Bodies and Books. Gillian Silverman
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Bodies and Books
Bodies and Books
Reading and the Fantasy of Communionin Nineteenth-Century America
Gillian Silverman
UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIA PRESS
Philadelphia
Copyright © 2012 University of Pennsylvania Press
All rights reserved. Except for brief quotations used for purposes of review or scholarly citation, none of this book may be reproduced in any form by any means without written permission from the publisher.
Published by
University of Pennsylvania Press
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19104–4112
Printed in the United States of America on acid-free paper
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data:
Silverman, Gillian D., 1967–
Bodies and books : reading and the fantasy of communion in nineteenth-century America / Gillian Silverman. — 1st ed.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-0-8122-4415-1 (hardcover : alk. paper)
1. American literature—19th Century—History and criticism. 2. Intimacy (Psychology) in literature. 3. Interpersonal relations in literature. 4. Books and reading—Psychological aspects. 5. Books and reading—United States—History—19th century. 6. Authors and readers—United States—History—19th century I. Title.
PS217.I52S55 2012
810.9′353—dc23 | 2011046743 |
To my mother,Doris K. Silverman,and in loving memory of my father,Lloyd Howard Silverman
Contents
Reading and the Search for Oneness
Railroad Reading, Wayward Reading
Textual Sentimentalism: Incest and the Author-Reader Bond in Melville’s Pierre
Outside the Circle: Embodied Communion in Frederick Douglass’s 1845 Narrative
“The Polishing Attrition”: Reading, Writing, and Renunciation in the Work of Susan Warner
Preface
Reading and the Search for Oneness
This is no book,
Who touches this, touches a man,
(Is it night? Are we here alone?)
It is I you hold, and who holds you,
I spring from the pages into your arms.
—Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass (1860)
In Leaves of Grass, Walt Whitman articulated a theory of reading that would be satirically celebrated in an advertisement for the gay-positive magazine, The Advocate, a little over a hundred years later. According to this vision, reading is a physical experience—involving, above all, the sensory perception of touch—that leads to a deep spiritual and erotic connection, either