The first half of the novel, though immensely intellectually stimulating, lacks the sort of constant plot development one might expect from a novel. The protagonist consistently bombards the reader with information concerning the Vril-ya people. Consequently, the first half reads more like a historical text rather than a novel.
In the second half, however, the plot generates momentum as the relationship between the protagonist and his physically and intellectually gigantic female friend Zee threatens to become more than Platonic. The plot culminates with the narrow escape of the protagonist and his return to the human world.
Through the Vril-ya people, Bulwer-Lytton challenges the reader to think beyond the American way of life, especially when it comes to gender role issues. The female Vril-ya, the Gy-ei, fill the masculine gender role and dominate the society. Faced with this scenario, the reader has no choice but to look at human society and sexual issues and question the status quo. The Coming Race may not become the first choice of escapist literature seekers, but it has plenty of thought-provoking material to become the hot topic at salons for months to come.
I also enjoyed Bulwer-Lytton's "challenge" to the reader by not writing about a patriarchal society, like that in England or the one in America today. However, I felt that because perhaps Bulwer-Lytton was such a Victorian at heart, he hadn't fully been able to shake off the patriarchal trappings of his own society when he wrote The Coming Race. This was particularly clear to me in the construction of the language of the Vril-ya, which seemed to be male-centric, though society seemed to be equally balanced between males and females, if not veer toward matriarchy. It seemed to me that if the Vril-ya were truly as intelligent as Bulwer-Lytton had wanted them to be, they would have recognized that they were using outdated oppressive language. A truly intelligent race striving for perfection would recognize that this type of language would need to be neutralized.
ReplyDeleteI agree that Edward Bulwer-Lytton makes comparisons between his modern society and that of a Utopia. However in Bulwer-Lytton’s attempts to describe a Utopia, he becomes lost in one. The Vril-ya people consider themselves as living in a Utopia. Their objective of perfection has been obtained. However if there is only perfection, the individual self becomes lost. Therefore, the Vril-ya people have no real movement according to Lytton’s modern society. Lytton’s modern society has been conditioned to always progress and the Vril-ya people have been conditioned otherwise. Lytton’s comparisons only go so far because in the Utopia, it is not always about moving forward. Therefore, modern society cannot and never will become a Utopia without the abandonment of progression. It is important for the reader to identify with the text. The text teaches us the implications of evolutionary theory.
ReplyDeleteI see what you mean about the way that Bulwer-Lytton challenges the reader to question gender role issues by reversing the male and female roles of the Vril-ya. However, while it seems like he’s reaching for gender equality, the reversal just allows the gender roles to perpetuate. For example, at one point in the story, the narrator states that the way the Vril-ya remember the soft pronunciation of the “G” in “Gy-ei” and the hard pronunciation of “G” in “Gy” is because “they have a proverb to the effect that this difference in pronunciation is symbolical, for that the female sex is soft collectively, but hard to deal with the individual.” This witty saying surprised me, because it seems like a gender stereotype typical of the human race rather than a thought-out sentiment by the Vril-ya. Bulwer-Lytton just reversed the male-female binary instead of equalizing it, and it’s even complete with stereotypes like this one. Of course, you can probably argue that Bulwer-Lytton reversed the gender roles rather than making them equal in order to make the point more salient to readers…
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