style
7.2. The narrative transmission of physiognomic descriptions
7.2.1. Remnants of transparent portraits of characters transmitted by an authorial narrator
7.2.2. Enhanced importance of intradiegetic physiognomists: continuation
of ‘transparent’ physiognomic observations, and the increase in (un-)reliable subjective physiognomic perceptions and in non-verbal communication
7.2.2.1. General remarks
7.2.2.2. Characters as physiognomists (I): Clifford Chatterley: the continuation of the realist belief in transparent physiognomies
7.2.2.3. Characters as physiognomists (II): Connie Chatterley: the heroine’s overall belief in transparency in spite of her occasional inability to ‘read’ faces
7.2.2.4. The increase in non-verbal communication
7.3. The message of faces and bodies: transparent faces in the realist tradition, ‘new’ and ‘reduced’ transparency
7.3.1. General remarks
7.3.2. Transparent faces in the realist tradition: Physiognomy as an indicator of a hereditary background, as a reflection of influential circumstances: events, milieu (‘local origin’) and social class
7.3.3. ‘New’ transparency: descriptions of physiognomies and bodies as indicators of sexual experience
7.3.4. ‘Reduced’ transparency: vital, sexual descriptions of bodies for their own sake
7.4. Conclusion

8. Descriptions of physiognomies in Virginia Woolf’s Mrs Dalloway (1925): the dominance of subjective, ambiguous perceptions of physiognomies as a strong undermining of the realist worldview and as a reflection of a ‘new’ sceptical approach to the world
8.1. Introduction: Virginia Woolf’s approach to the world and the new treatment of physiognomies
8.2. The narrative transmission of physiognomic descriptions
8.2.1. The overall withdrawal of the authorial narrator and its consequences for the treatment of physiognomies
8.2.2. Characters as the novel’s major physiognomists: various subjective perceptions of physiognomies and the lack of a ‘common’ worldview
8.2.2.1. General remarks
8.2.2.2. Characters as physiognomists (I): Clarissa Dalloway: the novel’s heroine as a representative of the traditional belief in ‘speaking’ faces
8.2.2.3. Characters as physiognomists (II): Septimus Warren Smith: an insane person’s distorted belief in transparent physiognomies
8.2.2.4. Characters as physiognomists (III): Peter Walsh: observations dominated by his ‘male gaze’ and the implicit rejection of realism’s epistemological basis
8.2.2.5. Characters as physiognomists (IV): Elizabeth Dalloway: her self-perception as a (possible) projection of her feeling of ‘otherness’
8.3. Conclusion

9.Final remarks

10. Bibliography

List of abbreviations

The following abbreviations will be used for the works repeatedly cited:

illustration not visible in this excerpt

1. Introduction: Descriptions of physiognomies in (English) literature and their significance

It is a fascinating phenomenon, that whenever we meet another person for the first time, we unconsciously and immediately judge him or her by merely looking at the person’s face. Although we may call ourselves the most tolerant people free of prejudices, we cannot help thinking a person likeable or not right away by the first visual impression we get, without ever having talked to him or her. Even though we know that a correspondence of physiognomic and ‘inner’ traits has never been convincingly or scientifically proved, it is unquestionable that most of us are impressed and influenced by visual data we receive from our fellow human beings’ faces.

In the course of history (and thus, of literature), people have repeatedly tried to come to terms with this phenomenon and to find explanations as well as definitions that may help to ‘face’ and deal with physiognomy in everyday life. Apparently, it has always been, and still is, people’s wish to ‘read’ in other faces so as to facilitate contact and to know how to judge characters. That this desire is not new can be seen by the fact that even (Pseudo-)Aristotle set up (very questionable, highly racist and sexist) rules according to which one could ‘categorise’ faces and thus know what kind of character is hidden behind the surface. Today, nobody relies on his writings anymore, which categorised people, among other factors, by establishing an analogy between animals and human beings. According to the author, those who had certain traits that were seen as resembling certain animals were considered to have the respective animal’s ‘inner’ traits as well, as in the following examples. “Die [Menschen] mit dicken Lippen, wobei die obere weiter vorsteht als die untere, sind dumm; siehe die Esel und Affen. [...] Die eine kleine Stirn haben, sind ungebildet; siehe die Schweine.“[1]

In (English) literature, the question of whether there is an indexical or arbitrary connection between inner and outer traits has been approached in many different ways which cannot be analysed in detail here. In a large number of older texts, descriptive passages containing physiognomic hints were not included, which points to a certain disinterest in this field of explanations (as well as in visual details in general). Some earlier works like Geoffrey Chaucer’s The Canterbury Tales (written around 1380), although dealing with physiognomy only in passing, rely on ‘speaking’, that is, expressive faces, without explicitly thematising physiognomic reading as such. Other authors seemed to be undecided between belief in ‘speaking’ physiognomies and a sceptical approach, as the following two quotations from the great dramatist’s plays illustrate. In Troilus and Cressida (IV, v, 55ff.), William Shakespeare unmistakably proclaims the ‘readability’ of physical traits: “There’s language in her eye, her cheek, her lip, / Nay, her foot speaks; her wanton spirits look out / At every joint and motive of her body.”[2] In Macbeth[3], however, a remarkable quotation includes a message contradicting the previous one: “There’s no art/ To find the mind’s construction in the face” (I, iv, 11f.), the king of Scotland cries out.

Although these two passages point to different approaches to the field of physiognomy, they at least reveal that the author has given some thought to the topic. In the course of the following centuries, due to a general rather careless treatment of outer details in English fiction, physiognomic descriptions did not play an important part. This does not necessarily mean that people in earlier times did not rely on the belief that faces are ‘readable’, but that the way of writing simply did not yet attempt to ‘visualise’ the (fictitious) world (including faces). This can partly be explained by the fact that novel-writing as such developed late in English literature, and that we have to wait until the 18th century to find novels that intend to depict ‘the real world’, that is, that try to create the illusion of ‘reality’. Thus, it is only from this point in history that physiognomies within a literary work can be treated as indices to the worldview underlying the respective work.

The interest in creating a plausible ‘real’ fictitious world, ‘inhabited’ by characters who have an ‘authentic’ life-like outer shape (which required descriptions of their looks) gradually increased, until it reached its heyday in 19th-century realist fiction.

Quite clearly, it would go beyond the scope of this book to discuss the various instances of physiognomies in English literature in general. Therefore, the focus will be on prose only and restricted to two literary epochs, which will be contrasted by their different treatment of physical traits. The discussion will start with an analysis of mid-19th-century realist works, in particular Elizabeth Gaskell’s industrial novel North and South (1854/55)[4] (cf. chapter 4) and George Eliot’s famous Adam Bede (1859)[5] (cf. chapter 5).

The task of this book is not merely a discussion of the treatment of the numerous descriptions of characters’ physiognomies within these works. As will be illustrated, the representation of characters’ looks not only reflects the implied norms of the respective work (and thus the implied author’s): by finding out how an implied author dealt with physiognomies – whether he or she presented them as transparent and ‘readable’, ignored this question, or treated physiognomy as ‘opaque’, that is, not revealing anything about the character beneath the visual surface – it should be possible to draw conclusions about the implied author’s (and even the epoch’s) general approach to the world. This is the reflection this thesis is based on. In the case of realist writers, as they mostly relied on the assumption that a face is indeed a ‘mirror’ of one’s soul, the suggestion that they generally had a positive, optimistic view of the world as a transparent and accessible one seems plausible and will be questioned and tried to be illustrated in the first part of this book.

The various reasons for the optimistic (in the semiotic sense) conviction of authors like Elizabeth Gaskell, Anthony Trollope or Charles Dickens will be included, too. What may have had a strong influence on at least some of these authors is the famous treatise about physiognomy by Johann Caspar Lavater called Physiognomische Fragmente, zur Beförderung der Menschenkenntniß und Menschenliebe published in 1775, which was well-known also in England[6]. While his theories were already strongly criticised during his lifetime, the fact that major thinkers and writers like Arthur Schopenhauer or Johann Wolfgang von Goethe favoured them contributed to their wide-spread popularity (cf. Gray: 2001). Although Lavater wrote his treatise centuries after (Psuedo-)Aristotle’s theories, the idea of facial features as unambiguous outer signs of inner traits is inherent in his work as well. The analogy between animals and human beings is given up, but the strong belief in transparency is still the basis of his observations, which he illustrated by including ‘model’ pictures of people’s heads which readers are meant to compare to those faces around them. In the 5th chapter called “Über die menschliche Natur”, Lavater strongly affirms the readability of physical traits.

So wie [der Mensch] nur durch die Sinne erkennt, so kann er nur durch die Sinne erkannt werden. [...] Dieß Aeußerliche und Innere stehen offenbar in einem genauen unmittelbaren Zusammenhange. Das Aeußerliche ist nichts, als die Endung, die Gränzen des Innern – und das Innre eine unmittelbare Fortsetzung des Aeußern. Es ist also ein wesentliches Verhältniß zwischen seiner Außenseite, und seinem Innwendigen.[7]

Approaching the turn of the century, in many works that distance themselves from the previous literary period’s convictions and conventions, the realist worldview is more and more critically questioned and undermined, until, with the modernist period, a counter-movement becomes the dominant literary influence. As modernist writers do not trust in the same ‘old’ system as the realist writers anymore, and radical modernist representatives openly dismiss the established conventions of storytelling as well as the former period’s whole epistemological basis, it can be suspected that the treatment of physiognomies within their literary works will have changed, too. A gradual development, from early ‘moderate’ modernism still stuck with old traditions to a final general dismissal of realist norms and worldviews, will be analysed in detail by taking two representative novels from the new period. After David Herbert Lawrence’s Lady Chatterley’s Lover[8] (published in 1928, but written earlier), in which realist elements and ‘new’ modernist insights as well as the author’s very peculiar style (cf. chapter 7) are combined, Mrs Dalloway (1925)[9], written by one of the most famous radical modernist writers Virginia Woolf, will prove to be an ideal example of the author’s new way of storytelling, whose effects on the field of physiognomy will be examined, too. (cf. chapter 8)

After the modernist period, it becomes more and more difficult to obtain an overview of the period’s overall approach to people’s looks. While postmodernist writers, based on their idea of a fragmented world that cannot be grasped and explained in its entirety, continued and radicalised the modernist depiction of reality (including physiognomies), thereby often mocking conventional ways of storytelling, other writers of the 20th century took up the realist tradition again and continued to transport the belief in ‘transparent’ faces through their books. Other, new media, like comics, make strong use of expressive physiognomies and body language to make it easy to tell right from wrong. The development of the film has taken up this black-and-white ‘colouring’ (already frequently found in realist fiction) from the very beginning, too. Even today, although many counter-examples exist which have found means to show a more differentiated picture of the world, films to a high degree still rely on ‘speaking’ pictures. A high number of mainstream-films, whose main action – to put it bluntly – is often about a hero fighting against an antagonist, speaks an inherent and unmistakable ‘language’ as far as the characters’ looks are concerned. Moreover, children’s literature, cartoons and related media make strong use of ‘speaking’ faces, which is a device apparently meant to facilitate the understanding of the story for the children. Up to this day, heroes tend to be the good-looking guys, while their enemies are easily recognised by their ugly features, although there is no scientific proof for unequivocal facial information and every (adult) viewer will know from his or her own experience that the world’s surface can not be categorised that easily.

These contemporary phenomena all underline the fact that the question of whether faces are ‘speaking’ the truth about the underlying character or not is still a topic of interest in our time. Maybe it is due to the enhanced fragmentation of reality, the blurring of reality and fiction and a general feeling that there is no firm basis we can rely on anymore, that people would like to find new ways of explaining the world or continue the age-old tradition of taking faces as a system of indexical signs. One very questionable result of this possible wish is an online-course about face reading, in which participants are instructed how to read physiognomies. For only $ 25, one can attend twelve online lessons, in which an instructor will teach participants how to “recognize and read the personality traits for lines, dimples [!] and clefts”[10] as well as learn how to interpret a person’s eyelids, nose, jaws, cheeks and hair [!]. (cf. Online Course: Face Reading [Physiognomy] 2003).

However various and interesting the dealings with physiognomies in our times may be, for a better understanding of our present culture as such, it is helpful to know the backgrounds and to take a closer look at the past. It is this book’s task to analyse the treatment of physiognomies preceding the fragmented postmodernist era by taking a closer look at representative works of two strikingly different literary periods, namely 19th-century realism and (early) 20th-century modernism. The novels’ treatment of facial descriptions shall reflect this book’s thesis, namely that it is possible to illustrate the norms and worldviews underlying the respective novels (and thus, the literary epoch it belongs to) metonymically by the presentation of physiognomies in the work.

2.Definitions of the terminology: ‘physiognomy‘, ‘pathognomy’ and ‘body language’

Before analysing the treatment of physiognomies in the realist and modernist novels, it is necessary to define what is meant by the most common terms used during the following analysis. As opposed to the German distinction between ‘Physiognomie’, meaning a person’s appearance with special emphasis on his or her face, and ‘Physiognomik’, the art of interpreting facial features[11], the English term most commonly used, ‘physiognomy’, contains a certain ambivalence. According to the Oxford Modern English Dictionary, physiognomy as a primary denotation means “the cast or form of a person’s features, expression, body, etc.”[12], being thus equivalent to the German ‘Physiognomie’. The second meaning of the English term is covered by the German ‘Physiognomik’, as the word may also mean “the art of supposedly judging character from facial characteristics etc.” (Swannell 1992: 805). Yet it seems that occasionally, in order to differentiate between the two meanings in the English language as well, the term ‘physiognomics’ is used, especially if one investigates in the Internet – for example, Gray’s Germanic-Physiognomics Research[13] – , but the term does not (yet) have an entry in the dictionaries. In the course of this book, ‘physiognomy’ will be used with both its meanings: however, as the task of this book is to analyse how and why physiognomic descriptions are included in the novels discussed, the second definition will be of special interest, namely the way physiognomies are presented and treated in the novels, which is meant to reflect the norms and worldviews underlying the novel and even the literary period in which the respective work is embedded.

A category related to physiognomy is the field of ‘pathognomy’, which, interestingly, lacks an entry in the Oxford Modern English Dictionary. By this term, sudden and temporary changes on a face are meant, which for example can be caused by shock, anger, fear or joy. While physiognomic traits are of a permanent nature and do not change easily, pathognomic reactions occur and disappear suddenly. Although the number of pathognomic reactions included in the novels is usually high, especially in the realist works discussed, this field is not as expressive of the norms, ideals and approach to the world by the implied author as are the descriptions of physiognomies, and will therefore not be treated separately. Even less so, as physiognomy and pathognomy are frequently combined and it is sometimes hard to tell them apart. Thus, in the course of this paper, pathognomy will be included in the analysis of physiognomy.

A third term that will often be used is ‘body language’, which usually includes faces and thus physiognomy as well. However, throughout this book, this ”process of communicating through conscious and unconscious gestures and poses” (Swannell 1992: 110) will be used to define gestures, movements and hints other than physiognomic. Frequently, body language and physiognomic traits are combined, so that it is necessary to analyse both aspects in combination. Yet, on the whole, the field of body language other than facial ‘language’ will play but a minor role in the following discussion.

2. Descriptions of physiognomies in English mid-19th-century realist fiction as a reflection of the period’s norms and worldviews

3. The general importance of physiognomy in the realist context: the dominance of ‘readable’ physiognomy as a confirmation of an objective, transparent world

Whereas in (English) literature until the 18th century, authors tended to focus on the action of the story and at the same time more or less ignored the visualising of the fictitious world, the attempts to visualise the intradiegetic ‘reality’ of novels have clearly and strongly increased since the 18th century, leading to a climax of ‘visualised’ intradiegetic realities in 19th-century realism. Among other (generally) detailed descriptions – of, for example, landscapes, weather, houses, rooms, clothes – descriptions of characters’ physiognomies strongly gained in importance, as Werner Wolf underlines in his latest essay on ‘speaking faces’ (2002a: 395).

Descriptions of characters’ physiognomic traits or pathognomic reactions can have various functions. Like other descriptions, they have the primary effect of enhancing the aesthetic illusion of the fictitious world; moreover, they help the readers to identify and tell characters apart. In addition to these obvious functions, there are, however, functions which not only partly deviate from the reader’s real-life experience, but are more relevant for this paper’s thesis and will thus be focused on during the following analysis: in the majority of instances, facial descriptions in realist fiction are not neutral observations but fulfil further functions, which Werner Wolf summarised as follows:

[Physiognomiedeskriptionen] tragen zur figurenbezogener Reliefgebung und Sympathielenkung bei und können bestimmte Erwartungen wecken. Daneben geben Beschreibungen von Gesichter wegen der besonderen medialen Bedingungen und Möglichkeiten narrativen Beschreibens [...] auch häufig Hinweise auf Charaktereigenschaften der Figuren, meist sogar in expliziter Form.[14]

From the general treatment of physiognomic descriptions in a novel, one can draw conclusions about the novel’s norms as well as about the epistemological basis of the respective literary work or even epoch to which the novel belongs (cf. Wolf 2002b: 303). It is this paper’s task to prove this thesis and exemplify it by a profound analysis of several literary works that belong to the period of realism, and to compare them to physiognomic descriptions in modernist novels, in order to outline the new assumptions and worldviews of the new literary period. As will be tried to illustrate, it should indeed be possible to take an examination of various physiognomic pieces of information in realism (as in any literary period) as a ‘metonymical analysis’ of the entire intradiegetic world and the realists’ worldview in general: taking a closer look at how characters are described within a novel serves as a true and reliable ‘key’ to parts of a novel’s underlying norms. The analysis of two novels by major realist authors will illustrate that faces in realist fiction tend to be ‘readable’, that is, transparent as to the characters’ inner traits: what is ‘seen’ and ‘read’ on the surface corresponds with what lies within the character. It is the task of this book to use the information about intradiegetic physiognomies within the realist works discussed as a ‘metonymy’ for the epistemological basis most realist novels share: namely that of an objective, unambiguous world accessible to everyone.

4. Descriptions of physiognomies in Elizabeth Gaskell’s North and South (1854-55): strong confirmation of a transparent, ‘readable’ world

4.1. Introduction

North and South, Elizabeth Gaskell’s industrial novel about a family from the south of England that moves into a factory town in the north, where they are faced with difficult circumstances, was written in the 1850s, in the heyday of realism. More than any of the other novels treated in this paper, North and South is representative of realist aesthetics: numerous examples can be found that illustrate realist norms, values and the underlying worldview.

As far as the treatment of descriptions of physiognomies is concerned , North and South represents an overall uncritical approach to faces that are ‘readable’, accessible to (almost) everyone, and thus reflect the belief in an objective, explainable world which can be experienced and represented without opacity and ambiguity. It is thus an ideal novel (as is also Gaskell’s first novel Mary Barton[15], which will be occasionally quoted) to illustrate the treatment of descriptions of physiognomies typical of that literary period.

In the following chapters, the most frequent categories of descriptions of physiognomies in realist fiction, the characters’ outer descriptions and the indexical readings of their physiognomic traits will be analysed. As opposed to the second realist novel discussed, namely George Eliot’s well-known work Adam Bede (1859), which reflects the author’s more critical and less generalising approach to transparent physiognomic traits, North and South lacks ambiguity, critical reflections or authorial comments on this subject. Thereby, it presents best the (intradiegetic) – and thus the ‘real’ world – as it should be like in realist eyes: positive, objective, explainable and extremely transparent.

4.2. The narrative transmission of physiognomic descriptions

“What else can be said of her face or personal appearance that will interest the reader?”[16]

“[Frank had] that kind of broad forehead which conveys rather the idea of a generous, kind, open-hearted disposition, than of a deep mind or a commanding intellect.” (K+OK: 24)

4.2.1. Transparent portraits of characters transmitted by an authorial narrator

The narrative situation is a crucial and determinative element as far as the treatment of descriptions of physiognomies in realist novels is concerned. The different attitude of modernist writers towards the authority of a story's narrator is, as will turn out, to a large extent responsible for the striking differences between the two literary epochs. Therefore the narrative situation in realist fiction needs separate analytical remarks before the ‘messages’ which ‘realist faces’ convey will be discussed.

The diegetic reality of novels representative of realism is typically given by an omniscient, authorial narrator located on the extradiegetic level who is consequently not part of the story. It is through this god-like position that general information, descriptions and explanations are provided for the reader.

Although all realist novels discussed throughout this paper share the same narrative situation, the narrators’ comments on physiognomy vary from novel to novel : North and South contains a comparatively high number of physiognomic elements, a large number of which are given from the ‘outside’, by the all-knowing narrator. This means that the amount of information about physical facts of characters is to a large extent determined by the narrator, as Barbara Korte remarks, referring to body language in general[17]. In a large number of cases, these physiognomic descriptions are far from being ‘neutral’ and contain ‘correct’ interpretations and comments by the narrator. This latter aspect is another phenomenon typical of that literary period (cf. Korte 1993: 114). The narrator in North and South, as in other realist novels, is a reliable ‘reader’ of physiognomic traits who is always able to use a character’s physiognomy as an indicator of various pieces of information about his or her personality. For the reader, there is no reason to doubt what the narrator reveals about physical appearances (or any other aspects). The omniscient position in realism guarantees an unrestricted (and consequently ‘objective’) approach to the physiognomy of all characters within the fictional world (cf. Korte 1993:114).

Moreover, it enables the reader to access the character’s personality and inner traits via their ‘speaking’ physiognomies: physiognomy in realist works in general and in North and South in particular is presented as an authentic ‘mirror’ of what is going on on the inside, in the psyche of a person.

The effect achieved by physiognomic descriptions in North and South (as in other realist fiction) is first of all the creation of the illusion of life-like characters by giving them a certain ‘shape’. The visualising aspect of characters is of great importance, since one of the intentions in realist fiction is to present characters and their actions and give reasons for their behaviour or the way things develop. In the realist writers’ opinion, as a first step for the reader to establish a relationship with the characters, “[t]he reader must see these characters, and see them clearly, if he is to understand them“[18]. So the two desired effects sought by a character's physical description could be defined as “definition and intensity“ (Irwin 1979: 41).

An especially interesting and important part is the way characters are introduced. This can be seen as a ‘substitute’ for the real-life experience of meeting a person for the first time, which unconsciously and immediately determines our opinion of that person. A detailed, memorable introduction of (especially major) characters primarily serves the ‘simple’ and, in realist writers’ eyes, essential function of enhancing the aesthetic illusion and contributing to a plausible, visualised and ‘realistic’ fictional world on the level of histoire. Seemingly endless descriptions of the intradiegetic world are typical of realist fiction, and so it does not come as a surprise that the physical appearance of characters is usually treated carefully, too. More often than not, these physical details are not necessarily important for the understanding of a character; frequently, long descriptive passages seem to be included for the mere effect of ‘painting’ round portraits without any further intentions by the narrator, as also W. J. Harvey remarks: “Most nineteenth-century novelists [...] take delighted advantage of the scope and plasticity of their medium to elaborate and portray characters for their own sake [...]”[19].

Of course, a convincing ‘portrait’ in written texts, transmitted through symbolic signs (words), cannot be compared, for example, to a painted picture or photograph of a person or to a ‘real’ meeting. Therefore, visual descriptions in literature are typically reduced to some details and are in a large number of cases only presented in schemata; it is consequently up to the reader’s imagination to complete the ‘literary picture’ of the character’s looks[20]. Yet, in realism, the number of physiognomic (and visual in general) details is comparatively high and may eventually, as will be shown, lead to an over-input in details.

Introductory portraits in realist fiction can basically be divided into two main categories which will be analysed by examples from the novels discussed: first, a ‘static narratorial portrait’ during which the story time is stopped while a detailed physiognomic description of a character, without any embedding in a certain ‘scene’, is given by the narrator. The focus here lies on the general character of outer traits and not so much on the ‘momentary’ effect (typically the focus of interest in modernist descriptions).

Secondly, predominantly ‘internal dynamic portraits’, which are given from a seemingly intradiegetic perspective and present a character ‘in action’; physiognomic descriptions fitting into this category are thus embedded in the story, are less static and to a certain extent foreshadow the modernist’s ‘momentary’ and subjective glimpses. Although these portraits seem to be perceived on the diegetic level, the voice of the narrator can in many cases be unmistakably ‘heard’, as he or she typically includes information another intradiegetic character could not be aware of. It is an effective device in which the narrator makes only implicit use of his or her ‘omniscience’.

In practice, as will be shown, it is sometimes not easy to find ‘pure’ forms of these two variations, as the majority of descriptive passages contains both static and dynamic elements, openly ‘authorial’ passages as well as seemingly intradiegetic ones. Additionally, both kinds of introduction can occur in a combination with physiognomic descriptions of another character: this ‘comparative description’ device, either used to introduce two new characters at the same time or to give a first introduction for one character while the second one has already been – physiognomically – presented, has additional effects which will be discussed in the following as well.

Although Elizabeth Gaskell’s North and South includes a variety of introductions, a typical, exclusively static narratorial introduction will be looked for in vain. Authorial static ones do not seem to be characteristic of Gaskell’s fiction; portraits typically contain many dynamic ‘inner’ elements. Therefore, in order to illustrate a stereotypical realist static portrait, a representative example from Anthony Trollope’s The Kellys and the O’Kellys (1848) shall be taken. The following is an excerpt from the introductory static portrait of one of the few positive characters in the novel, Fanny Windham.

Fanny Windham was above the usual height; but she did not look tall, for her figure was well-formed and round, and her bust full. She had dark-brown hair [...] Her forehead was high, and beautifully formed, and when she spoke, showed the animation of her character. Her eyes were full and round, of a hazel colour, bright and soft when she was pleased, but full of pride and displeasure when her temper was ruffled, or her dignity offended. Her nose was slightly retroussé, but not so much so as to give her that pertness, of which it is usually the index. The line of her cheeks and chin was very lovely: it was this which encouraged her to comb back that luxuriant hair, and which gave the greatest charm to her face. Her mouth was large, too large for a beauty, and therefore she was not a regular beauty; but, were she talking to you, and willing to please you, you could hardly wish it to be less. I cannot describe the shade of her complexion, but it was rich and glowing; [...] (K+OK: 146f.)

This extract includes various interesting and typically realist aspects: the description has a classical form: it begins with an overall view on the young woman (height, figure) and then focuses on her face, that is, her physiognomy, starting on top with forehead and hair and eventually moving downward in her face, describing cheeks, mouth and chin[21]. The ‘semiotic terms’ used in the quotation, namely the fact that Fanny’s forehead which “[...] showed the animation of her character” (my italics K+OK: 146) or that her nose serves as an “index” (my italics, K+OK: 147) are two terms frequently found in passages concerned with descriptions of transparent, ‘speaking’ physiognomies, in Trollope’s work as well as in realist fiction in general.

A similar, yet also different structure can be made out in the following description of Mr. Thornton’s grim mother in Gaskell’s novel: an example that belongs to the category of ‘static narratorial (or authorial) portraits’, as it is explicitly (and not in a ‘hidden’ way, as is the case in dynamic introductions) given from the extradiegetic point of view, thus by the narrator. It lacks dynamism and the physiognomic elements it contains are generally true and are not part of a subjective momentary look at the woman. Yet, a few elements rather point to an internal dynamic portrait: her introduction at the beginning starts at a dynamic point, namely her sitting in her house, knitting and talking to her son, and explicitly contains an intradiegetic focaliser (“passers-by in the street” [ N+S: 76]). Still, as the following excerpt shows, the static, narratorial elements clearly dominate.

A large-boned lady, long past middle age, sat at work in a grim handsomely-furnished dining-room. Her features, like her frame, were strong and massive, rather than heavy. Her face moved slowly from one decided expression to another equally decided. There was no great variety in her countenance; but those who looked at it once, generally looked at it again; even the passers-by in the street, half-turned their heads to gaze an instant longer at the firm, severe, dignified woman, who never gave way in street-courtesy, or paused in her straight-onward course to the clearly-defined end which she proposed to herself.

She was handsomely dressed in stout black silk, of which not a thread was worn or discoloured.[...] (N+S: 76)

This example is representative of the static narratorial portrait in particular and realism in general in a number of details. First, Mrs. Thornton gets a longish introduction that covers almost a whole page. It starts and ends with the momentary situation of Mrs. Thornton: she is sitting in her living room and mending a table cloth. Yet, from the second sentence of her introduction, the narrator ‘leaves’ the setting and provides a general description of her features – including a general reaction by others to her appearance – and then moves back to her sitting in the room and talking to her son (cf. N+S: 76f.), a device characteristic of narratorial portraits.

While Mrs. Thornton’s physiognomy is reduced to a few traits, Fanny’s introduction in The Kellys and the O’Kellys includes a description of most parts of her face. The large number of details with which Fanny is provided is another device typical of portraits in realist fiction, especially of static narratorial ones, as the details given could not have been consciously observed in their entirety and remembered all at once by another fictitious character or in a real life situation, which might render the portrait a little less authentic. Usually, one tends rather to observe only some striking traits in a person’s countenance. “The exhaustive description, [...] the inventory of features, is false to the psychology of perception. We tend not to notice what is not exceptional” (Irwin 1979: 20). This idea of Michael Irwin’s refers to long, detailed descriptions in realist fiction in general, but is also true of Fanny’s physiognomic introduction in particular, which, although the exceptionality of her features is focused on, might already include too much and thus disturb the illusion of a real-life tête-a-tête. Mrs. Thornton’s introduction, in contrast, clearly does not strain the reader’s imagination with an ‘over-input’ of physiognomic details. He or she probably has a more vague, yet more life-like idea what this woman may look like.

Another aspect typical of physiognomic details in realism can be found in both introductions: the two portraits are far from being neutral and function as an at least implicit guide of the reader’s sympathy. However, Fanny’s portrait contains more explicit manipulating elements. While Fanny’s body gets a number of positive adjectives that serve as a mirror of her beautiful inner traits (“beautifully formed”, “lovely” chin and cheeks, “luxuriant” hair, K+OK: 146f. among others), Mrs. Thornton’s physiognomy gets less qualifying attributes, yet her facial features can be read as transparent signs of her soul: she is indeed a grim lady lacking emotions, who, as she will show throughout the novel, is “firm” and “severe” (N+S: 76), which already her “strong and massive” and “grim” (N+S: 76) features (as well as her house!) reveal. Although both characters have not appeared in the novel and have not been able to ‘show’ the animation of their personality yet, for the reader, their respective introductions have made it clear whom to like and whom to dislike. Thus the physiognomic introductions do not only reflect the underlying belief in a transparent, ‘readable’ world; but their way of transmission also contributes to an evaluation of (the objects of) this world.

Moreover, Trollope’s narrator goes into many details in order to paint a more differentiated picture of the young woman than Gaskell’s portrait ever achieves. Even Fanny’s nose, which is apparently not perfectly shaped, is described with a French adjective, which makes it sound more charming and less negative. Additionally, the narrator wipes out possible connotations of it indicating a certain “pertness, of which it is usually the index” (my italics, K+OK: 146f.). He[22] explicitly underlines the possibility of reading noses as transparent signs of one’s soul, yet presents the woman’s as not “retroussé” (K+OK: 146) enough to be ‘read’ as an index of arrogance or snootiness[23].

The description of Fanny’s eyes as “full”, “round”, “bright” and “soft” (K+OK: 146) presents also one of the most crucial parts of her face in a positive light. It contains a number of adjectives from a category that is frequently used in order to characterise positive young women in realist novels (cf. chapter 4.3.4. on physiognomy as a moral indicator).

While Gaskell’s narrator only implicitly emphasises the transparency of Mrs. Thornton’s face by its anticipation of her character traits[24], Fanny Windham’s physiognomy and pathognomy are explicitly presented as extremely transparent: her different moods can be immediately seen and thus ‘read’ on her countenance. Not only does her forehead “show” (K+OK: 146) the animation of her character, but also her eyes ‘speak’ and are either “bright and soft” (K+OK: 146) when she is in a good mood and “full of pride and displeasure” (K+OK: 146) when she is angry. She shares this ‘readable’, transparent physiognomy (expressed by the ‘semiotic terms’ described above) with other positive female heroines: Margaret (in North and South), Mary (in Mary Barton) and Dinah (in Eliot’s Adam Bede) cannot (and do not attempt to) feign the expressions of their faces send which renders them all pure, natural and good.

While in The Kellys and the O’Kellys the number of static portraits is rather high – although often combined with various ‘dynamic’ elements – the introductory portraits in Gaskell’s fiction tend to fit rather into the second category, the ‘dynamic portraits’, which focus more on the momentary condition of a character’s physiognomy. Nevertheless, this kind of introduction contains valid information as to the permanent features of the respective character, too. Although seemingly from an intradiegetic point of view (through the eyes of a focaliser), the narrator’s omniscient voice usually can be detected, as in the following ‘internal’ portrait of heroine Margaret. Although she has already appeared in the novel, the reader gets to know her body when she presents her cousin’s dresses in front of her aunt and a few other ladies:

So Margaret went down laden with shawls, [...]. Her aunt asked her to stand as a sort of lay figure on which to display them, as [her cousin] Edith was still asleep. No one thought about it; but Margaret’s tall, finely made figure, in the black silk dress which she was wearing [...] set off the long beautiful folds of the gorgeous shawls that would have half-smothered Edith. Margaret stood right under the chandelier, quite silent and passive, while her aunt adjusted the draperies. Occasionally, as she was turned round, she caught a glimpse of herself in the mirror over the chimney-piece, and smiled at her own appearance there–the familiar features in the usual garb of a princess. [...] (N+S: 9)

The physiognomic information in Margaret’s introduction clearly is not much. The reader basically only gets a first idea of her (good-looking) figure and an overall positive impression of a girl who has always been standing in the background of her cousin Edith, although, as is suggested here, Margaret is the better-looking one of the two. The narrator’s voice, which can be ‘heard’ in this quotation (“No one thought about it; but... [...]”, N+S: 9), raises this idea by commenting that the dresses look better on her than on her cousin.
A typically realist device included in physiognomic descriptions, the topos of describing physiognomies as reflected in a mirror, is embedded in this portrait, too. Margaret’s self-perception – “[she] smiled at her own appearance [...]”, N+S: 9) – reveals her self-assurance, which she will later prove by her actions: she never hesitates to tell her own opinion even in front of influential people and does not stop believing in herself throughout the novel. Thus, this seemingly unimportant remark can be seen as a foreshadowing – and thus transparent – device.

The reader has to wait until her father Mr. Hale (cf. N+S: 16f.) gets his ‘dynamic’ introductory portrait[25] in order to get more physiognomic information about Margaret, too. Only then will the reader be explicitly informed (and finally convinced) of her outer and inner beauty. As is typical of realism’s main characters, her beauty is not a ‘classical’ but an exceptional one, since she is “so far from regularly beautiful; not beautiful at all, was occasionally said” (N+S: 17). Although this last comment could be seen as an (intradiegetic) questioning of her good looks, the (extradiegetic) description which follows makes clear that she is an exceptional and attractive young woman (cf. N+S: 17).

The fact that the heroine’s looks deviate from classical features can be seen as a typically realist device. The idea that is explicitly raised here is that she is neither an average person (which is undermined by the many positive adjectives) nor a perfect beauty, which renders her an exceptional character[26]. Her non-regular physiognomy thus puts emphasis on her individuality. Since the 18th century, individual (main) characters in fiction have gained in importance: Margaret’s presentation as an outstanding individual turns out to be valid, since she is able to handle difficult and unknown situations and is to be a true friend and big help for those around her.
In North and South, as in realist novels in general, both the ‘static narratorial’ and the ‘internal dynamic’ introductions tend to occur in an interesting variation: in numerous cases, a static or dynamic introduction is ‘combined’ with introductions of other characters. These ‘double’ or ‘comparative’ portraits are used, for example, when two characters – both or at least one still ‘visibly’ unknown to the reader – stay in the same room. Generally, it can be said that these portraits have the same functions and effects as a ‘single’ introduction, since the narrator’s voice and guidance is likewise to be found; yet, the instances of ‘comparative introductions’ in the novels discussed also imply further functions and have supplementary effects.

A comparison is automatically implied when two characters are introduced at the same time (or at least one directly following the other), which often renders the characters’ physiognomies even more visible to the reader, since it is easier to imagine a person when it is possible to oppose or compare him or her to another person.

Although not given by the omniscient narrator but by the intradiegetic character Margaret, whose judgements are in accordance with the narrator’s throughout the novel, the following example nevertheless fits into the category of narratorial transmission: not only does Margaret, the focaliser, share the same set of norms and values with the narrator, the authorial voice behind that analysis can be made out, too. The following ‘double’ portrait illustrates very clearly the desired effect of opposing two different personalities in North and South, namely Margaret’s father Mr. Hale and the owner of a mill, Mr. Thornton, whom Margaret will marry in the end and whom at that point of the story she has not consciously begun to love yet. Both characters have already appeared in the novel, the reader having had a first glimpse at Mr. Hale’s appearance earlier (cf. N+S: 16), which however might not have produced a lasting impression. At this point in the story, the reader has only a vague idea, if any at all, of Mr. Thornton’s physiognomy, since his description was left out when he first appeared in the novel and met Margaret for the first time, in an episode in which only her good looks were focused on (cf . N+S: 61ff.). The following quotation thus combines a ‘second’ introduction of Mr. Hale with a first introductory physiognomic portrait of Mr. Thornton.

[...] and on suddenly looking up from her work, [Margaret’s] eye was caught by the difference of outward appearance between her father and Mr. Thornton, as betokening such distinctly opposite natures. Her father was of slight figure, which made him appear taller than he really was, when not contrasted, as at this time, with the tall, massive frame of another. The lines in her father’s face were soft and waving, with a frequent undulating kind of trembling movement passing over them, showing every fluctuating emotion; the eyelids were large and arched, giving to the eyes a peculiar languid beauty which was almost feminine. The brows were finely arched, but were, by the very size of the dreamy lids, raised to a considerable distance from the eyes. Now, in Mr. Thornton’s face the straight brows fell low over the clear, deep-set earnest eyes, which, without being unpleasantly sharp, seemed intent enough to penetrate into the very heart and core of what he was looking at. The lines of the face were few but firm, as if they were carved in marble, and lay principally about the lips, which were slightly compressed over a set of teeth so faultless and beautiful as to give the effect of sudden sunlight when the rare bright smile, coming in an instant and shining out of the eyes, changed the whole look from the severe and resolved expression of a man ready to do and dare everything, to the keen honest enjoyment of the moment [...]. Margaret liked this smile; it was the first thing she had admired in this new friend of her father’s; and the opposition of character, shown in all these details of appearance [...] seemed to explain the attraction they evidently felt towards each other. (N+S: 80)

This episode, which almost fills a whole page in the novel, contains various interesting details that can be used to exemplify realist functions of physiognomic descriptions.

Even the macro-structure of this passage is remarkable: the narrator enables the reader to learn about a new character, Mr. Thornton, by starting first of all with an already known one, Mr. Hale and his features, before moving on to the other’s unknown physiognomy. Hereby, the author does not contrast the two in a crude opposition of their features, but finishes the first description before moving on to the second one. Still, the desired contrasting effect is achieved without problem: The “soft and waving” (N+S: 80) features of Mr. Hale form a clear opposition to Mr. Thornton’s “firm” (N+S: 80) features “carved in marble” (N+S: 80), although these are mentioned some ten lines later. The same is true of Mr. Hale’s beautiful, almost feminine eyes (that just like his soft face indicate his inner softness), which differ from Mr. Thornton’s “straight brows” (N+S: 80) and “deep-set earnest eyes” (N+S: 80), which point to his seriousness and his businessman attitude, without which he would not be able to keep a factory. His physiognomic traits contrast with Mr. Hale’s “dreamy eyelids” (N+S: 80). The one’s face shows “every fluctuating emotion” (N+S: 80), the other one keeps a “severe and resolved expression” (N+S: 80), which implicitly opposes Mr. Hale’s rather emotional character and opposes it to Mr. Thornton’s rationality.

There is no doubt that the contrasting physiognomies of the two serve as outer evidence of the men’s “distinctly opposite natures”(N+S: 80); a knowledge which every reader will have gained after having read this passage, but which is also explicitly referred to by the narratorial voice. After this comparison, there is also no doubt about whom Margaret loves dearly and whom she is (still) rather opposed to.

Yet the impression that could have been raised here of an opposition ‘good’ (Mr. Hale) vs. ‘bad ‘(Mr. Thornton) is met with additional explicit ‘good’ features of the latter character: his “bright smile, [...] shining out of the eyes, [...] to the keen honest enjoyment of the moment” (N+S: 80), which pleases the good heroine Margaret, point to his positive character. Therefore, this ‘comparative introduction’ goes beyond a mere ‘good -vs.- bad’- opposition, as opposed to, for example, the comparison of good Silas and his evil ‘friend’ William in George Eliot’s Silas Marner (1861)[27].

Since Mr. Hale’s and Mr. Thornton’s physical traits reflect corresponding inner ones, a semiotic relation which is explicitly mentioned – “the opposition of their character, shown in all these details of appearance” (my italics, N+S: 80) – the transparency of the world is once more emphasised. Interestingly, their differing physiognomies and characters are taken as an explanation [!] of their mutual likeness, since “the opposition of character, shown in all these details of appearance [...] seemed to explain the attraction they evidently felt towards each other”. (my italics, N+S: 80).

Additionally, the passage is an instance of a seemingly intradiegetic observation (as opposed to the extradiegetic authorial ones), a momentary glimpse at the two men sitting at a table and having tea. As opposed to ‘static’ introductions, the subjectivity and transitoriness of this description is also explicitly mentioned: Mr. Hale’s slightness usually makes him appear “taller than he really was” (N+S: 80), but “at this time” (my italics, N+S: 80), he seemed smaller due to the tallness of Mr. Thornton. Therefore this quotation can be taken as an instance in which germs of the later dominance of intradiegetic, momentary portraits (as in Thomas Hardy’s The Return of the Native [1878] or in a more radical way in modernist fiction) can already be made out: descriptions that will in the long run replace the extradiegetic position still dominant in realist fiction of Gaskell’s time.

Summing up, realist works contain a number of devices that transmit the characters’ physiognomies and at the same time underline the features’ transparency as far as certain inner traits of the respective characters are concerned. The authorial narrator has thereby turned out to be a reliable and keen ‘observer’ whom the reader can (and has to) trust. The introduction, namely the first optical encounter with a certain character, which simulates a first meeting of that person in a real-life situation, has proved to be highly significant. Not only does it enable the reader to visualise round characters thanks to their ‘surface’, their outer traits, but it also, directly or indirectly, provides relevant information about the character’s personality: this is done either explicitly, by directly referring to physiognomies’ transparent indexical function, or implicitly, by the character’s actions and deeds, which later in the novel confirm what the narrator has already revealed by the description of ‘readable’ and ‘accessible’ features on a character’s countenance.

“I can read her proud bonny face like a book.”[28]

“So much was understood through eyes that could not be put into words.”[29]

4.2.2.Characters as successful ‘readers’ of physiognomies and the functioning of non-verbal communication

For the reader, as shown in the previous chapter, the authorial narrator guarantees a reliable, transparent access to characters’ faces. As typical of the narrative situation in realist novels, the narrator in North and South in his or her god-like omniscient position stands above the intradiegetic characters. It is thus not surprising that the characters’ reliability and their judgement concerning different topics, including the ‘reading’ of other characters’ faces, do not come close to the truth-value of those by the superior all-knowing narrator.

Yet the implied norms of most realist novels, affirmed by the respective narrator – among them the belief in (the existence of) a transparent world – and reflected in his or her ability to ‘read’ and interpret physical traits, would not be persuasive and plausible if they did not find any confirmation in the intradiegetic world[30].

As already mentioned, a ‘proof’ of the narrator’s ‘physiognomic analysis’ of characters is first of all given by the way the story develops and by the characters’ actions. To name but two prominent examples, our heroine Margaret in North and South ‘justifies’ her positive introductory portrait throughout the novel by her permanent ‘moral goodness’, as does the eponymous heroine in Gaskell’s earlier novel Mary Barton (1848).

Secondly, the way in which intradiegetic characters interact among each other, the way they make use of, rely on, and trust in the ‘speaking’ faces of their fellow human beings as well as the high number of successful ‘non-verbal communication’, are very important, as they implicitly support the extradiegetic narrator’s claim of a reliable ‘reading’ of physiognomy. It renders the application of the narrator’s interpretation and comments plausible and relevant for the fictional world and its ‘inhabitants’. Additionally, the fact that intradiegetic characters observe each other has the side-effect of an enhancement of the illusion of the fictitious as a ‘real’ world. Looking into other faces, noticing in them, for example, slight changes or moods and trying to find meaning in them, is an unconscious phenomenon people do in real life, too.

The number of characters who trust in their ability to ‘read’ in the faces of their fellow human-beings (and do so successfully) is remarkably high in Gaskell’s novel. The heroine’s ability to see meanings in other faces confirms the belief in a transparent world: the most positive intradiegetic character can successfully (and to a very large extent) rely on the same set of values as the narrator. The fact that she turns out to be a reliable interpreter of physiognomic traits characterises her as a positive, sensitive young woman and in that respect ‘justifies’ the goodness that was proclaimed in her narratorial portrait.

The following example emphasises the implied norms by presenting Margaret as a successful ‘interpreter’ of her father’s face.

He [her father] looked a complete gentleman in his rather threadbare coat and well-worn hat. Margaret was proud of her father; she had always a fresh and tender pride in seeing how favourably he impressed every stranger; still her quick eye sought over his face and found there traces of some unusual disturbance, which was only put aside, not cleared away. (my italics, N+S: 26)

One could even talk of multiple correct ‘readings’ here, since Margaret also seems to be able to ‘see’ in strangers’ faces how her father’s appearance has an impact on them (“seeing how favourably he impressed every stranger”, N+S: 26). Although not explicitly mentioned, the two last lines of the quotation suggest that she can possibly read more than other characters from her father’s countenance, since she is provided with a “quick eye” (N+S: 26), which enables her to decipher the traces she sees in his face. “Traces”[31] (N+S: 26) that she observes, but cannot yet understand at this point of the story, but which already point to her father’s decision to quit his job as a parson and go to live in an industrial town in the north[32].

Throughout the novel, Margaret herself, too, is repeatedly described with a very expressive, easily readable face and ” speaking” eyes (my italics, N+S: 432). “’You did not look pleased at what Shirley was saying at dinner.’”, Mr. Lennox ‘read’ from her face during a mutual dinner (N+S: 407) towards the end of the novel[33], to which the addressed Margaret replies: “’Didn’t I? My face must be very expressive’” (N+S: 407), which could be seen as a summary of all the previous successful readings of her physical traits by other characters.

The correct interpretation and conclusions by others not only emphasise the positivity of Margaret’s character, they make her a pure and ‘transparent’ person who does not try to hide or ‘feign’ her feelings. This positive picture starts early when Mr. Lennox proposes to her and is turned down. To him, Margaret’s features are (correct) indices of her mental state.

‘Margaret,’ said he [Mr. Lennox], looking into her eyes, which met his with their open, straight look, expressive of the utmost good faith and reluctance to give pain, ‘Do you’ – he was going to say – ‘love any one else?’ But it seemed as if this question would be an insult to the pure serenity of those eyes. ‘Forgive me! I have been too abrupt. I am punished. [...] (my italics, N+S: 29)

This passage, as indicated above, illustrates Margaret’s good nature through her looks and “expressive” eyes (my italics, N+S: 29), but implies other interesting features as well: Mr. Lennox thinks (and is right) that his speculation as to whether she loves another man would insult her. Interestingly, he does not think that it would be an insult to the “pure serenity” (N+S: 29) of this person, but “of those eyes” (N+S: 29), which means that he (and the implied norms) equate her character with her eyes (and renders them interchangeable); this metonymy implies a strong confirmation of the transparency of her physical traits and hence of an accessible world as such.

Other examples that include explicit hints at ‘speaking’ faces are frequent in North and South. The following one reflects an interesting phenomenon in realist novels: quite often, and especially in the field of pathognomy, visual details concerning a person’s face are withheld from the reader, although the face as such has an important function in the passage and is presented as transparent for other intradiegetic characters. In the following instance, which is representative of a high number of similar episodes, the physiognomy (or body language) is not explicitly described, but only implied by its function or, as in the following example, by its effect (cf. Korte 1993: 99): both Mr. Hale and his daughter Margaret, on their return from a dinner party, know from looking into their servant’s face that something terrible has happened. “But [their] smiles were changed to white and trembling looks, when they saw [the servant] Dixon’s face, as she opened the door[,]” (N+S: 167) even before she utters a single word[34]. Interestingly, Dixon, who as a peripheral character lacks a detailed authorial introduction, is not even provided with any physiognomic details now. Obviously, the visualising effect in order to be able to ‘imagine’ her looks must have seemed irrelevant to the implied author. What counts here is Mr. Hale’s and Margaret’s reaction to what they see in her face, thus the effect stands in the focus of interest[35]. As in several other instances throughout the novel, it is thus up to the reader to imagine Dixon’s scared or disquieted countenance.

When Dixon subsequently tells them about Mrs. Hale’s weak health and Mr. Hale observes his daughter, he turns out to be a firm ‘reader’ of physiognomy as well since he is capable of deducing very differentiated information about his daughter’s state of mind from her face.

He looked at her face, and saw an expression upon it of surprise and extremest [!] sorrow,

but not the agony of terror that contracted his own unprepared heart. She knew more than

he did, and yet she listened with that hopeless expression of awed apprehension. (N+S: 168)

Apart from the interesting and natural equation once again of his heart and the missing agony on her face, this is another instance of the girl’s extremely transparent countenance. Still, it could be argued that the transparency which is given here (since she really knew about her mother’s approaching death before her father) does especially ‘work’ between family members; a supposition which is confirmed by another passage in the novel: “The brother [Frederick] and sister [Margaret] arranged the table together, saying little, but their hands touching, and their eyes speaking the natural language of expression, so intelligible to those of the same blood.” (my italics, N+S: 246). Yet, the frequent reliable and true ‘readings’ of faces among non-related characters throughout the novel do not restrict transparency to family members or familiar countenances. The message given here could be that physiognomic readings are easier and more reliable among people who know each other well.

Another category which presents characters as active and successful physiognomists underlines the conviction that the world is transparent: non-verbal communication. This field represents an additional, implicit, yet all the same crucial diegetic affirmation of the novel’s implied norms; there is a remarkably high number of instances in North and South that fit into this sub-category.

Non-verbal communication, a term established by the two psychologists Ruesch and Kees (cf. Korte 1993: 25), could be defined as a non-verbal communicative behaviour that can but often need not go along with verbal communication (cf. Korte 1993: 26). As in the field of pathognomy[36], non-verbal communication is an unconscious – and therefore maybe even more relevant – phenomenon which doubtless plays a significant role in real life, too, whenever people unconsciously ‘send’ and observe ‘body language’ (cf. Korte 1993: 26). This special kind of communication carries along a variety of additional information, as Barbara Korte underlines:

Nonverbales Verhalten erlaubt (mit und ohne gleichzeitige verbale Mitteilung) Rückschlüsse über Gefühle, Gedanken, Persönlichkeitsstrukturen und Einstellungen der Interaktanten; [...] es vermittelt selbst feinste Schattierungen interpersoneller Attraktion bzw. Aversion und dient der Interaktionssteuerung in ritualisierter Form. (Korte 1993: 27)

This leads the author to the following definition: “NVK [Nonverbale Kommunikation] oder Körpersprache ist [...] jedes dekodierbare, d.h. potentiell für einen Empfänger sinnhafte nonverbale Verhalten, ob es bewußt oder unbewußt , intentional oder nichtintentional erfolgt” (Korte 1993: 29).

One could talk of a ‘confirmation of verbal communication’, whenever non-verbal signs go along and underline verbal communication within the diegetic reality. Representative episodes of this category are frequent in the novel. For example, when Margaret gets to know poor workman Nicholas Higgins and his sick daughter, he is insulted when she asks about his name (in order to visit them) after they had had a nice conversation. “I’m none ashamed o’ my name. It’s Nicholas Higgins. [...] Whatten yo’ asking for?” (N+S: 73), he asks Margaret rather harshly. She thus concludes: “It seemed all at once to take the shape of an impertinence on her part; she read this meaning too in the man’s eyes.” (my italics, N+S: 73). Here, non-verbal ‘reading’ only confirms Margaret’s impression of having insulted the man so that in this instance, it has only an additional function that once more stresses the transparency of faces and the way he talked to her[37].

Whenever non-verbal behaviour functions instead of verbal communication, which, as a second category, could be called ‘replacement of verbal communication’, it underlines even more strongly – and in an implicit way – the unambiguous ‘access’ to other peoples’ thoughts and feelings through their faces, without the necessity to learn about characters’ feelings through their words, as the following examples show.

When Margaret meets Bessy Higgins again after not having visited her despite her promise to do so, the latter is rather angry with her. When Margaret expresses her wish to visit the Higgins’ home now (“May I go with you now?”, N+S: 90), Bessy does not ask her again if Margaret really wants to, but looks at her to ‘see’ in the girl’s face if she indeed wants to come. ‘Reading’ this to be true, Bessy’s countenance (and mood!) change too, without an additional word passing between them: “Bessy gave a quick glance at Margaret’s face, to see if the wish expressed was really felt. The sharpness in her [Bessy’s] eye turned to a wistful longing as she met Margaret’s soft and friendly gaze.” (N+S: 90)

In another scene, after the death of Mrs. Hale, Mr. Thornton visits the Hales to offer his condolences, which he ‘sends’ predominantly through non-verbal communication: “He [Mr.Thornton] came up straight to her father [Mr.Hale], whose hands he took and wrung without a word –holding them in his for a minute or two, during which time his face, his eyes, his look, told of more sympathy than could be put into words.” (my italics, N+S: 271) Thus non-verbal behaviour explicitly gets a higher rating here than verbal communication.

As has been shown in this chapter, the diegetic reality, in which characters turn out to be successful physiognomists and to understand and make use of non-verbal communication as well, reflects the belief in accessible physiognomies just as the portraits of characters by the authorial narrator do. An easy access to people’s psyche through their physiognomies and the existence of a correspondence between inner and outer traits – which as a metonymy reflects an objective, ‘readable’ reality – are thus confirmed on both the extradiegetic and the diegetic levels.

4.3.The ‘message’ of transparent faces

4.3.1.General remarks

The confirmation of a transparent world, as discussed in chapter 4.2., is on the one hand achieved by the information about, and interpretation of, physiognomic traits by the authorial narrator. On the other hand, North and South ’s characters turn out to be good, reliable readers of each other’s countenances as well. Both the diegetic and the extradiegetic levels thus share and transport a hopeful belief in an unproblematic readability of the world as such.

Apart from these categories, a more profound and detailed analysis of the variety of messages that the narrator and/or characters ‘see’ in (other) characters’ physiognomies is indispensable in the context of this paper’s thesis. There are numerous messages repeatedly found, to a varying degree, in all realist novels discussed that are ‘indicated’ in, or ‘seen’ on, a person’s face: a person’s origin, hereditary and social background, the influence of ‘outer’ circumstances such as crucial events, a person’s past or the milieu a person lives in, or, as maybe the most interesting (and, from the point of view of a person living in the 21st-century, maybe the most questionable) category, the indication of moral ‘goodness’ (or the contrary) in a character’s physiognomic traits. Not all of these categories are equally emphasised or occur as frequently as the others, yet examples for each sub-chapter can be found in almost all the novels discussed.

Elizabeth Gaskell’s North and South contains the highest number of faces as indicators of the various messages discussed in the following: it confirms the whole variety of possible traces found and read on a face without questioning any of them (not even the ‘moral group’ which, for example, is more ambiguous and even partially undermined in Adam Bede, cf. chapter 5.3.4.).

Neither are there any ironical or critical narratorial comments in Gaskell’s industrial novel. While the narrator in Adam Bede, as will be analysed (cf. chapter 5), draws the reader’s attention to ambiguous messages or unreliable readers and readings of physiognomies, narratorial interventions of this kind will hardly be found in North and South. Hence, the novel’s implied norms in no way warn of a too hasty interpretation of other person’s looks as in Adam Bede or possible misjudgements concerning physiognomy. These facts underline North and South ’s status as the clearer and more typical example of realism, since Gaskell’s novel reflects an uncritical and unproblematic approach to the realist’s objective transparent world.

4.3.2. Physiognomy as an indicator of a hereditary background: family likeness

The firm realist belief in the explicability of characters is based on the findings that became largely known and accepted throughout the 19th century, namely that a person’s ‘fate’, his or her (mental) development, and his or her actions are determined by certain ‘outer’ factors which serve as reliable evidence if one attempts to explain a person’s behaviour or motivations. These factors are typically visible in a person’s face (cf. also chapter 4.3.3.-4.3.4.). Apart from ‘outer’ influential circumstances (such as the social class), the hereditary background, namely a person’s genes, are often taken as visible evidence that physiognomic and – possibly – even character traits can be inherited and ‘shape’ a person[38], which once again underlines the belief in an explainable world.

In North and South, family likeness seems to be the least important ‘message’ to be read from a person’s face. Although the narrator from time to time draws the readers’ attention to the physical resemblance between members of a family, these instances do not necessarily include an inheritance of inner traits as well. This, in a way, rather speaks against transparent faces at a first glance. On further examination, it reflects the 19th-century’s growing awareness of the importance of individuality which would be weakened if children were presented merely as little copies of their parents and did not show any peculiarities.

Thus, the primary function of descriptions of ‘resembling’ physiognomies in North and South seems to be an enhancement of the aesthetic illusion, since certain features typical of a whole family or some of its members seem to be primarily used to visualise relatives and ‘categorise’ them[39], as the following excerpt from the introduction of Henry Lennox shows. The latter plays but a minor role in the novel as Margaret’s cousin’s husband and has an aristocratic family background. “[Henry Lennox] was close by his handsome brother; he was the plain one in a singularly good-looking family;” (N+S: 14) This remark contributes to ‘visualising’ the Lennoxes and presents Henry as the less good-looking of the family’s sons[40]. As this example and the following one show, the belief in transparent faces is also confirmed by the mentioning of a resemblance between members of the same family.

When Mr. Hale’s and Margaret’s physiognomies are described one after the other (cf. chapters 4.2.1. and 4.3.3.), the narrator also stresses their optical resemblance and ‘uses’ their likeness as a transition from Mr. Hale’s description to his daughter’s.

But [Mr. Hale] had the same large, soft eyes as his daughter,–eyes which moved slowly and almost grandly round in their orbits, and were well veiled by their transparent white eyelids. Margaret was more like him than like her mother. (N+S: 16f.)

It should be noticed that the last sentence, which apparently also refers to their characters, is added without any linking words or explanation (such as ‘his inner traits were also found in Margaret’); the conclusion that the ‘outer’ resemblance automatically implies an inner one, seems – for once in the novel – to be drawn here.

Moreover, by underlining that Margaret has inherited physiognomic traits from her father and not from her mother, the narrator also raises the idea of a possible closer ‘inner’ bond between father and daughter than between mother and daughter, which in fact turns out to be true. Mr. Hale is described in more positive terms than his wife and is closer to his daughter who is the most positive character of them all. Mrs. Hale, in contrast, is constantly complaining about their low social status and their dwelling place in Helstone, whereas Mr. Hale and his daughter Margaret have similar positive attributes: they share their ‘moral goodness’, their modesty, their self-sacrifice for others, their compassion and helpfulness; values Mrs. Hale, though not a bad character, rather lacks.

Although not the most important or interesting field of transparency, and above all, the least questionable of all[41], family likeness is nevertheless explicitly used throughout the novel to affirm ‘readable’ countenances. When Mr. Hale and Mr. Thornton talk about problems with the factory workers who protest against their working conditions, Margaret, watching Mr. Thornton, is reminded of his mother’s face, which frequently shows indices of excitement and disquietude: “Mr. Hale began to talk about the strike. Mr. Thornton’s face assumed a likeness to his mother’s worst expression, which immediately repelled the watching Margaret.” (N+S: 117)

From time to time, family likeness is only indirectly presented. In the case of Mr. Thornton and his mother, the alert reader could already be aware of their physical resemblance before the episode mentioned above. Throughout the novel, Mrs. Thornton’s features are repeatedly described as (and restricted to) being decided, firm and resolute (cf., for example, N+S: 76); traits that her son has inherited. Only four pages after the reader’s first physical impression of Mrs. Thornton, her son’s face is described as having lines that are “few but firm” (N+S: 80) as well as a “severe and resolved expression” (N+S: 80); although the narrator does not explicitly focus on it, a resemblance between Mr. Thornton and his mother is indirectly stressed; Mrs. Thornton’s face usually moves “from one decided expression to another equally decided” (N+S: 76) which creates the impression of “a woman of strong power, and firm resolve”. (N+S: 84)

As these examples have shown, the aspect of family likeness hardly ever implies a transmission of ‘inner’ traits as well. Yet in Gaskell’s first novel Mary Barton, there is an instance of a possible ‘double’ inheritance of both inner and outer traits, which is, however, not confirmed by the narrator or by the way the story develops. When Mary's father John looks at his beloved daughter, he is reminded of his wife's sister, who left the family years ago. As they resemble each other optically, he concludes that they could have the same fate, too. “He [John Barton] often looked at Mary, and wished she were not so like her aunt, for the very bodily likeness seemed to suggest the possibility of a similar likeness in their fate;“ (my italics, MB: 147). This, of course, is a character's position and does not have the reliable ‘truth value’ of a comment by the narrator. But it is mentioned at a point in the development of the plot when the reader might also fear that something similar may happen to the heroine. However, the very fact that their physical likeness only “seemed to suggest“ (my italics, MB: 147) the possibility of the same fate shows that John Barton himself is not fully convinced of it[42].
At a first glance, the fact that family members in Elizabeth Gaskell’s novels resemble each other through their looks but differ in their personalities could be regarded as undermining the belief in transparency, as has been discussed. Yet the inner character of a person could be seen as a ‘mixture’ of a person’s genes and other influencing factors (discussed in the following chapters). Therefore, as far as it goes, family likeness among realist fiction’s characters corroborates the belief in a transparent world, while at the same time, the lack of this ‘double’ inheritance points to the individuality of characters. In combination with further influences that ‘shape’ people, this way of presenting characters who on their surface show their background and other influential factors, as well as the narrator’s efforts to explain and give reasons for the characters’ looks and behaviour, reflect the increasing interest in explaining individuals in the 19th century (cf. Wolf 2002a: 401).

4.3.3. Physiognomy as a reflection of influential circumstances: events, milieu (‘local origin’) and social class

4.3.3.1. General remarks

As typical of realist narrative fiction, and in accordance with North and South ’s tendency to present the characters’ faces as ‘books’ to be read from by both narrator and other intradiegetic characters, a character’s fate, namely the circumstances he or she is faced with, crucial events, and the surroundings in which a character lives or (temporarily) stays, are often also deducible from his or her physiognomy. A character’s origin, either in the sense of the country or area he or she comes from or in the sense of ‘social’ origin (that is the affiliation to a social class), are additional messages often ‘indicated’ on the character’s physiognomy. These categorisations are often based on stereotypes which the reader might share with the implied author. To a certain extent, this reduction runs counter to the period’s growing awareness and interest in the individual; at the same time, categorisation and reduction to types and the use of stereotypes are successful means to guarantee readable, because ‘recognisable’ and ‘classified’ faces, as Werner Wolf remarks (cf. 2002a: 400).

4.3.3.2. Physiognomy as an indicator of influential events

As opposed to pathognomy, which is the field of transitory changes in a face due to, for example, shock, anger, fear or joy, the reflection of crucial or grave events in a character’s life on his or her face, is of a more permanent nature and does not appear or disappear suddenly (as with many pathognomic reactions) on a person’s countenance.

In North and South, the most explicit and longest example of a description of a face ‘mirroring’ several crucial events of a person’s life, and reflecting the most influential conditions a person had to endure, can be found when Margaret watches her father’s physiognomy while he is asleep in a railway carriage on their way from their old living place in the south to the new industrial town Milton in the north:

[Mr. Hale’s] blue-black hair was grey now, and lay thinly over his brows. [...] The face was in repose; but it was rather rest after weariness, than the serene calm of the countenance of one who led a placid, contented life. Margaret was painfully struck by the worn, anxious expression; and she went back over the open and avowed circumstances of her father’s life, to find the cause for the lines that spoke so plainly of habitual distress and depression. (N+S: 16)

This observation by his daughter is given at an early point of the story. The reader does not yet know much about the sad history of the Hale family, which was primarily due to the misfortune that happened to Margaret’s brother Frederick. Although the ‘reading’ of Mr. Hale’s lines is not a very precise one[43], the ‘message’ read from it is clear: even his grey hair, which – of course – could simply be the result of a natural ageing process, raises the connotation of ‘sorrow’. He apparently led the very opposite of a “placid, contended life” (N+S: 16). When his daughter thinks of his past misery, she realises that his “lines spoke so plainly of habitual distress and depression” (my italics, N+S: 16), which makes clear that his physiognomy is very transparent (“plainly”, N+S: 16)) and that his sorrows are of a permanent nature (“habitual”, N+S: 16). Needless to say, this interpretation by Margaret turns out to be true, as the narrator immediately afterwards provides sufficient information about the reasons for the visible “distress and depression” (N+S: 16) by letting the reader enter Margaret’s desperate reflections about her brother (cf. N+S: 16), whose past life was the main cause for the trouble that left traces on her father’s face.

Mr. Hale is not the only one who is faced with grave events that change his life, and accordingly his countenance. Towards the end of the novel, when Margaret sees Mr. Thornton again for the first time after she left Milton, she notices changes on his facial features: crucial events apparently have left traces on his body and soul: he had to give up his manufacturing business, lost a large sum of money and consequently sank from his high social position.

Margaret looked with an anxious eye at Mr. Thornton [...]. It was considerably more than a year since she had seen him; and events had occurred to change him much in that time. His fine figure [...] gave him a distinguished appearance [...]; but his face looked older and care-worn; yet a noble composure sate upon it, which impressed those who had just been hearing of his changed position, with a sense of inherent dignity and manly strength. (N+S: 429)

Interestingly, although the outer circumstances clearly have marked his looks – he even ‘aged’ optically due to his misery[44] – and have changed him inwardly, he still keeps up his dignity and his noble appearance, which observers may also ‘read’ from his physiognomic traits.

4.3.3.3. Physiognomy as an indicator of the milieu or ‘local origin’

Not only can important events have effects on North and South ’s characters and their physiognomies. Outer influences of a more permanent nature, namely a person’s surroundings, the milieu he or she stays in (even if it is only temporarily) and his or her ‘local origin’ can be seen in North and South ’s characters’ countenances as well, and thus function metonymically as an affirmation of a ‘translucent’ world. Margaret’s mother, a sickly woman who did not like their living place in the south, Helstone, and permanently complained about it, turns out to be – even more – affected by the new circumstances she encounters in the industrial town of Milton: an explicit proof of the milieu as an influential factor visible on a person’s face. Although the changes on her face are not presented in detail, her daughter notices them after having lived a short time in the new place: “Margaret had noticed her mother’s jaded appearance with anxiety for some time past [...]” (N+S: 88). The indicator “for some time past” (N+S: 88) explicitly refers to their time in Milton, as the explanation which follows Margaret’s observation underlines: “The life in Milton was so different from what Mrs. Hale had been accustomed to live in Helstone, [...]; the air itself was so different, deprived of all revivifying principle as it seemed to be here; [...]” (N+S: 88). The bad air in Milton, ‘poisoned’ by the waste gas of the factories, is given as the cause of the bad condition of Mrs Hale, whose health constantly decreases during their stay and ultimately leads to her death. The air, however, may also be read symbolically for the depressing, miserable atmosphere in town, from which not only Mrs. Hale, but also many inhabitants, for example Bessy Higgins, suffer.

In heroine Margaret’s physiognomy, the influence of the surroundings, the different milieus she was surrounded by, can be deduced, too. After a period of suffering in Milton and Oxford, during which her parents and her beloved godfather have died, she is brought to a seaside resort for repose. After a longer stay there, the changes visible on her face point to her recovered mental state: “Those hours by the sea-side were not lost, as any one might have seen who had had the perception to read, or the care to understand, the look that Margaret’s face was gradually acquiring”. (N+S: 415) The narrator refers to her face as ‘mirroring’ the changed inner condition due to her new surrounding, explicitly pointing out the transparency of physiognomy in this field visible to those who “had the perception to read” (N+S: 415), as for example Henry Lennox who “[...] was excessively struck by the change. ‘The sea has done Miss Hale an immense deal of good, I should fancy,’ said he, [...]. ‘She looks ten years younger than she did in Harley Street.’”[45] (N+S: 415) Margaret’s cousin Edith, in her rather selfish manner, thinks the reason for Margaret’s better looks is a bonnet she, Edith, gave her, to which Mr. Lennox, clearly in accordance with the narrator’s previous comment, replies:

‘[...] I believe I know the difference between the charms of a dress and the charms of a woman. No mere bonnet would have made Miss Hale’s eyes so lustrous and yet so soft, or her lips so ripe and red–and her face altogether so full of peace and light. –She is like, and yet more,’ –he dropped his voice, – ‘like the Margaret Hale of Helstone.’ (N+S: 415)

Mr. Lennox’ judgement turns out to be true. Moreover, his observation that her looks now remind him of her appearance in Helstone is correct. Back in her old home, she had not yet suffered from the problems that started in Milton. Thus, the transparency of her physiognomy reveals that she had been happier and therefore looked healthier and better back then.

At a later point of the story, the influence of outer circumstances on Margaret’s looks is once more confirmed when Mr. Lennox, during a dinner with Mr. Thornton in London, remarks: “’Milton didn’t agree with [Margaret], I imagine; for when she first came to London, I thought I had never seen any one so much changed. [...]’” (N+S: 429).

Physiognomic traits as indicators of outer influential circumstances are thus reliable and ‘readable’ throughout the novel. As it is one of the main functions of North and South as an industrial novel to illustrate the miserable circumstances of the poor workmen and women in towns like the fictitious Milton and guide the reader’s sympathies to the working class, it is not very surprising that only negative events or an unfavourable setting or milieu are messages found on the characters’ faces. North and South ’s world contains only a few happy moments, which are reflected in characters’ pathognomies rather than in this category of physiognomies, which is, if not irreversible, of a more permanent nature.

A prominent example of the readable ‘local origin’ of people, namely the milieu they grew up in, is the following observation of Margaret Hale, which is presented to be ‘generally true’. In a discussion with Mr. Thornton, who praises his hometown Milton and dislikes the south, Margaret’s argument for the advantages of the south is based on her (visual) comparison between people from the south (where she grew up) and people from the north (where she is unhappy).

‘ [...] I see men here going about in the streets who look ground down by some pinching sorrow or care–who are not only sufferers but haters. Now, in the South we have our poor, but there is not that terrible expression in their countenances of a sullen sense of injustice which I see here [...]’ (N+S: 81)

The reason for the different physiognomies of people from two towns in England is based on the different milieus and surroundings they encounter. In the case of Mary Barton, the eponymous heroine’s father John ‘sees’ people’s origin from two different English places on their faces, too. He, of Manchester origin, is married to a woman from Buckinghamshire and assumes that her (and her sister Esther’s) different origin is visible on their countenances:

You see them Buckinghamshire people [...] has quite a different look with them to us Manchester folk. You'll not see among the Manchester wenches such fresh rosy cheeks, or such black lashes to grey eyes (making them look like black), as my wife and Esther had (MB: 6).

It should not be forgotten that this statement is from the limited point of view of a character. Still, the narrator does not comment on this remark in any negative way. In fact, he or she rather corroborates it by referring to the transparent message of origin on people’s faces when describing Mrs. Wilson a few pages earlier: “[She had] somewhat of the deficiency of sense in her countenance, which is likewise characteristic of the rural inhabitants in comparison with the natives of the manufacturing towns.” (MB: 4)

Both quotations are ‘typifying’ and generalising and could be dismissed as problematic and questionable; the narrator’s comment could even be read as discriminating against people from the countryside. As to the first quotation, it seems rather implausible that women from Buckinghamshire could really be recognised by their “fresh rosy cheeks“ (MB: 6), a detail belonging to the field of pathognomy and therefore of no permanent nature, or their “black lashes“ (MB: 6) that without doubt women in other places also have.

As these examples from Mary Barton have illustrated, the novel’s norms confirm the belief in the – local – origin expressing itself on physiognomic traits. Also in North and South, a strange example of this category can be found. Frederick, Margaret’s brother, who was innocently involved in a mutiny at sea years ago and was therefore forced to leave England and stay in South America and Spain, has apparently adapted to his new home country Spain also physiognomically. When he secretly returns to England in order to pay a last visit to his dying mother, his physiognomic changes are a reflection of the southern setting he lives in.

[Frederick] had delicate features, redeemed from effeminacy by the swarthiness of his complexion, and his quick intensity of expression. His eyes were generally merry-looking, but at times they and his mouth so suddenly changed, and gave [Margaret] such an idea of latent passion, that it almost made her afraid. But this look was only for an instant; and had in it no doggedness, no vindictiveness; it was rather the instantaneous ferocity of expression that comes over the countenances of all natives of wild or southern countries–a ferocity which enhances the charm of the childlike softness into which such a look may melt away. (N+S: 247)

Frederick’s physiognomic description suggests that his new surroundings have left traces on his face, while at the same time his English origin has not totally disappeared; only at times does the ‘new’ origin become transparent in his face, namely when his “latent passion” (N+S: 247) – a reference to the cliché of quick-tempered southern people – becomes suddenly visible.

Interestingly, the southern influence is not restricted to his physiognomy only. He has adapted a “quick intensity of expression” (N+S: 247), a remark which is based on the common stereotype of southern people talking more quickly than inhabitants of northern places. While the “swarthiness” of his skin (N+S: 247) seems natural and plausible, the narrator’s remark that “all natives of wild or southern countries” (my italics, N+S: 247) share the same physiognomic expression and are a ‘wilder’ race than the English people renders the description rather questionable or at least based too much on prejudices.

However generalising or stereotyping the category of transparent local origin and/or setting on characters’ physiognomies might be, it is nevertheless one of the most reliable fields of transparent faces to be found in realism. Elizabeth Gaskell without doubt used prejudices and – as the last example of Frederick has shown – extremely generalising descriptions that might irritate a readership who wants differentiated, round individuals. Still, the achieved effect for the readers of her time, namely the affirmation of ‘readable’ physiognomic traits that can easily be decoded, cannot be denied. Moreover, these clear and unambiguous messages confirm and reassure those who long to believe in a ‘vitreous’ world that lacks ambiguities or enigmas. For the maintenance of the novel’s epistemological basis through the presentation of transparent faces, the reader has to accept that many of Gaskell’s characters are classified and categorised by their local origin and by the milieu in which they are embedded.

4.3.3.4. Physiognomy as a class indicator

Apart from the ‘local origin’ as a transparent message in North and South ’s faces, the social origin is also visible, even if characters no longer belong to a certain class. This implies that physiognomies do not change easily and cannot ‘mislead’ the beholder, since one’s roots can not be hidden or feigned: another implicit confirmation of an optimistic conviction of a transparent world.

A representative example of this category is Mrs. Hale. Margaret’s mother is of a rich, aristocratic origin. Since she “had married the man of her heart” (N+S: 15), a simple preacher, she was forced to give up her high social status and live under poor circumstances. Much to her discontent, she cannot dress like a lady in elegant clothes because she cannot afford them. Yet, even after decades of changed living conditions, her social origin remains visible in her appearance: “Mrs. Hale took off her black silk apron, and smoothed her face. She looked a very pretty lady-like woman, as she greeted Mr. Lennox [...]. (N+S: 24).

A similar remnant of one’s original social class is ‘readable’ from Mr. Thornton’s face. When Frederick watches him for the first time, his impression is not that of a rich, influential mill-owner, but rather of a person belonging to a lower social class. When he describes Mr. Thornton, whose identity he is not aware of, Margaret replies: ‘I fancied you meant some one of a different class, not a gentleman; somebody come on an errand [...]’” (N+S: 257), to which her brother answers: “’He looked like some one of that kind,’ [...] ‘I took him for a shopman, and he turns out a manufacturer.’ (N+S: 257). Apparently, also Margaret had had a similar first impression of the gentleman: “She remembered how at first, [...], she had spoken and thought of him just as Frederick was doing. It was but a natural impression that was made upon him, and yet she was a little annoyed by it.” (N+S: 257)

But can two positive characters be mistaken? At a first glance, these two wrong impressions could be taken as rare instances of ‘opaque’ faces in the novel; yet, as will turn out later when Mr. Thornton’s personal history is revealed, his looks do indeed ‘speak’ the truth and were perceived correctly by Margaret and Frederick. Mr. Thornton really has the background of a lower class workman who, only through chance and effort, happened to gain in social importance, so that, Margaret and Frederick, although not aware of it, read the man’s original social position correctly from his face.

In order to ‘paint’ a picture of a certain social class and ‘embed’ for example the novel’s hero or heroine in a social context, Elizabeth Gaskell, like many other realist authors, repeatedly uses ‘group physiognomies’ – vague mass descriptions – which suggest that members of a certain social group share certain physiognomic or pathognomic features. Although many characters have very individual traits, the narrator in Mary Barton from time to time tends to describe groups of people from a certain class collectively (which could be considered to be the complement to the popular ‘one of those’-principle[46]: not a single person representing a whole class or group, but a whole group characterising – optically – every single one of its members). In the first chapter of Mary Barton, before any individual introduction of any character, the narrator provides what could be called a ‘group physiognomy’ for the factory girls living in that area. One could see ‘mass descriptions’ of social or regional groups like the following one as a means to counteract the danger of having too high a number of individuals, which could lead to confusion (cf. Wolf 2002a: 401).

Groups of merry and somewhat loud-talking girls, whose ages might range from twelve to twenty, came by with a buoyant step. They were most of them factory girls, and wore the usual out-of-doors dress of that particular class of maidens; [...] Their faces were not remarkable for beauty; indeed, they were below the average, with one or two exceptions; they had dark hair, neatly and classically arranged, dark eyes, but sallow complexions and irregular features (MB: 3).

[...]


[1] [Pseudo-] Aristoteles (~ 300v.Chr./1999). Physiognomica. Übers. u. kommentiert von Sabine Vogt. Berlin: Akademie Verlag. 26f.

[2] William Shakespeare (1609). Troilus and Cressida. In: The Illustrated Stradford Shakespeare (2000). London: Chancellor Press. 637.

[3] William Shakespeare (1623). Macbeth. In: The Illustrated Stradford Shakespeare (2000). London: Chancellor Press. 779.

[4] Elizabeth Gaskell (1854-55/1988). North and South. Oxford: Oxford UP.

[5] George Eliot (1859/1985). Adam Bede. Harmondsworth: Penguin.

[6] For example, the fact that a character in Anthony Trollope’s The Kellys and the O’Kellys (1848) refers to Lavater shows that the author must have been familiar with the latter’s theories: “I have studied Lavater well enough to know that such a head and face as yours never belonged to a mind that could satisfy itself with worsted-work.” Anthony Trollope (1848/1982). The Kellys and the O’Kellys. Oxford: Oxford UP.414. Although this is only a character’s position, which cannot be equated with the narrator’s nor the author’s opinion, the overall treatment of physiognomies in Trollope’s work underlines this belief in ‘readable’ faces, apparently based on Lavater’s assumptions.

[7] Johann Caspar Lavater (1775/1908). Physiognomische Fragmente, zur Beförderung der Menschenkenntniß und Menschenliebe. Berlin: Conrad Paris, 1908. 33.

[8] David Herbert Lawrence (1928/1994). Lady Chatterley’s Lover. Harmondsworth: Penguin.

[9] Virginia Woolf (1925/1996). Mrs Dalloway. Hertfordshire: Wordsworth.

[10] “Online Course: Face Reading (Physiognomy)“. Universal Class School. [Online] http://home.universalclass.com/i/cm/2200.htm

[11] Cf. Werner Wolf (2002a). „Speaking Faces“? – Zur epistemologischen Lesbarkeit von Physiognomie-Beschreibungen im englischen Erzählen des Modernismus“. Poetica 34/2002. 391.

[12] Julia Swanell, ed. (1992). The Oxford Modern English Dictionary. Oxford: Clarendon Press. 805.

[13] Richard Gray (2001). “How Scientific Theory Became Fascist Rhetoric“. College of Arts and Sciences. [Online] http://www.artsci.washington.edu/newsletter/Summer01/Gray.htm

[14] Werner Wolf (2002b). „Gesichter in der Erzählkunst. Zur Wahrnehmung von Physiognomien und Metawahrnehmung von Physiognomiebeschreibungen aus theoretischer und historischer Sicht am Beispiel englischsprachiger Texte des 19. und 20. Jahrhunderts“. Sprachkunst 33/2002. 303.

[15] Elizabeth Gaskell (1848/1987). Mary Barton. Oxford: Oxford UP.

[16] Anthony Trollope (1873/1990). The Eustace Diamonds. London: The Trollope Society. 22.

[17] Cf. Barbara Korte (1993). Körpersprache in der Literatur. Theorie und Geschichte am Beispiel englischer Erzählprosa. Tübingen: Francke Verlag. 114.

[18] Michael Irwin (1979). Picturing: Description and Illusion in the Nineteenth-Century Novel. London: George Allen & Unwin. 41.

[19] W. J. Harvey (1961). The Art of George Eliot. London: Chatto&Windus. 55.

[20] The role of the reader and his or her imagination in the reading process cannot be treated here. For a more detailed analysis, cf. Werner Wolf 2002b: 306ff.

[21] Cf. also Adam Bede’s introduction which, though not a static one, starts with an overall description of his body and then moves onwards to the different features of his countenance (AB: 8), or Job Legh’s introduction in Mary Barton (MB: 42).

[22] Trollope’s narrator indeed seems to be male, since the male gaze on attractive women is obvious throughout the novel. Moreover, he often (also in Fanny’s introduction) addresses a male readership.

[23] This instance is a convincing example which underlines this paper’s thesis of physiognomic traits reflecting the novel’s implied worldview. Fanny’s description reveals an extreme belief in transparent faces, since the level of pertness of a person can be deduced from a nose’s degree of turned-upness, as is implied here. Metonymically speaking, it reflects the novel’s implied conviction of an accessible and readable world.

[24] In fact, the transparency of her features turns out to be true in the dialogue between Mrs. Thornton and her son which follows the woman’s descriptive passage, in which she proves to be a rather harsh, grim lady.

[25] Also a number of other characters in North and South are introduced in a ‘internal, dynamic’ way, for example, Mr. Thornton (cf. N+S: 64), Mr. Hale (cf. N+S: 16f) or Edith (cf. N+S: 5).

[26] Realist writers tend to focus on character’s individuality. No matter how representative of a certain group or class characters are, they usually have unique and exceptional features, as for example the eponymous heroine in Mary Barton.

[27] “The expression of trusting simplicity in Marner’s face, heightened by that absence of special observation, that defenceless, deer-like gaze which belongs to large prominent eyes, was strongly contrasted by the self-complacent suppression of inward triumph that lurked in the narrow slanting eyes and compressed lips of William Dane.” George Eliot (1861). Silas Marner. In: George Eliot (1871-72/1861/1858/1994). Middlemarch. Silas Marner. Amos Barton. London: Chancellor Press. 659.

[28] Mr. Higgins in North and South: 74.

[29] Taken from North and South: 256.

[30] This approach may seem irrelevant if one considers that both narrator and the characters are invented by the implied author. Yet, the analysis of the characters’ interactions, separated as much as possible from authorial comments, shall serve to prove that the strong affirmation of a transparent world can be made out on the diegetic ‘reality’ as well. This ‘doubling’ on both levels clearly has an intensifying effect.

[31] The term ‘traces’ is one of the typical phrases used in realist novels in order to underline the transparency of faces and render them readable, and has the same, if not a stronger, effect as the semiotic terms ‘indicate’ or ‘spoke of’ for example.

[32] This is one of the rare examples in the novel which prove that descriptions of physiognomies can also have a plot function: the creation of suspense (“disturbance” N+S: 26), or at least the anticipation of some crucial event on the level of story is given through a character’s face which shows that the information provided not only serves the function of a transparent access to the character’s inner traits, but goes beyond a mere visualisation and characterisation, too.

[33] This intradiegetic opinion stresses and justifies the narrator’s positive characterisation as does, for example, the stranger riding through Hayslope and perceiving the eponymous hero in Adam Bede ’s first chapter.

[34] Additionally, the narrator does not forget to remark that also Mr. Hale’s and Margaret’s physiognomies (or rather pathognomies in this case) change, too, in reaction to their servant’s pathognomy.

[35] One of numerous similar examples is found in Anthony Trollope’s The Kellys and the O’Kellys. When Martin Kelly returns from a journey and meets his sisters (whose physiognomies remain vague throughout the novel), he realises that they have news for him by merely looking at their faces: “Their looks were big with some important news. Martin soon saw that they had something to tell.” (K+OK: 99f.)

[36] As will be seen, pathognomy and body language are the two fields that – at least to a higher degree than the typical usage of physiognomy – occur even in radical modernist novels too.

[37] Since the readers, due to the limitations of ‘written’ texts, cannot ‘hear’ the intonation, volume and harshness of his voice (as the narrator does not provide any information that could render his words ‘audible’), the girl’s observation of the change in Higgins’ countenance serves as a means of pointing out his rage instead.

[38] Cf. Werner Wolf (1998). „‘I must go back a little to explain [her] motives [...]‘. Erklärung und Erklärbarkeit menschlichen Verhaltens, Handelns und Wesens in englischen Romanen des Realismus: Hard Times und Adam Bede.“Germanisch-Romanische Monatsschrift. Band 48. 441.

[39] The mere ‘visualising effect’ of family members is also repeatedly pointed out in Mary Barton: between Mary’s mother and her sister (cf. MB: 6) and her mother and Mary herself (cf. MB: 7)

[40] There is evidence in the novel that Captain Lennox, his brother, is indeed good-looking: “Then Edith came back, [...] half-proudly leading in her tall handsome Captain.” (N+S: 13) This of course does not confirm the family likeness.

[41] However, even family likeness, a phenomenon which is as such unquestionable, is undermined or at least not presented in an unambiguous way in radical modernism, cf. Virginia Woolfs’ Mrs Dalloway. (cf. chapter 8.2.2.5.)

[42] Yet he is at least partly right. Esther left the family years ago in order to escape from her awful circumstances. So does Mary at times who thinks of overcoming her desolate situation by marrying well-off Henry Carson. As a truly positive character, Mary however eventually rejects the material temptations. In the end her father's (and possibly the reader's) fear does not turn out to be true.

[43] As opposed to other descriptions, we do not get any detailed physiognomic analysis like ‘his eyes spoke of...’ here. Moreover, what Margaret deduces here is not really concrete; her background knowledge is necessary to ‘read’ the sorrow on his face more precisely.

[44] The idea of ‘looking older’ as a consequence to negative circumstances is repeatedly raised in the novel: Margaret’s looks apparently have ‘aged’ as a consequence of her hard lot, since she looks younger after recovering (cf. N+S: 415), and also her father, as was suggested earlier in the novel, looks older, with grey thin hair due to his problems (cf. N+S: 16)

[45] Harley Street in London is the residence of her aunt, with whom Margaret had lived rather unhappily before returning to Helstone.

[46] The ‘one of those’-device is often used in realist novels in order to present a character as a representative of a certain group or class. He or she is usually provided with stereotypical attributes (and looks) that are thought to be typical of a specific group of people. ; this generalising approach relies on a common ground of experience of (implied) author and (implied) reader.

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Details

Title
Descriptions of physiognomies in English fiction from realism to modernism
College
University of Graz  (Institute for Anglistics)
Grade
very good
Author
Year
2003
Pages
181
Catalog Number
V19447
ISBN (eBook)
9783638235785
File size
1268 KB
Language
English
Keywords
Descriptions, English
Quote paper
Mirjam Marits (Author), 2003, Descriptions of physiognomies in English fiction from realism to modernism, Munich, GRIN Verlag, https://www.grin.com/document/19447

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