English 3554E Lecture Notes - Lecture 4: Mass Suicide, Zuleika Dobson
28 Sep 2016
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Duke is caught between two objects, desire and death. Desire is the realm of history and of time. Once he makes his decision as final, he re-becomes himself, his integrity returns, The choice of death is related to dandyism. They come together as the duke"s fate he is worthy of the gods. The duke died for fate, for history, for dandyism, not for zuleika. This is extremely unsatisfying for her, he died without loving her. Question of the gaze - zuleika looking in the mirror. Gives her the doubt that she is not the exception. In a way she has vanquished the duke"s gaze, and all the men who died. Hopes to have everything that happened at oxford be repeated. Oxford taught her that she is not the exception, it looks like she might be, but there are historical problems in the mass suicide: maybe some were saving others, maybe some were clumsy, maybe some were depressed.
