The Collector
Select a topic to reflect upon -- you might which to prepare some minimal research before you respond.
- Now that we know that the dominant literary allusion employed throughout the text is of Shakespeare’s The Tempest, with your group, conduct minimal research and answer the following:
- Make connections/parallels between the 2 texts
- How does this impact your study of The Collector?
- The Collector is thought to involve a study of the class system. Discuss what points Fowles is making about the class system through the characters of Miranda and Frederick and their relationship.
- Explore the concept of Art and Beauty:
- Provide what you believe to be Frederick’s definition and Miranda’s definition
- How is Art and Beauty expressed in the text? (process and product?)
4. Fowles is developing a complex, problematic scenario about the human condition regarding freedom. Both Frederick and Miranda seek freedom, not just literal.
- What other types of freedoms are there?
2. Frederick Clegg did not come from a high class in the book. What he had gained was wealth through his winning of a pool for soccer. Miranda on the other hand was brought up in a more affluent home. Therefore, when they encounter each other, Clegg tried to make himself seem like he was more high class so that he could be accepted by Miranda and maybe she would love him. Miranda reads through his mask and realizes that he is low class in reality by the way he speaks and calls him out for it. The difference in class is clearly shown here because Miranda and Clegg are from very different classes and besides the reason that her kidnapped her, she could have never been with him since he was of a lower class despite his wealth.
ReplyDeleteFreedom is a recurring motif in many senses within "The Collector". Taken literally, Miranda is seeking physical freedom from Frederick’s captivity. She makes several attempts to escape, but is never successful. What disturbs her the most about her time spent with Frederick is his ignorance in that he will believe anything that she wants him to, without forming his own educated opinion. She can not understand that he does not have mental freedom because she has captivated him in every sense of the word. She tries relentlessly to explain that since he has freedom from financial troubles, he should be spending it on causes that he believes in. He told her that he does not see the point in voicing opinions on matters that he will not be able to influence. This infuriated Miranda because they have the freedom to have opinions and it’s about proving to yourself and others around you, especially the lazy ones that don’t take the time to put forward the effort, that you care. She is explaining the freedom of feeling and the freedom to make the world a better place to him and he does not seem to understand. More or less, Miranda emphasizes the importance of individuality, but Frederick cannot grasp it.
ReplyDeleteThroughout his life, Frederick felt isolated in the sense that he did not make connections with many people. He seemed to be going through life without much purpose or drive, until he saw Miranda. She allured him and he developed an intense obsession with her. He found a purpose: to be with her. His obsession overtook his life and he found a sense of freedom in having her as his “guest”. His freedom was found in control, which he took very seriously. At the end of the novel, after she dies, he no longer has a purpose. He is looking for freedom from the life he currently lives and despises through death. He plans to commit suicide and be with Miranda on the other side. Although they encounter different forms, both Miranda and Frederick desire freedom and hope to achieve it through any means possible.
Through the two main character, Fowles provides two opposing viewpoints on what beauty is and what art is for. Frederick maintains that Miranda is the epitome of beauty; her long hair and fair skin makes her beautiful enough for him to kidnap. Frederick finds beauty in things that are on the surface, like Miranda or Mariam’s appearance, butterflies, or what he is “supposed” to find beautiful, like design deemed popular by society at large. He finds elegance in simple photographs and the cases of dead butterflies.
ReplyDeleteMiranda, on the flip side, sees beauty in art. While she knows she is beautiful, she finds quality art as much more worthwhile than the material beauty that appeals to Frederick’s eyes. She scolds those who take beauty as a quality that is on the surface, as Frederick does. Miranda finds Frederick’s version of beauty preposterous, going as far as to smash his interior decorating and insulting his collection of photographs and butterflies. Because of her “enlightened” views, she thinks herself superior to Frederick. She is part of “The Few,” while Frederick is a weak part of “the many.” She finds herself responsible to teach him what “real” art is, and that his version of beauty is tainted by society.
Over Miranda’s diary entries, she reflects on the process of making art and perfecting it to turn it into beauty. She details the thought and emotion that must be put into a piece to create a significantly elegant piece. In this, she seeks an inner beauty instead of an outer beauty, one that is carefully constructed by humans, not nature.In contrast, Frederick finds beauty in the natural, in butterflies and Miranda’s appearance. Frederick does not seek an “inner beauty,” as Miranda does, but an inherent quantitative sort of beauty that can be seen in an instant.
(For Question #3)
Delete3. Frederick’s definition of art and beauty is much different than Miranda’s. Frederick wants to capture beauty and keep it for himself. He does this by collecting butterflies and also capturing Miranda. Frederick wants to keep beauty and lock it up and keep it for himself and keep it away from someone else. Frederick is afraid that if he lets the beauty be free it will escape from him and he will never see it again or someone else will steal it away. He kidnaps Miranda so he could keep her for himself. He watched her in her own world for awhile, but he didn’t want her to get away on him and he would have lost her. Miranda sees beauty as something that should be admired from afar. She doesn’t want to capture it because part of the beauty of something being beautiful is that it is free and alive. When Frederick shows Miranda his butterfly collection, Miranda says that the butterflies are beautiful but sad. When she sees the amount of butterflies Frederick has she says, “I’m thinking of all the living beauty you’ve ended”(54). Miranda likes beauty that is alive, Frederick wants to capture beauty which he does by killing living beauty. The moment had takes Miranda he slows starts killing her.
ReplyDeleteFrederick takes photographs for art, Miranda draws for art. The same idea of living vs dead for beauty applies to their views of art. Miranda thinks that photographs are dead. She tells Frederick, “When you draw something it lives and when you photograph something it dies” (55).
When you photograph something that image of the object is stuck in time. Painting captures an image from a person’s view so that object can be viewed in a multitude of different ways depending on perspective.
In the text Miranda continues her artwork and also gets a painting that G.P. drew. Frederick also continues photographs in the text and takes photos of Miranda including nude poses. The product of Miranda’s art is hope that she will survive and escape and one day ask G.P. who the girl in his painting was. The product of Frederick’s photos was that it hurt Miranda. It wore her down and took away part of her dignity.
4. Clearly, Miranda is deprived of freedom in a very literal sense when she is taken prisoner by Frederick. However, both Miranda and Frederick long for a sort of mental freedom from the mindsets in which they are trapped. Frederick, in particular is very restricted in what he thinks he is capable of. He is trapped within his own obsessive thoughts and behaviors; he does not socially interact with other people, and only knows how to observe people, and eventually "collects" Miranda. He is unable to escape his cyclical patterns and obsessive thoughts to live a normal life. When Miranda attempts to seduce him, he is extremely uncomfortable with sex and relationships; he is stuck within his own head his behavior. Even at the end of the story, after he saw all that happened to Miranda and the ineffectiveness and horror of the whole situation, he is still trapped within his own mind and plans another abduction. Miranda is also mentally trapped; obviously she wants to be freed from Frederick, but she also wants to be free to live her life as she pleases. She spends much time reflecting on her unhappiness in the real world. She is too focused on what makes good art or bad art, or pleasing G.P. that she does not consider what she wants and likes in her life. They are both unable to accept their own circumstances and be happy. They cannot seem to be freed to move forward in life.
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ReplyDeleteClass in the novel, The Collector, is a complicated affair. The concept of class, particularly the differences between the classes, colors the whole novel. Both characters, consciously or otherwise, are motivated by class to act the way they do. Clegg, a man from a working class background, became rich by luck, winning the "pools"/lottery. However, even as a newly rich man, he despises the wealthy. He distains their "la-di-da" voices and foolish spending, yet he himself spends lavishly on a new cottage and items for Miranda. He is part of the class of "New People," as Miranda's mentor G.P. calls them--a class of the once poor, but newly rich that are "poor in soul" but no longer lack money. Beyond Clegg's class anxiety, The Collector addressed the "us vs them" mentality of class, through the concept of the "Few" versus the "Many". Miranda, an upper class woman, is one of the "Few" meanwhile Clegg represents the "Many," "ordinary dull little people who aren’t ashamed of being dull and little" as Miranda puts it (121). Despite Clegg's money, or perhaps in spite of it and all of the class anxiety it brings, Miranda stills views him as lower class. Clegg constantly frets about others' perceptions of him, thinking that the upper class can see right through him, disdaining him for pretending to be one of them, both with strangers and Miranda. Miranda, although she believes she does not dwell on class, is of the belief that rich are superior to the poor and much "teach them" their superior behavior/way of living. In the novel, she only identifies with fellow upperclass characters such as Emma Woodhouse from Emma, meanwhile she disdains lower class characters, who also remind her of Clegg. Although both characters attempt to forget about class and the issues that come with it, it is a constant presence in the book, lying under each and every interaction the two share.
Throughout The Collector there is a constant theme of freedom and want of freedom. Miranda seeks freedom literally. She wants to escape from the box that she is locked in. She is like the butterflies, once free and beautiful, but now cooped up in a frame or box only to be looked at by Clegg. She tries to escape multiple times, but fails each and every time. She also loses the trust of Clegg as well. Miranda also longs for freedom of expression. She wants to be out in the real world conversing with people, especially GP. She wants to be able to draw and paint in the outside world. Miranda expresses herself through art, but she does not find happiness in it because she is trapped. Miranda also wishes she had the freedom to choose. This reminds me much of the combine in "One Flew Over the Cuckoos Nest." The combine and Big Nurse took away the right for patients to choose anything for themselves. They were told what to do and when to do it. This is much like Clegg and Miranda. Miranda cannot choose when she gets to take a bath, go outside, walk around, when she eats etc. Her life and her daily routine is all dictated by Clegg. The freedom to choose what she wants to do and when she wants to do it has been taken away forever. Both Miranda and Clegg long for mental freedom. Miranda suffers from only hearing her thoughts and Clegg's thoughts. Her mind is consumed with thought of how to escape, Clegg, and GP. She cannot seem to think of anything or anybody else. She starts to go insane as she has not seen another human life in months. She begins to talk to herself in the mirror because she is the only person to understand herself. Clegg may not notice it, but he wants to be free mentally. He is so infatuated with being an outsider and how everybody else perceives him. Clegg has no self confidence and it really shows. Clegg wants freedom from the outside world, which contradicts Miranda, who wants freedom from the introverted one she is living in. Clegg feels uncomfortable when he is around other people. For example, when he is in the doctor's office attempting to get the doctor for Miranda he can only focus on the woman staring at him. He has to leave because he almost feels suffocated by being around so many people who he believes are judging him. Thus, both Clegg and Miranda seek other freedoms throughout the novel.
ReplyDeleteAlthough Clegg sees class as the barrier between him and Miranda. Miranda acknowledges this barrier as a barrier of art. Miranda has a deep appreciation for the humanities. She constantly asks Clegg more records and literature. Miranda in her paintings seeks to imitate life and love at its fullest, which to her, is the beauty of art. Miranda comments “When you draw something it lives and when you photograph it dies” (55). She sees Clegg’s hobbies as dreadful because they destroy life. Miranda also think collecting kills beauty and does not find it artistic in any way. According to Miranda, Clegg resorts to this hobbies because he is in poverty with soul and art. Miranda calls people who lack appreciation for art as the New People, in which Clegg classifies in. Clegg has no opinion on anything and does see the value in classic works of literature and music. Life and love are what makes art beauty, according to too Miranda, whereas Clegg cannot appreciate love and life. Miranda's will to live keeps her going until the very end. She feels she has so much potential to make something of herself as an artist and even to make the world a better place. Clegg, however, minds no meaning in life. “I think we are just insects, we live a bit then die and that’s the lot” (299). Clegg believes life is simple and dead is inevitable. This feeling could have been brought upon by the dead of all his love one, his parents, and uncle. He seems to think about death causally the way he introduces their deaths to the reader in the being of the novel. More disturbing was his reaction to Miranda’s death, “Well, I shut her mouth up and got the eyelids down. I didn’t know what to do then, I went and made myself a cup of tea” (Fowles 295). Clegg finds very little value to human life. He also cannot manage to express love. When Clegg tells Miranda he loves her, she describes it as “[h]e said it as he might have said, I have cancer”(200). Clegg lack of ability to display loves comes from a lack of exposure to love. He cannot open up to love. Clegg’s ignorance towards art is displayed through his lack of appreciation for life and love.
ReplyDeleteQuestion #3
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DeleteQuestion 4:Throughout the entirety of her imprisonment, Miranda is desperately seeking physical freedom from her captor. Perhaps the kidnapping was made even more horrifying in contrast with the freedom Miranda regularly embraced through her art and creativity. G.P. taught her to embrace her sense of free will by painting with emotion and feeling, not memory and formality. Her freedom is the potential to love and be loved, to exist in synchronization with other human beings. The nature of Miranda is everything Frederick wants and does not have. By capturing her freedom, he believes he will obtain his own. Ultimately, Frederick is at the mercy of his own mental prison, destroying life slowly in the beauty of his butterflies and his captive Miranda. She gets frustrated at him for his lack of passion for anything of importance in the world. While she has learned to never give up hope and keep fighting for the causes you believe in, Frederick is self-involved and uses his money to purchase a house for Miranda and endless gifts of “love.” He lacks the freedom to think for himself, and therefore yearns for control over another individual. He fools both Miranda and himself into thinking he is a moral and just hero by abstaining from the terrible acts he could inflict on Miranda. She tries to take advantage of his weak mind by ordering him around and educating him on art and music. While she is physically confined, her mind is always roaming and free. Frederick, however, is permanently choked by the most severe lack of mental freedom, never permitted to live as an individual human being.
ReplyDeleteQuestion 2: Through Miranda and Frederick, Fowles is saying that two people from separate classes cannot coexist because of the distinction between the two which has been so long ingrained into the minds of those making them up. This is evident in both Miranda and Frederick. First, it can be seen most prominently in Frederick. From the very beginning of the novel, Frederick always comments on class as a hinderance between him and those around him. In an interaction with a realtor, Frederick says that the man was, “Surprised I had money… like most of them” (17). Frederick is unwilling to make compromise between himself and others around him whom he views as different because of class. Immediately, he sets up the idea of “us” versus “them.” “Them” refers to anyone with money or anyone coming from a family with education. When he goes out to fancy dinners “them” are the people who belong, the ones who look down on “us.” “Us” is anyone who comes from a poorer or less educated background. Frederick often says that it is his manner of speaking which betrays him as “us.” Often, when he talks about “us,” it is in conjunction with “them.” Miranda is the best example of a part of “them,” because, though she she insists that she is equal to Frederick, her actions and words betray her. She regards him as lesser than her because he does not have an appreciation for art and life like she does. She talks down to him and berates him for his narrow views, which are merely the product of the life the has lived. While she had the time and luxury to be able to appreciate the finer aspects of life, like art and literature, he never had that luxury because he was working and focused on other things; hence, ingrained class structure. By just looking at the novel through the scope of class, Fowles is showing that classes cannot intermingle for too long because of their inherent differences. With Frederick as a symbol for the lower class and Miranda as the symbol for the upper class, the lower class will always feel inferior to the upper class, no matter how reformed the upper class may be. The long established roles of greater and lesser will always take over. The lower class is always going to be militant and envious of the upper class, causing an undissolvable schism. If the lower class ever gets the upper hand, it will control and eventually destroy the upper class, even if unintentional, just because of how their relationship has developed over the centuries. This is the path with Frederick and Miranda. They tried to coexist for a while, but, with Frederick always having the upper hand, it was only a matter of time before he conquered Miranda. She couldn’t help but fall back on her class ties, and, resenting that, Frederick couldn’t help but fall back on his. Thus came about the destruction of Miranda, the upper class.
ReplyDeleteOf course, the most simple form of freedom in The Collector is manifested in the form of Miranda’s desire to escape her cellar prison and the insufferable clutches of Frederick Clegg. She is held against her well as a mere play thing and beautiful accessory for her captor. Part 2 reflects Miranda’s inner desire to once again experience: to see the sky, walk outdoors, or have her beloved G.P. by her side. She has been deprived of her freedom of choice. She is imprisoned by Clegg, who masquerades as a caring individual. In reality, he is stripping her of her worth and purpose in life; he is completely indifferent to her needs and solely focuses on his own. His most selfish act is allowing Miranda, the woman he claims to love, to die. Additionally, Miranda lost her freedom of outward expression. She writes in her journal, paints and maintains her pensive nature, but still she is not able to act as a true imaginative, free spirit. She is unable to be herself without judgement in the atmosphere created by Clegg; she cannot connect with him because he is unable to see the world as she does. In some ways, Clegg has even less room to freely express himself. Throughout the novel, he seems incapable of feeling deep emotions. His mindset is overwhelmingly superficial and lacks humanity. He is cold, mechanical, and an obedient follower of society. It is possible that he suffers from some form of mental illness. Miranda hinted at this on multiple occasions and expressed sympathy towards him, even going as far to say that she would want to help him and free him from his illness. Additionally, Clegg is held captive by his desire to dominate. Clegg is not the traditional masculine type; he lacks the assertion and strength. His kidnapping of Miranda is almost him compensating for his weakness. He puts himself in a position of power, and that gives him confidence and thus happiness. His worst experience with Miranda, in his eyes, is when she seduced him because in that moment she used her sexuality to overpower and control him. After this, Clegg cannot forgive Miranda until he is put in a position of power again when Miranda is ill.
ReplyDeleteQuestion 4
DeleteQuestion 4:
ReplyDeleteThe concept and actuality of freedom is integrated into The Collector from Frederick’s fascination in butterflies to Miranda’s struggle to escape the cottage. Frederick tries to escape the “la-di-da” society by isolating himself from those around him and doing what suits him: collecting butterflies and women. Furthermore, Frederick wants to free himself from the class system that society places on us. He feels that when he is away from the city with only Miranda that there would be no class-distinction, just people. However, Miranda’s apparent beauty and allure fades and inside the reader sees that she is just a young woman, who seems to be of the upper class. Frederick wanted to be with someone who wasn’t “la-di-da” (fake) but also did not realize that real people like Miranda still hold true to their “class”.
Miranda’s attempts to escape symbolize her attempts to escape the cages of uneducated and “fey” folk like her aunt Caroline and her mother. Miranda wants to stick to her passions and beliefs, no matter what happens to her. And so, in her final efforts to escape she would think to herself, “I will survive. I will escape. I will not give in. I will not give in.” Giving in, would mean giving up her opportunity for actual, physical freedom but also would be giving into Frederick and what he wants: company and photos. Miranda refuses to take photos without her clothes on, which then Frederick forces upon her; and Miranda tries to use sex as a way of getting out, all actions that go against her morals. Also, Miranda despises any conversation with Frederick because he is “uneducated” and “simple.” She protests to be forced into any decision or any action, which is then taking away her freedom of speech and her freedom of thought and decision-making.
I'm in 13-14
ReplyDelete2. The class system that existed in England st the time was (and is) fairly rigid. Fredrick is born to parents of a lower class and after they die/disappear he moves in with his aunt and uncle who are also of a fairly low class. Miranda is of a higher class than Fredrick although she is not overtly wealthy, and is able to attend art school in London because of this. Fredrick knows that she would never look at him as a suitor because of his lack of wealth and lower class. When he wins a large sum of money in “the pools”, Fredrick is now catapulted into a higher class of people in terms of wealth and now lives in the West End a very ritzy area. However everyone still looks at him funny and he remains in his current social class. What Fowles is trying to say through this book is that the class system is so rigid in people's minds that the way that they act and think is influenced by the class system whether they are aware of that or not. Fredrick doesn't think he has a shot to be with Miranda until he has money. But Miranda does not view him as a husband because of the class he was born into (and maybe because he kidnapped her).
Miranda and Frederick both find beauty in different forms of art. Frederick happens to find beauty in collecting and viewing live things. He must continuously add to his butterfly collection to feel whole. Miranda, on the other hand, finds beauty in simple art forms. She, deep down, finds a connection to G.P. through this art. She even brings that connection to surface when she asks Frederick for a painting by G.P. Since Frederick really doesn’t have anyone special in his life he tends to focus in on one thing at a time, and that thing just so happened to be Miranda. Frederick loved watching Miranda and started to come up with a fake relationship with her in his head. He became obsessed, and like the butterflies he decided she would be his and only his, to watch and to take pictures of. Miranda actually had a relationship with G.P., although not romantic, this is why she did not become obsessed like Frederick. She was able to get close enough to him to feel satisfied that it didn’t overwhelm her. Since, Frederick could not get close to Miranda his obsession overcame him. Another layer of Miranda’s view of beauty is that she likes when things make you struggle to see their beauty. With artworks she loves the ones that aren’t obvious. Which could be why she loves G.P., to her he’s mysterious. She sees him as an artwork, a challenge. While Clegg is too outright with her, so she could never love him or think he’s beautiful.
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