From our discussions in class, I have felt that there is not always a lot of sympathy going around for Clara, since some have said she tends to contradict herself and she does not always seem consistent. The latest reading section, however, has made me think that perhaps we should have more sympathy for her than we do.
Previously, she had been shocked into the fact that her and her friends' acquaintence Carwin was not all that he seemed, and that he actually intended to do her harm. Now, she is also realizing that her brother and her closest friend, Pleyel, are doubting her own honor and her word. When Pleyel confronts Clara in her parlor, he asserts, "how thou art fallen! From what height fallen! A ruin so complete-so unheard of!"(118) Here he alludes to what we discussed in class yesterday: that perhaps Clara, or even the Wieland family in general, had suffered some sort of fall from grace after the death of their father. Pleyel refuses to believe that she hasn't entered into midnight interviews with Carwin, and this shocks Clara. She had thought that he might be persuaded to believe her like Wieland was. Wieland accepted her story, as odd and suspicious as it was, because he "had known [her] since childhood, because a thousand instances have attested [her] veracity, and because nothing...would convince [him]...that [his] sister had fallen into wickedness..."(125) Unfortunately, Pleyel was not so easily persuaded, possibly because he felt betrayed by the one whom he had loved and admired for so long.
Therefore I believe that Clara's biggest flaw, at this point, is being naive. She has spent most of her life secluded in the same home with the same three or four people near her. She has been living a sheltered life, and now that she is discovering people (Carwin) and experiences that she has never really had before, she is having difficulty navigating her way around these experiences. She does not know what to make of the mysterious voices; indeed, who would? She is being exposed to murderers and rapists, but she was not fully aware of that fact. She is experiencing a break-up of sorts from Pleyel, which is certain to shake her up since he was supposed to be a close, loyal friend, if not a future lover. If she contradicts herself in any way, it is because she is experiencing a new situation to which she had never been exposed. She is young, she is scared of the unknown of the mysterious voices, but she is also learning how to deal with it. The biggest example of this is when she stands her ground when talking to Pleyel in Chapter 13. She never admitted to what Pleyel accused her of, and even though he ultimately left her in the end of Chapter 14, she still stood by the truth of her situation.
I definitely agree with what you said about Clara's inconsistency stemming from her exposure to new experiences. In this way, Brockden Brown is exploring the human mind: he is trying to make sense of how it works. We see, on one side, Clara, who had previously lived a very secluded, relaxing life, now contemplating death and passing her days in a degree of despair. We see this as a reaction the mysterious events that are occurring around her. She is not sure whether or not she believes in the supernatural. She tries to logically explain these events, but she also ponders the idea of supernatural occurrences. Pleyel, on the other hand, represents the fact that humans often see what they want to see. Pleyel had convinced himself that Clara loved Carwin. Thus, he accuses, and believes Clara responsible of something she had no part in.
ReplyDelete