‘By All The Roar of the Elements’: A Study in Queer Phenomenology Across Literature in the Nineteenth Century Gothic

Abstract

My project considers the transformation of phenomenological language as it relates to nineteenth century British and American literature. I am interested in how the natural language reinstates and reinvigorates the language of cripqueer discourse. For example, how does discerning phenomenology alongside queer theory change or ‘re-orient’ how we study queerness? How does putting sensory language and neurodivergence at the forefront of this analysis change how literature is examined? I am interested in how these ideas overlaps with the works of queer scholars such as Sarah Ahmed, Eve Sedgwick, and Anna Mollow. Each chapter of this project looks at a selection of work which uses phenomenological language while dealing with the intersection of crip-queer identity. These chapters include nineteenth century British authors (Robert Louis Stevenson, The Brontës, Oscar Wilde, Bram Stoker) as well as their American contemporaries (Herman Melville, Emily Dickinson, Walt Whitman). The first chapter takes an in-depth look at Robert Louis Stevenson’s work in Treasure Island, Kidnapped, and The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. Stevenson’s extensive oeuvre deals with complex themes of duality with strong elemental roots that explore queerness, disability, and othered language in both the author's professional and personal life. In the second chapter, authors’ texts are explored using cripqueer elemental phenomenology first explained in Chapter One to explore perspectives, identity, and status in wider Victorian society at the time. The Dark Romantic theme of these texts reveals how vital the language of phenomenological presence is to describe a variety of experiences, especially in the context of the nineteenth century. The last chapter addresses nineteenth century American literature (Moby-Dick, Billy Budd, and other works by Herman Melville– various poems of Emily Dickinson and Walt Whitman) to further expand how this language makes possible to cohere the experiences of queer and disabled people across geography. By transgressing boundaries and revealing new pathways to critique, explore and incite changes in how we view nineteenth century literature, phenomenological studies rooted in nature and the elements remain as relevant as ever.