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PHI2301: Assignment 1 Philosophy and Media Meredith Zima South University Mr. Christopher Kinney December 07, 2013

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Martha Quest by Doris Lessing: A Journey of Individuation Locke makes a point of distinguishing persons from human beings, and he makes consciousness a defining feature of persons: a person, he says, "is a thinking, intelligent Being, that has reason and reflection, and can consider itself as itself, the same thinking thing in different times and places; which it does only by that consciousness, which is inseparable from thinking, and as it seems to me essential to it:" (E II.xxvii.9: 335). A human being, by contrast, is defined by its physical form or shape. (Chappell, 2004)Hence, by applying Lockes theory of the self is a consciousness to a novel by Doris Lessing the theme of self and identity would be highlighted through the protagonist or character. The novel, Martha Quest belongs to a quintet, Children of Violence written by Doris Lessing. In this series Lessing traces the gradual evolution of the identity or self of the female protagonist, Martha Quest the title of the novel is named after. The urge behind Marthas consciously undertaken search for her inner self is a motif which is inherent in her surname Quest. It is the need she looks for to find her proper place in space and time that she lives in. Since she is born to British parents living in colonial Zambesia, she is neither here (an African) nor there (A British) that leads to her self displacement in society. Hence, she is a product, a child of violence since the First World War haunts her childhood and the Second World War looms like an unavoidable circumstance she has to face unwillingly. Marthas quest of making herself is identical to Lessings suffering to self discovery. This novel has a deep autobiographical strain and not only is Martha Quest based on Lessing but also on other characters and places Lessing has known. In spite of this, there are evident similarities between Martha and Lessing. One such resemblance is the pattern adopted by Martha

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in the search for herself. She joins various groups and ideologies and enters into various relationships, only to later extricate from each, like Lessing with an impersonal attitude. The act of splitting from a group is regarded by Jung as an imperative occurrence of the individuation process. In order to become an individual, separation from the mob psychology/ communal psyche is necessary. At the initial point of the novel, Martha is shown rejecting the membership of the three district ideologies or groups: the colonial ideology, the imported British cultural ideology and the patriarchal norms regarding women and the space and opportunities permissible to them. She (Martha) exclaims satirically to Marie/ Marnie Van Rensberg, Marry young? Me? Id die first. Tie myself down to babies and housekeeping (Lessing, 2001, p.17) Although Martha knows she doesnt want to be like, her mother, her dilemma is that she lacks a model to follow. She would not be like Mrs. Van Rensberg, a fat and earthy housekeeping woman; she would not be bitter and nagging and dissatisfied like her mother. But then, who was she to be like? Her mind turned towards the heroines she had been offered, and discarded them (Lessing, 2001, p.14). Marthas preoccupation with forming an identity is thus hinted at, from the onset of the novel. The act of stripping to scrutinize her naked body expresses her desire to know what she is as well as exploring her own sexuality. She symbolically peels off her skins (clothes) to discover what she truly is beneath them. Hence, she looks at herself from an objective perspective, in a self analytical manner to see where there is room for improvement and change. Her decision to lose weight and change the way she dresses are signs of the fact that she realizes she exists in a raw form and needs polish her rough edges and undergo a process of refinement to become a

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composite whole similar to the popular proverb of undergoing a transformation from an ugly duckling to a beautiful swan. Undaunted by the limited opportunities provided to her at the farm, she begins the process of making herself on the basis of knowledge she has gained from reading the books borrowed from Joss, and Solly, the Cohen brothers. But, she also wears out from the books and feels that they imprison her in their own way since they provide her with second hand experience of life. Moreover, she yearns for opportunities which would enable her to explore her latent capabilities and qualities, good and bad: She had reached the point where she could not read one of these books without feeling exhausted, for she knew quite well that if she read them she would only be in possession of yet another information about herself, and without even less idea of how to use it (Lessing, 2001, p.13). Nonetheless, she does carry an image of herself which she constructs on the farm with her to town. This is the self she creates through reading books. This aspect of her remains largely suppressed in town , but does surface once in a while and not surprisingly, Martha identifies the most with those people or objects in town that correspond to this aspect of herself. Two significant examples are the newspaper, New statesman and the Nation, and Douglas Knowell. When she reads the New Statesman for the first time, it gives her the feeling of being part of a brotherhood (Lessing, 2001, p .154) and both the newspaper and Douglas Knowell make her feel that she has come home. Significantly, Martha never experiences this sense of belonging with anyone or anything related to Donovans party/group. This is because the former allows her to be herself while the latter forces her to take up social masks and disguised roles respectively.

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To her advantage, Martha is very well aware of the various roles she is intimidated to play by the society and the groups she joins. From the initial point she is conscious of the fact that she becomes a sexual objectification Donovan subjects her to. He makes her feel as if she were being possessed by another personality, it was disturbing and left her with a faint but pronounced distaste (Lessing, 2001, p.127). Later the same night when she meets Mr. Anderson for the first time, she is mindful of the fact that the mask/role has been thrust upon her by society: Now, Martha was adapting herself to Donovan according to the external pressure which said that she must; and yet this pliability was possible only because something was informing her, in a small voice but a clear one, that this had nothing to do with her; in fact, it could be said she was so easy and comfortable with him just because of this fundamental indifference(Lessing, 2001, p.128). She experiences conflictual emotions within her as soon as she moves into town. Likewise, she conveys a confusion of feeling as she feels resentful; or rather a small critical nerve in her is struck unpleasantly and an excitement was flooding in her at the idea that she was being displayed (Lessing, 2001, p.134) simultaneously. Such role playing does not allow her room to explore or expand herself. Rather, her growth is stunted since she is pigeon holed in a role society has thrust upon her. At the beginning Martha represses this knowledge and deliberately ignores the small voice but a clear one which informs of this contraction of the self. The pressure and effort of repressing this knowledge take its toll on her and are manifested in her complaints of tiredness and exhaustion, only six weeks after she moved to town. These complaints are symptomatic of an inner yearning, dissatisfaction and unhappiness with her present state of mind.

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Nevertheless, instead of submitting to the will of the collective force, Martha resists its influence and struggles to dispose the social persona she has used for herself. Once she realized that the social persona threatened implicitly to take over her personality, she decided to fling off her social persona, since it was becoming synonymous with the sum total of her identity, just as Jung had stated. Like in, The Grass is Singing, Mary drops her persona and begins to show her feelings for Moses she cannot repress any longer. By this point in the novel, Martha is lost. Since whatever self she had made for in the town, it was shattered to such an extent that she was back to square one from where she started. Thus, her feelings of confusion were dire since she lacked and required a guide or model to pattern herself on. Not only did she become disillusioned of the town and its society but she was vulnerable at the hands of the society and could not shun her social persona. At the end of the novel, she comes to a full circle, or rather, stands, one step back from where she started at the novels beginning. Though Martha is desirous for growth, she faces obstacles in developing herself primarily because of her attraction to social groups, and the security of being part of the mob. Moreover, Martha is aware of the multiple selves in her: it was as if half a dozen entirely different people inhabited her body and they violently disliked each other.(Lessing, 2001, p.186) Some of these selves include the intellectual girl with radical views, the new girl in town who enjoys being the centre of attention and lastly, a truer and deeper aspect of her is that of the girl on the farm capable of having adventures, who has a vision of the Golden City, but who does not know how to get there. Throughout the novel her personality expands and contracts

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incessantly; she makes herself only to unmake herself in order to remake herself all over again. Throughout, she is striving to attain a sense of self that will make her feel secure and significant.

References Chappell, V. (2004, Nov 17). Locke on Consciousness. Retrieved from Locke on Consciousness website: http://philosophy.fas.nyu.edu/docs/IO/1650/chappell.pdf Lessing, D. (2001). Martha Quest. N.Y.: Harper Collins Perennial Classics.

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