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and Carnivalesque:
as
in the
Incorporation
Utopia
Early Image of America*
Cannibalism
Mario
Klarer
accounts
of discovery
of early modern
and travel
majority
reflect a peculiar
fusion of a Utopian
narratives about America
and paradise-like
idyll of the new continent with cruel cannibal
The
istic practices
a benevolent
and medieval
Nature
or
fortunatarum,"
the
mysterious
islands
in
the Atlantic
accord
the
depict a Utopian West beyond
ing to the Irish abbot St. Brendan
known world. Parallel to these utopias of the West, ancient and medieval
sources use the Far East to situate the Earthly Paradise. Marco Polo's
fantasies of
fourteenth-century
travelogue and the fictional geographic
are the most prominent
advocates of these eastward
Sir John Mandeville
to
The westbound
voyage of Columbus, which was supposed
projections.
to fuse both Utopian
it possible
lead to the East via the West made
in the early image of America.
The major
in the
traditions
gaps
new
of
the
continent
could
be
therefore
knowledge
bridged
by re
courses
to ancient
and medieval
Utopian
concepts
West.
This
is a revised
Carolina)
revision
version
during
from the fellows
of a paper
a Rockefeller
of
at the National
Humanities
presented
in
1995-96.1
received
valuable
Fellowship
this year's
class.
Center
suggestions
(North
for
390
A
NEW
in the early
Nature
ranging
amoenus,
for human
necessary
as
an
from
and
or
mater
alma
modern
to
pastorals,
the
tradition
long
of a locus
the concept
Age,
first
has
mother
of a Golden
of
image
eagerly provides
feminized
concept of
notions
ancient
HISTORY
which
America
everything
LITERARY
of
descriptions
America.
Already
through images that
are reminiscent
islands
other
of this region,
of classical utopias:
"[T]he
one
can
as
are
as
is
be.
This
surrounded
fertile
too,
by harbors,
they
characterizes
Columbus
numerous,
and
safe
very
and
broad,
not
to be
with
compared
any
others
and
forests
groves,
are
which
for
green,
always
the
never
leaves
describes
the
as
Paradise
earthly
like
"prominence
this protrusion
being the highest and nearest
and at the eastern extremity
line,
equinoctial
eastern
constant
extremity,
references
the
where
to
gold,
land
that
is,
and
the
the
lack
a woman's
nipple,
iron,
end."5
also
Columbus's
situate
the
new
notions
of the Golden
side with ancient
Age as
and Ovid.6
in texts which make
ancient and medieval
utopias
a real manifestation
of diverse
temporal and geo
now of the Renaissance,
here
in
and
the
graphical Utopian projections
to the repulsive
cannibalistic
marks a decisive
practices
counterpoint
and
in the texts of Columbus
to the natives. Originating
attributed
a
as
serves
in
all
not
leitmotif
cannibalism
major
only
Vespucci,
irreconcil
travel narratives, but also functions as a seemingly
subsequent
to the Utopian setting of the continent.
able counterpart
of America
in the context of the discovery
Famous misconceptions
as well as the term
"Indians"
natives
the
include erroneously
calling
"cannibal," which also derives from semantic
indirectly
shortcomings
side by
continent
rendered by Hesiod
The uses of these
America
appear as
391
I have
in the following passage: "All the people
by Columbus
expressed
of
of
fear
the
Caniba
until
time
this
encountered
up
greatly
people
. . . The Indians with me continued
to show great fear . . .
Canima
one eye and a face of a dog,
insisting that the people of Boh?o had only
and they fear being eaten. I do not believe any of this. I feel that the
to the domain of the Great Khan."7 Christo
Indians they fear belong
the name of the tribe of the "Canibe"?
who
interpreted
pher Columbus,
due to the first syllable "can"?as
subjects of the Great Khan or man
snouts (from the Latin cants?dog),
the
eaters with dog-like
provided
treatments of these "cannibals" in the texts of the
basis for subsequent
and his successors project a
sixteenth century (see figure l).8 Columbus
onto
the
of
number
of ancient
and medieval
topoi
anthropophagy
the
The
travel
continent.
early
narratives?especially
newly-discovered
the
exotic
motif
of
curiosa
of
Amerigo Vespucci?employ
ethnographic
man-eaters
and expand
it as a popular feature. As early as the sixteenth
or
the older
the term "cannibal"
century,
replaced
"androphage"
an
thus
from
The
ethnographic
changed
neologism
"anthropophage."
term for man-eater,
term into a general
and
technical
geographical
new
a
serves
as
toto
its
and
for
the
continent
pars pro
simultaneously
native
Fig.
John
inhabitants.
1. Cannibals
Carter
with
Brown
dogs'
Library.
snouts
in Lorenz
Fries,
UslegungDer
Carthen,
Stra?bourg,
1525.
392
NEW
LITERARY
HISTORY
continent:
The
man
young
and
around
and
advanced
touched
and
mingled
stroked
him,
the women;
among
him,
wondering
greatly
a
she reached
came down
the hill carrying
a woman
from
big club. When
point
blow
such a heavy
was
man
she struck him
the young
the place where
standing,
rest of the women
dead. The
fell to the ground
that he immediately
from behind
. . .There
the
him by the feet up the mountain
him and dragged
at once
seized
now
in
were
him
our
before
killed
the
had
who
women,
eyes,
cutting
youth
at a
fire.
us the
them
(AV138-39)9
large
roasting
pieces,
showing
pieces,
of the
is a good
of these cruel practices
example
depiction
after having gently
nature of the image of America.
Shortly
paradoxical
and
the young sailor, the female Indians murder,
dismember,
touched
for a majority
devour him. The structure of the passage is paradigmatic
in early travel narratives. A benevolent,
of cannibalism
of concepts
as
the alma mater tradition suddenly turns
from
familiar
feminine
setting
into a cannibalistic monster
(see figure 2). The notion of a tempting but
ex
is increasingly
is a very popular motif which
Amazon
devouring
of the travel narratives.10 In many of these
in the iconography
panded
as a voluptuous
is rendered
America
temptress and/or
allegorizations,
of dismembered
monster
before the background
an Amazon-like
(mostiy
of
are
in
the
often
which
human
bodies,
process
being
prepared
male)
The
for
consumption.
Thence
Cyclopes,
we
sailed
an overweening
on,
at heart,
grieved
lawless
and
folk,
and
who,
we
came
trusting
to
in the
the
land
immortal
of
the
gods,
from
as one of
is regarded
mother with cannibalistic
1505
a nursing
the earliest
of Brazilian
depictions
Staatsbibliothek
images. Bayerische
M?nchen.
plant nothing with their hands nor plough; but all these things spring up for
them
rich
without
assemblies
of
sowing
of wine,
clusters
for
lofty mountains
council
or
wheat,
ploughing,
the
and
have
in hollow
they,
rain
nor
caves,
of
and
barley,
Zeus
appointed
and each
one
and
gives
laws, but
vines,
them
which
increase.
they dwell
to his
is lawgiver
on
bear
the
Neither
the peaks
and
children
substitution
of anthropophagy
end in antiquity but continues
for agriculture.
This concept does
in various forms in cultural history.
not
394
For
NEW
example,
passage
about
man-eaters
in
John
LITERARY
HISTORY
Mandeville's
four
fantastic
is that
of
travel
narrative;
again
combines
a nonbarbarian
with
is confronted
a
As in
cannibalistic
people; again the plot is situated in Utopian setting.
and
cannibalism
condemns
Andreas
most
other
texts,
superficially
to
While
the
in
this phenomenon
setting.
Utopian
opposition
places
many
texts
on
cannibalism
introduce
the
Utopian
element
as
descrip
the
of a Golden
Nature
tive Cockayne-idyll
Age,
the
themselves
manifest
in Andreas
through
indirectly
Utopian features
of the
The text starts with a description
Christian hope of redemption.
as a
sent
his
Matthew
had
where God
island Mermedonia
disciple
no
was
in
bread
the
"There
to
the Androphagoi:
place to
missionary
the
land
a
to
water
but
nor
drink of
feed men,
they
throughout
enjoy,
feasted on the blood and flesh, on the bodies of men, of those who came
with
a benevolent
from afar. Such was their custom, that when they lacked meat they made
Such
food of all the strangers who sought that island from elsewhere.
was the savage nature of the people."15 God sends his disciple Andreas,
saves the
whose cruel martyr's death at the hands of the Androphagoi
feature of this text is the fusion of
Matthew. An interesting
condemned
CANNIBALISM
AND
CARNIVALESQUE
395
of salva
with the Christian doctrine
notions of anthropophagy
a
use
form
of
of
cannibalistic
makes
also
which
tion,
incorporation.
as the eating of the
Already with the fall of Adam and Eve incorporation
as a central motif
later taken up in the
fruit functions
forbidden
ancient
and anthropophagy
with new valences.
Eucharist,
Utopia
although
an integral
as
irreconcilable
coincide
constituting
principles
apparently
as a
serves
thus
the
Other
of
part of the Eucharist.
Incorporation
or
a
of
for
the restitution
utopia.
unity
prelapsarian
prerequisite
the
Andreas executes
of America,
of early accounts
Like a number
an
in
indirect
and anthropophagy
of Christian
communion
equation
The Christian
and encoded manner.
concept of salvation superficially
as uncivilized
both
cannibalistic
opposes
atrocity, although
primitivism
to analogous
structures of incorpora
function
according
phenomena
the unity of subject
tion. While
cannibals devour strangers to reestablish
for a
eat the "body" of Jesus as a guarantor
and object, Christians
or
oneness
accounts
and
the
Andreas
their
God.
with
early
Utopian unity
in
of America
thus work with a Utopian hope which is deeply entrenched
itself in more or less stylized
cultural tradition and manifests
Western
of the Other.
forms of incorporation
texts and the modern
travel narratives
Most of the ancient-medieval
to Utopian
set cannibalism
the territories
in opposition
of
imagery
a
as
of
described by employing
savagery.
sign
primordial
anthropophagy
in his famous essay "Des Cannibales"
Michel de Montaigne
(1580) was
the first to analyze these two apparently
contradictory
images of utopia
as interdependent
He bases the new
mechanisms.
and cannibalism
in the ancient
tradition of Utopian
continent
thought like the Platonic
These
geographical
projections.16
are
in
"Des
Cannibales"
followed
Utopian extrapolations
geographical
of ancient
into a Utopian past of a
temporal reprojections
by examples
"I
continent:
also links with the American
Golden Age, which Montaigne
think that what we have seen of these people
[Indians] with our own
eyes surpasses not only the pictures with which poets have illustrated the
to draw mankind
in the state of
age, and all their attempts
golden
Atlantis
myth
and
other
westward
as well"
but the ideas and the very aspirations of philosophers
happiness,
the
The
of
America's
of
(110).
idyllic fertility
following
description
is reminiscent
of Homer's
in the
Nature
Utopian island of the Phaiacians
or
the
Diodorus's
of
Sun
Christo
Island,
Jambulian
Odyssey,
depiction
"For the
islands in the Caribbean:
newly discovered
pher Columbus's
rest, they live in a land with a very pleasant and temperate
climate, and
as my witnesses
inform me, a sick person
is a rare sight;
consequently,
and they assure me that they never saw anyone palsied or blear-eyed,
of fish and
toothless or bent with age . . .They have a great abundance
396
LITERARY
NEW
HISTORY
This
no
is a nation,
I should
of
knowledge
letters,
no
political
inheritance,
superior,
no divisions
but
any kinship
or wine.
of corn
and
slander,
no
habit
in which
say to Plato,
of numbers,
science
of
service,
of property,
common
ties, no
the
The
title
poverty,
kind
leisurely
occupations,
no
clothes,
agriculture,
treason,
lying,
How
heard.
far
of
commerce,
of magistrate
no
contracts,
only
very words
denoting
never
have
been
forgiveness
no
or
riches
is no
there
utopias,
Nature
greed,
such
of
no
no
respect
no metals,
no
deceit,
from
or
for
use
envy,
perfection
can be explained
as a general
Montaigne's
long list of various "things"
nor
lack of difference. Neither
clothes,
letters,
property,
figures,
kinship,
a total unity, disturb
this prelapsarian
wholeness.
which
could oppose
of
continues
in his enumerations
by stressing conventions
Montaigne
the
native
Americans
that
bear
to ancient
likeness
a commu
of
notions
to Utopian
and children which
is generally
introduced
is also
This
ties.18
visions in order to do away with differentiating
family
a very common
accounts
it
here
is
of
in
America;
topos
early
employed
to emphasize
of the inhabitants
of the New
the symbiotic wholeness
which Montaigne
World. The absence of separating difference,
depicts
on various levels, is epitomized
It
of cannibalism.
in his interpretation
division of subject
"difference"?the
marks the abolition of the ultimate
nism
of women
from
object,
that
is,
interior
exterior.
from
in the apocryphal
on
incorporation
total
unity.
gospel?want
as a necessary
The
savages
noble
Montaigne's
do
savages?
to be devoured,
consequence
eat
not
of
their
since
a view
of
prisoners
who
limbs is still in
of your ancestors'
you not see that the substance
them? Taste them carefully, and you will find the flavour is that of your
own flesh'" (117; see figure 3).19
to
essay, like a number of early travel narratives, belongs
Montaigne's
an age of drastic changes
of men with animate and
in the interaction
Can
of a proud prisoner
before his execution
twice,
speaking
Fig. 3. De Bry uses this engraving
as an illustration
for Hans Staden's
and Jean de L?ry's accounts.
Both texts most probably
for the History
of Art and the
Americae Tertia Pars, The Getty Center
influenced
Montaigne.
Humanities.
in Western
Nature. The year 1600 marks a turning point
can be described
terms as a
science
in
of
which
simplistic
philosophy
an
of
Nature
with an
of
process
concept
replacing
organic-holistic
as an
considers Nature
view of the world.20 Holism
overall mechanistic
inanimate
a living creature
as a self
very much
resembling
as
a
notion
is
Nature
in
connoted
this
Implicit
organicist
like a nourishing mother,
she provides everything men
in ancient, medieval,
and early
need. Most of the descriptive
utopias
texts are part of this tradition. The lack of agriculture
and a
modern
a
are
of
feminine
of
natural
abundance
gifts
signs
deep
general
structure manifesting
itself in notions of an alma mater or Mother Earth.
of
The younger mechanistic
concept explains Nature as a conglomerate
whole,
organic
contained
unit.
feminine:
being
supposedly
a masculine
organization
feminine
398
NEW
LITERARY
HISTORY
of science
in the early modern
the philosophy
positions within
period
are not only present
in scientific discourses
but also dominate
literary
utopias ofthat age.21 Francis Bacon's Nova Atlantis (1627) and Tommaso
these two opposing
Civitas Solis (1602) represent
tradi
Campanella's
tions in an overt way. In Civitas Solis, all human
actions are part of a
cosmic
Stellar configurations,
wholeness.
seasons, and the plan of the
a holistic worldview
as one of
into which man is integrated
city mirror
many
members.
can
combine
In
Francis
Bacon's
technocratic
vision,
male
scientists
in almost
limitless variety. Thus
the male
spirit
Nature
benefit
of
mankind.
for
the
opposes Nature,
exploiting
refers to these two traditions by equating
the
subliminally
Montaigne
of
culture
matter
with
the discoverers
mechanism
and
the
by describing
terms:
in holistic-organicist
concept of Nature found with the Cannibals
are wild in the same as we say that fruits are
"These people
[cannibals]
them by herself and in her ordinary
wild, when nature has produced
in fact, it is those that we have artificially modified,
and
way; whereas,
the common
from
removed
the
former,
true,
most
that we ought
order,
and
useful,
natural
virtues
to call wild.
and
In the
are
properties
to
Francis
foreshadow
Bacon's
mechanist
concepts
refer
when
in European
science of imitating nature's
ring to the "modern" practice
"With all our efforts we cannot imitate the nest of the
living creatures:
its beauty, or the suitability of its form,
very smallest bird, its structure,
nor even the web of the lowly spider" (109). The cannibals of America,
"are still governed
however,
by
by natural laws and very little corrupted
our own" (109). While Montaigne,
of an
and with him the proponents
organic
whole,
of
concept
the
advocates
Nature,
argue
new
the
of
for
man's
mechanistic
integration
worldview
into
aim
cosmic
at
the
with
A
with
the Christian
ethic
of
striking example
salvation and cannibalism
the
interdependence
is the 1557 account
in
belief
of Christian
of the German Hans
AND
CANNIBALISM
399
CARNIVALESQUE
entitled
The True History and Description
of a Land of the Wild,
Grim
Situated
in
the
New World America.2* Like most
Naked,
Man-Eaters,
authors of sixteenth-century
accounts of America,
Staden juxtaposes
the
with Christians, who are deeply rooted in their faith.
"grim man-eaters"
Staden
In continuous
variation he comments
recourse
to Christian doctrines.
The
on the deeds
depictions
drawn something
into the powder of the egg shells the club is subject to
a
ritual.
The club is then stuck between
the legs of the
night-long
the
sexual
connotation
the
of
ritual action:
executor?again
stressing
"The chief of the hut takes the club and sticks it once between his
legs.
an honor among them" (143). The
This is considered
following detailed
of the killing, preparation,
and eating of the prisoner
is
description
in
its
full
it
serve
as
since
will
later
in
the
quoted
length
major example
of
discussion
the
connection
images of cannibalism
between
in the early
Renaissance
folk-culture
immediately
scratch
off his
wood
to make
his
When
the women
skin, make
sure that
skin
him
nothing
is
take
the
completely
goes
a man
and
image of America:
dead
man
white,
to waste.
and
and
drag
seal his
anus
across
the
a
with
piece
fire,
of
takes him,
cuts off his
the knees
off,
scraped
legs above
to the
close
women
Then
four
take
the
four
and
body.
pieces
run around
the huts
Then
the
back
with
the
screaming
joyously.
separate
they
buttocks
from
the front.
That
women
them.
The
the
among
they share
keep
entrails.
boil
and with
a thin
the broth
called
them,
They
they make
pulp,
as well
as
ming?u,
meat
of
the arms
which
the head.
the children
they and
The
children
devour
taking
with
them
what
is their
eat
the
the
entrails
tongue
and
(146;
see
figures
4 and
as well
anything
as
the
else
they return
5).
400
NEW
Fig. 4.Woodcut
Hans
from Staden's
Staden's
medical
printed
account
fusing
is not
discourse
culinary
representative
only
August
LITERARY
Bibliothek
preparation
of numerous
and
HISTORY
Wolfenb?ttel.
anatomical
other
travel
a topos of grotesque
reflects
in the
literature
The
of
in
revival
the
modern
travel
sixteenth
cannibalism
century.
narratives has its counterpart
in the folk culture and literature of the late
Middle Ages and early Renaissance.
The most striking example of this
fusion of Utopian and cannibalistic
in carnival
imagery can be found
of
in
the
time.
These
motives
carnal
literature
and
practices
travelogues
coincide
of the Carnival in Europe,
temporarily with the strengthening
which sees itself as a inversion of current hierarchical
order of European
narratives
social
The
but
also
reality.
carnivalesque
traits
of
Rabelais's
Gargantua
and
Pantagruel,
as
Fig. 5. Engraving
for
Center
Getty
in Theodor
de Bry's Americae
the History
of Art
and
on Staden's
woodcut.
The
the Humanities.
to early
formal parallels
show obvious
discussed
Bakhtin,
by Mikhail
features
structural
of the
which
travel
literature,
incorporated
into the descriptions
of the New World.26 Both phenom
carnivalesque
ena?the
European Carnival and the imagery of the new continent?are
characterized
by Utopian features which turn current conditions
upside
this Utopian inversion as follows: "we find an
down. E. R. Leach describes
extreme
the participants
form of revelry in which
play-act at being
men
as
act
what
the
of
women, women
are;
they really
opposite
precisely
as men, Kings as beggars,
servants as masters,
In
acolytes as Bishops.
life is played
in reverse, with all
such situations of true orgy, normal
manners
and
of sins such as incest, adultery,
transvestitism,
sacrilege,
treated as the order of the day."27 Leach's characterization
l?se-majest?
state of affairs could also serve as a
of the carnival as an upside-down
in the early travel narra
summary of the protoethnographic
depictions
are full of these carnivalesque
of European
inversions
tives. They
men in the
women or feminizations
of
of
Masculinizations
perspectives.
all
contexts
and
role
above
of Amazon
reversals,
grotesque
myths,
402
corporeality
of America
NEW
LITERARY
HISTORY
figure 6).
Mikhail Bakhtin tries to find a common denominator
for carnivalesque
Renaissance
culture when using the cosmic human body as the center
(RW 365). In his focus
"uniting all the varied patterns of the universe"
on the human body, Bakhtin draws a direct link between
carnivalesque
folk culture and Utopian hope as reflected
in concepts
of the Golden
Age, the ancient Saturnalia cult, and Christian visions of salvation: "Even
tradition
more, certain carnival forms parody the Church's cult_The
of the Saturnalias
remained
unbroken
and alive in the medieval
this universal renewal and was vividly felt as an
carnival, which expressed
from
the
usual
official
The "carne vale" or
escape
way of life" (?W7-8).
"farewell meat," despite
its superficial negation
of the consumption
of
as
leads
into
the
Last
the
"cannibalistic"
meat, ultimately
Supper
part of
de Bry's illustration
of Staden's
account,
Fig. 6. Theodor
costumes
and masks,
is very reminiscent
of carnivalesque
for the History
of Art and the Humanities.
Getty Center
which,
images.
through
Americae
on
its emphasis
Tertia Pars, The
CANNIBALISM
AND
403
CARNIVALESQUE
the Christian
ritual. The cannibalistic
in Christian
tradi
deep-structure
tion is thus indirectly reflected
in the carnival of early modern
times.
can hardly be overlooked.
to the New World
The analogy
America
even
more
than
the
"the
of a
becomes,
Carnival,
European
potentiality
of
the
of
carnival
truth"
the
(RW4S). While
friendly world,
golden age,
a temporary,
Carnival
represents
European
though cyclical, enclave of
in the course of the year, its basic elements
are
to
new
the
transferred
continent. Grotesque
motifs, which
permanently
are part of the ritual renewal of the old world
in the carnival, are
onto America.
Bakhtin coins the term "grotesque
realistically projected
realism"
in the European
carnival,
(RW 21) for these basic features
which characterize
both the structure of grotesque
physical disfiguring
in the early image of America.
and the cannibalisitic
elements
In other
of a continually
the concepts
world
from
derived
words,
regenerating
onto
folk rites are transported
the newly-discovered
thus
continent,
an
America
of
these
making
expression
subliminally
regenerative
deep
of the carnival:
structures, or as Bakhtin
put it in his characterization
Utopian
"People
conditions
were,
so
to
reborn
speak,
for
new,
human
purely
relations.
or
only a fruit of imagination
abstract
The
ideal
and
the
thought;
experienced.
Utopian
in this carnival experience,
realistic merged
unique of its kind" (jRWIO).
What Bakhtin
the carnival characterizes
to an even
says here about
the
of
in
America
the
sixteenth
greater degree
conceptions
century. The
across the Atlantic materialized
as the
New World
carnivalesque?a
world whose main
features
include
the Utopian
inversion
of social,
and
all
in
reflected
structures,
political,
personal
indirectly
anthropoph
from premodern
agy. A number of examples
periods already illustrated
the interrelation
of carnal motifs with Utopian
topoi. This is especially
true of the works of Rabelais, which are
with
roughly contemporaneous
These
truly human
relations
they were
were
not
many
shoulder-blades,
cracked
the
crushed
fore-arms
of
the
yet
shins,
others.
dislocated
. . . Others
the
he
thigh-bones,
smote
so
and
fiercely
404
NEW
LITERARY
HISTORY
their turnspit, and at the fire in which the knights were burning
prisoner
set
to roast" (GP 252). In another episode
their
in Turkey,
venison
they
to
over
is
with
be
the
"The
covered
lard
roasted
fire:
Panurge
rascally
Turks had put me on a spit, all larded like a rabbit" (GP 214).
account
Even
of
the most
detailed
of the cannibalistic
practices
refers to this very passage about the cannibalistic
Brazilian man-eaters
Turks by Rabelais. Jean de L?ry's Histoire d'un voyage fait en la terre du
from
its overt distancing
Br?sil, auterment dite Am?rique is?despite
same
in
much
rooted
the
and
grotesque
Rabelais?very
carnivalesque
that the cannibals
tradition.29 L?ry argues
of the New World
always
on grids over the fire.
roast
dismember
their victims before
them
they
text abounds
this negation
in imagery
of Rabelais,
L?ry's
Despite
is
in
used
and
reminiscent
of the culinary
that
language
Gargantua
are
at
for
like
the
the
Pantagruel,
example,
"being fattened
prisoners
pigs
come forward with hot water
trough" (HV 122) and "[The cannibals]
that they have ready, and scald and rub the dead body to remove
its
outer skin, and blanch
it the way our cooks over here do when
they
(HV126).
prepare a suckling pig for roasting"
as a
Like Staden, L?ry also introduces
the motif of woman
tempting
and devouring monster, when relating the tribe's practice of giving the
to
prisoners
own
their
women:
woman
the
"[A]fter
has
or
some
made
time
an
means
here
Degradation
as an element
of birth,
element
that
of
and
up
to concern
also means
degrade
body, the life of the belly and
relates
to acts
of
and
defecation
maternal
(the
to earth,
down
coming
swallows
renascence
gives
birth
at
the
the
same
conception,
. . .
breasts).
contact
with
time.
earth
...
To
stratum
of the
it therefore
pregnancy,
and
which
to matter,
terror
to
the world,
to
the
cosmic
elements
...
(RW 335;
see figure
It transforms
7).
cosmic
In these
405
and regeneration
manifest
discourses,
quasi-historical
incorporation
in a form Bakhtin
themselves
labels as "grotesque
realism," which
transfers all latent ritual-theological
tradition of
aspects of the European
cults onto a material
level by grounding
them in the New World.
trace a common
One can therefore
denominator
traditional
among
in classical myths, medieval
texts,
concepts of anthropophagy
religious
and carnivalesque
literature of the
grotesque
early travel narratives,
and the philosophical
notions
of holism of Montaigne,
Renaissance,
the
always linking Utopian hope with motives of incorporation
regarding
human body. All the various manifestations
of the cannibalistic,
despite
their rather divergent
share a Utopian
appearances,
longing for unity
or as Bakhtin
summarizes
this latent
through sublation of difference,
wish
for completeness:
These
traits
transgresses
body
is enriched
and
are most
here
grows
fully
its own
at
and
account
Staden's
Fig. 7. This engraving
by de Bry which
accompanies
women
cannibal
the dead body. Americae Tertia Pars, The Getty
prepare
of Art and the Humanities.
History
shows
how
the
Center
for
the
406
NEW
which
world,
the most
of
Here
man
. . Man's
.
triumphs
between
HISTORY
is one
mouth,
biting,
chewing
rending,
of human
and imagery.
objects
thought
tastes
the world,
it into his
it part of himself.
body, makes
encounter
with
the world
in the act of
is
he
eating
joyful,
triumphant;
over
the world,
devours
it without
devoured
himself.
The
limits
being
takes
ancient,
man
and
inside
place
and most
the open,
important
introduces
are
the world
attack
for
(RW 281)
advantage.
and cannibalism
by recourse to Bakhtin's
is both fashionable
and at the same time
reasons.
various
to man's
erased,
LITERARY
Bakhtin's
entire
of
reading
the
carnival
and Rabelais
in particular
in general
have been severely criticized
for
not being sufficiently grounded
in textual and historical evidence. Dietz
for example,
attacks Bakhtin's
R?diger Moser,
by accusing
approach
him of Utopian projections:
turn his
did he [Bakhtin]
"Much more
to the west, since he thought to be able to find there?in
attention
the
so
new
which
he
missed
in
carnival?two
the
all
things,
progressive
.. . and the liberation of the
socialist society: The freedom of the people
pressure
on
resting
of
many
them."30
The
structure
is
not
to
be
parallels
motives
in a
materialize
This Utopian
Other,
which
spatial
manner.
calls
the
"most
ancient
. . .
the world
objects
of
or the
human
theories of
thought" (RW2SI), also serves as the basis for psychoanalytic
movements
All
in
the
twentieth
the
theoretical
century
identity.
major
on binary oppositions
or difference:
their arguments
signifier
ground
in structural
in linguistics,
the raw and the cooked
and signified
as
are only a
as
in
and
well
object
subject
psychoanalysis
anthropology,
one
of basic dichotomies
which?if
few of the numerous manifestations
to go that far?ultimately
between
"boil down" to the opposition
that is, edible and inedible.31 The constitution
of the
inside and outside,
or
to
is
in
Freudian
linked
theory
directly
incorporation
Oedipal
subject
to
itself
tries
into
"The
introject
original
pleasure-ego
introjection:
that is bad. From its
that is good and to reject everything
everything
to the ego, and what is external
point of view, what is bad, what is alien
can thus be
to
The
identical."32
are,
dichotomy
subject-object
begin with,
to
of
the
inedible.
The pre
edible
and
the opposition
traced back
wants
lapsarian?or
in this
case
pre-oedipal?wholeness
of man,
which
was
lost
AND
CANNIBALISM
407
CARNIVALESQUE
is consequently
ritually restored through
through eating and not-eating
or introjection.
various forms of incorporation
between utopia and
This also sheds light on the causal relationship
from
the earliest
ancient
theories
cannibalism
of cultural
ranging
to the grotesque-realistic
and theological
evolution
material
discourses,
ization in the image of America
the
through
propagated
early travel
and historiography,
link cannibalistic
narratives.
which
Rites, myths,
with Utopian spaces, reflect this subliminal
human drive
incorporation
oneness
an
for a restitution of primordial
of the
through
incorporation
two
Other. In the early modern
of
these
contradic
America,
very
image
tory concepts?the
utopia of the Golden Age or terrestrial Paradise and
to fuse and materialize
anthropophagy?seem
through a realistic and
material
projection
New World.
of stylized Utopian
rituals
onto
of incorporation
Universit?t
the
Innsbruck
NOTES
1
On
the gender-specific
see Mario Klarer,
aspect of the early image of America
Utopian
and Arcadia:
on the Early
The
Impact of Ancient
Utopian
Thought
Image of
1-17.
America,"
Journal
of American Studies, 27.1 (1993),
2 Christoforo
tr. Frank E. Robbins
Colombo,
Inventis,
(Ann
Ep?stola de Insulis Nuper
"Woman
Arbor,
1966), pp. 9-10.
3 Amerigo
Account
Vespucci,
Introductio
Wieser
4
byMartin
(1507)
Cosmographiae
and Franz von
Waldseem?ller
(Ann Arbor,
in the Odyssey
on the island
describes
conditions
comparable
and
grow trees, tall and luxuriant,
pears and pomegranates
with their bright
olives. Of these the fruit
fruit, and sweet figs, and luxuriant
apple-trees
not nor fails in winter
or in summer,
but lasts throughout
the year; and ever does
perishes
as it blows, quicken
to life some fruits, and
the west wind,
ripen others; pear upon pear
waxes
ripe, apple upon apple, cluster upon cluster, and fig upon fig. . . .There
again, by
the last row of the vines, grow trim garden
beds of every sort, blooming
the year through,
are two springs." Homer,
and therein
The Odyssey, tr. A. T.
2 vols.
(1919; rpt.
Murray,
in text as TO with book and line
hereafter
cited
Mass.,
1960), VII, 114-32;
Cambridge,
number.
of
The
analogous
the Phaiacians:
passage
"Therein
hereafter
Nov.
1492; 23 Nov.
1492;
so-called
"Cynoc?phales"
11 Dec.
(people
Fuson
references
(Camden,
1992),
to the Canibe
26 Nov.
1492;
the Log, 4
talks about the
also
1492; 17 Dec. 1492. John Mandeville
with dog's heads),
who practise
cannibalism.
see
"Men and
408
women
heads
... If
like dogs
they capture
tr. C.W.R.D.
Moseley
in battle,
[Harmondsworth,
1983],
texts considered
As early as 1520 Spanish
from the Latin
concluded
that it was derived
in the Caribbees:
Literature
The
and Power
Constitution
in the Seventeenth
of the word
and
the etymology
"Cannibale"
see Peter Hulme,
"Hurricanes
canis?"dog";
of English
in 1642:
of the Discourse
Colonialism,"
Century: Proceedings
of theEssex Conference on the Society
Peter Hulme,
ed. Francis
Barker,
John Coombes,
Jennifer
Jay Bernstein,
of Literature,
Colonial
Stratton
and Jon
Stone,
1981),
(Colchester,
p. 67; see also Peter Hulme,
1492-1797
Encounters: Europe and theNative Caribbean,
1986), p. 22, and Frank
(London,
toJules
The Discovery and Representation
Cannibals:
of the Cannibal from Columus
Lestringant,
and Los Angeles,
Morris
Verne, tr. Rosemary
1997), pp. 15-22.
(Berkeley
of four young male
is preceded
this passage
9
by an account
enough,
Interestingly
natives who had been castrated
tribe: "In the canoe which
they
by a hostile
neighboring
to the same tribe, but had
four youths, who did not belong
had abandoned,
there were
in another
land. These
youths
captured
a fact which
caused us no little astonishment"
been
had
p. 122).
Voyage, inWaldseem?ller,
10 See, above all, the numerous
illustrations
The New Golden Land: European
Honour,
Hugh
recently
(Amerigo
on
female
Images
had
their virile
Vespucci,
parts removed,
Account
of the Second
allegorizations
of America from
of America
the Discoveries
in
to the
Present
11
Time
The
unfilled"
See
rivers"
hereafter
(Michel
cited
de Montaigne,
in text).
Essays,
tr. J. M. Cohen
[Harmondsworth,
1958],
pp.
106-7;
one finds
of texts that could be labeled Utopian,
the few medieval
examples
in his The Former Age, but also
the
of a Golden
vision
Age
retrospective
of the
into many national
literatures
Land ofCokaygne, which was incorporated
anonymous
of a
visions
The Isle of Ladies. These medieval
Middle
time, and the anonymous
English
core of both classical
formed
the
central
that
draw
the
terrestrial
upon
topoi
paradise
and
such as communal
modern
fertility of the land, health,
property,
supernatural
utopia,
im
mittelalterlicher
und
antiker
See
Mario
life.
Klarer,
Utopievorstellungen
"Topoi
long
160
42.2
The Isle of Ladies," Germanisch-Romanische
(1992),
Monatsschrift
mittelenglischen
17 Among
Chaucer's
77.
18
"If of
are called
the same
children,
call one
age they generally
and the old men are fathers
another
one
to be held
of their property,
possession
on her creatures
nature
bestows
which
Essays, p. 114).
(Montaigne,
of 1578
19 Jean de L?ry's account
served as a direct
it almost certainly
in common,
when
with
she brings
no other
them
tide
into
than
the
the world"
to Montaigne's
essay that
the
Especially
depiction
to have served as a model
for the Montaigne
of the prisoner
savage who recites a
appears
. . .will be clubbed
to death
in all his feathered
is by no
ballad:
"Even he who
regalia,
on the contrary,
means
about
and drinking,
he will be one of the
downcast;
leaping
. . . [W]ithout
even though both his arms
ones there.
his offering
merriest
any resistance,
as a
are left free, he will be walked
for a little while
and displayed
the village,
through
. . . [W]ith an incredible
he will boast of his past feats of
and assurance,
audacity
trophy.
. . . T have eaten
to those who hold him bound
and to
your father,'
prowess,
saying
a
T have struck down and boucan?your
brothers'"
another,
(Jean de L?ry, History of Voyage
cited in text
to the Land of Brazil, tr. Janet Whatley
1990], pp. 122-23; hereafter
[Berkeley,
shows
source
such obvious
parallels
for "Les Cannibales."
as//V).
In her
20
Francisco,
of creatures
"sound-"
in the Catholic
cannibalism
with
links American
transubstantiation
L?ry
to an even greater
than Montaigne.
When
of the eucharistie
speaking
degree
and obtained
from God Thy Father
that Thy
says: "Thou hast willed
L?ry's priest
23 Jean
Eucharist
de
host,
to believers,
who by their eating of Thy flesh and blood, Thou has made
justice be ascribed
one with Thee
and transformed
into Thee,
nourished
their
by Thy flesh and substance,
true bread,
to live eternally"
(L?ry, History
of a Voyage to the Land of Brazil, p. 40). L?ry
the Catholics
with the cannibalistic
not only
compares
Quetacas:
"[T]hey wanted
directly
to eat the flesh of Jesus Christ grossly rather than spiritually,
but what was worse,
like the
to chew and swallow
I have already spoken,
savages named
Quetaca, of whom
they wanted
it raw" (41). Although
the Calvinist L?ry condemns
it as an example
anthropophagy,
using
a traditional
his descriptions
for Catholic
also follow
heresy,
deep
organic-holistic
as a restitution
oneness.
which
of universal
For a more
structure,
incorporation
regards
see the
on L?ry
treatment
of this Calvinist
in
detailed
view on cannibalism
chapter
Cannibals,
pp. 68-80.
Lestringant,
see the facsimile
text of 1557,
German
edition:
24
For the original
Hans
Staden,
und Beschreibung
eines Landes der wilden nackten grimmigen Menschenfresser,
Wahrhaftige Historia
in der neuen Welt Amerika gelegen, ed. G?nter
E.Th.
cited in text in my translation.
hereafter
1978);
Bezzenberger
(Kassel
and Wilhelmsh?he,
410
25
Staden
26
Mikhail
hereafter
even
includes
a woodcut
Rabelais
Bakhtin,
cited in text as RW.
27
Edmund
28
Fran?ois
Ronald
Rabelais,
and His
Leach, Rethinking
The Histories
illustration
World,
of
this club
tr. H?l?ne
Anthropology
in this printed
Iswolsky
(London,
1962),
and Pantagruel,
p. 6.
tr. J. M.
of Gargantua
hereafter
cited in text as GP.
1955), pp. 99-100;
... have
I shall here refute the error of those who
represented
(Harmondsworth,
29
"However,
edition.
(Bloomington,
1984);
Cohen
and painted
legs and other
about Panurge
to theLand of Brazil,
the Brazilian
human
flesh on a spit, as we cook mutton
savages roasting
. . . Since
are
meat.
truer than the tales of Rabelais
not
these
things
escaping
pp.
30
from
and half-cooked"
(L?ry, History
of
Voyage
126-27).
"Lachkultur
des Mittelalters?
Michael
Bachtin
und die Folgen
Moser,
Dietz-R?diger
84.1 (1990),
seiner Theorie,"
91-92.
Euphorion
to Cannibalism:
From Communion
An Anatomy
See also Maggie
31
ofMetaphors
of
Kilgour,
(Princeton,
1990), pp. 3-19.
Incorporations
in General Psychoanalytical
32
Freud,
(New
Sigmund
Theory, ed. Philip Reiff
"Negotiation,"
York,
1963),
pp.
214-15.