Spectacle and Sexuality in Metropolis and “Goblin Market”

In our class discussion about Metropolis, Carrie, George, Melinda and Mista Jay were assigned to talk about the male gaze in the film. Peter Rupert writes, “the film thematizes the relationship among female sexuality, male-oriented vision, and film technology.” The male gaze, of course, plays an integral role in the establishment of female sexuality. On the one hand, the view watches Freder watching Maria, as he falls in love with her for her purity; later, the male gaze is even more evident as we watch the hordes of men gawking at the robot version of Maria, almost naked, who uses her sexuality to control.

Both women have a lot of power. Maria organizes and gives guidance to the workers, who follow her because of her purity. This power is somewhat undermined by her insistance that they wait for a “mediator,” who happens to be male. Maria as a robot controls the masses with her sexuality, though this too in somewhat undermined in that she is commanded by a man. Metropolis, though it portrays women in power, enforces the dichotomy between virgin and whore. I wanted to look at another classic portrayal of female sexuality, and the first thing that came to mind was Christina Rossetti’s “Goblin Market.” Metropolis seems like a romantic film to me in many ways, so thinking about it in relation to the romantic poem “Goblin Market” seemed appropriate. (Of course, I mean romantic like Wordsworth, not like romance novels.) The comparison of the two works reveals the power dynamics inherent in their representations of sexuality, and the importance of spectacle in involving the viewer in those power dynamics.

The basic plot line of “Goblin Market” is this: two sisters, Lizzie and Laura, walk past the Goblin Market, where they are tempted by otherworldly fruit. Laura gives in and in the next few days can think of nothing else. She is wasting away, so Lizzie goes to get fruit for her. The goblins tempt Lizzie, but she resists though they abuse her, and she returns to Laura covered in fruit juice. Laura drinks the juice from her skin and is cured. The perspective in this poem, then, is decidedly not male. The goblins, who represent men tempting the young girls in the way the robot Maria tempted men, are “othered.” They are strange and otherworldly. In “Goblin Market” there is a latent sexuality in the young women, which the goblins can coax out, but it is different than the sexuality in Metropolis, which is read on to the female body by male spectators. “Goblin Market” offers an example of active female sexuality which Metropolis does not.

However, this does not mean that the women in “Goblin Market” have more power. The concept of the virgin or the whore still exists, but women do not have power in either role. Rossetti describes Lizzie about her household chores, but says of Laura:

She no more swept the house,

Tended the fowls or cows,

Fetch’d honey, kneaded cakes of wheat,

Brought water from the brook:

But sat down listless in the chimney-nook

And would not eat.

It seems, then, that the options available to the two women are either domestic labor or wasting away, longing for more “forbidden fruit.”

Both Metropolis and “Goblin Market” rely heavily on spectacle to convey their portrayal of femininity and sexuality. The technology of the text temporarily halts the narrative to create a strong visual image, which sucks in the viewer/reader. Our group (me, Sugar Spice, Hannah, and Michelle) discussed narrativity in Metropolis, and our conversation mostly involved Lang’s use of spectacle, which Laura summarized nicely in class notes: “As one group pointed out, there was a tension between the spectacle and the plot at times and they were wondering what that meant.    Of course, those spectacles and representations forced us to see relationship a certain way.” The scene in which the robot Maria dances to entrance the men is a good example of this; the actual event need not take up so much time, but the spectacle, as it halts the progression of the plot, draws us in. In the same happens in “Goblin Market,” as Rossetti halts the plot with lengthy, luxurious descriptions of the fruits the goblins offer:

“What melons, icy-cold
Piled on a dish of gold
Too huge for me to hold,
What peaches with a velvet nap,
Pellucid grapes without one seed:
Odorous indeed must be the mead
Whereon they grow, and pure the wave they drink,
With lilies at the brink,
And sugar-sweet their sap.”

This link between sexuality and spectacle is important. It enables the reader/viewer to, on some level, experience the temptations describes. The audience of Metropolis watches Maria along with the men who are under her control, allowing us to experience the same temptation the men do. In the case of “Goblin Market,” the reader can indulge in the sumptuous descriptions of the fruit, a metaphor for sexuality. So, while both texts consider sexuality very dangerous, and warn the reader about temptations, they also allow the reader to experience the temptation.

It is questionable, then, how much texts like Metropolis and “Goblin Market” warn the viewer, and how much they in fact present temptation. The relationship between sexuality and power is also important; both seem to suggest that giving in to sexual feelings is to allow another person power over you, no matter your gender. In giving in to the temptations of the texts, to the rich spectacle, the audience allows the text to have power over them in the same way. The spectacle, in the act of pulling you in on a more visceral level, allows the author or director more control than simply constructing plot.

For the full text of Goblin Market:  http://www.victorianweb.org/authors/crossetti/gobmarket.html