Representing the Woman: The Modern Subject in Quest of Mastery in The Arrow of Gold by Joseph Conrad

Conrad’s last novel The Arrow of Gold (1919) not only dramatizes the intricate relationship between the protagonist, Monsieur George, and Doña Rita, but it also brings into focus the modern subject’s endeavour to exert control through the representation and objectification of women, ultimately perpetuating the oppressive discourse of patriarchy. George, a young seaman involved in gun-running for the followers of Don Carlos, the pretender to the Spanish throne, develops desire for Rita. His attitude towards Rita defines him as the subject who seeks to appropriate her by objectifying and transforming her into visual representation. The feminist critique of the modern subjectivity, heir to the Cartesian cogito rooted in the the mind/body dichotomy, points to its significant role in providing the conceptual framework which justifies women’s subservient position. According to Elizabeth Grosz, the mind/body dichotomy, which the narrator relies on to construct Rita’s representation, accounts for the emergence of somatophobia involving the disavowal of the female body as the locus of irrational impulses and, therefore, the source of women’s inferiority. Thus, George’s representation of Rita is marked by the tendency to subordinate the female body to discipline and constraints as well as to desubstantialize her by reducing her to a spectral vision. Although Conrad never declared the intention to speak up for the cause of feminism, yet in The Arrow of Gold he exposes the dichotomous conceptual framework that limits Rita’s autonomy and legitimizes the male subject’s will to mastery.