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- Title
Impotence and the Male Artist: The Case of George Moore.
- Authors
Green, Sarah
- Abstract
George Moore was infamous for his bragging about sexual exploits, and for his treatment of sexual themes in his novels, autobiographies, and poems. But at the end of his autobiography Hail and Farewell (1911–1914), he declared his intention to consciously embrace the onset of age-related sexual impotence. Further, he claimed that this half-voluntary, half-involuntary continence was going to be the final step towards his transformation into a great artist, and allow him to write a book – Hail and Farewell itself – that would be a great work of art. This article asks why Moore made this declaration at a time when impotence was being increasingly associated with degeneration, weakness, and effeminacy. It argues that Moore was drawing on a sexual discourse widely credited in the Victorian period, in which sexual continence involved the containment of something that could then be put actively towards other ends, including the production of artistic works. Moore's employment of this discourse is read alongside his gendering of artistic success, to show how he represented impotence – imagined as containment rather than as failure – not as effeminate and weak, but as masculine and strengthening.
- Subjects
MOORE, George, 1852-1933; IMPOTENCE -- Age factors; HAIL &; Farewell (Book); HUMAN sexuality; MASCULINITY; MENTAL health; IDENTITY (Philosophical concept) in literature; AESTHETICISM (Literature); CREATIVE ability
- Publication
Journal of Victorian Culture, 2019, Vol 24, Issue 2, p179
- ISSN
1355-5502
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.1093/jvcult/vcy077