32 IntĂŠgritĂŠ: A F aith and Learning Journal
Clever Woman tells the story of Rachel Curtis, who, on her 25th birthday, complains that she is unable to perform the useful work she desires because she is a woman. She comSODLQV ³+HUH LV WKH ZRUOG DURXQG PH RQH PDVV RI PLVHU\ DQG evil! Not a paper do I take up but I see something about wretchedness and crime, and here I sit with health, strength, and knowledge, and able to do nothing, nothing²at the risk of breaking my moWKHUœV KHDUW´ She prides herself on her strength and cleverness. SKH HYHQ ZULWHV D SDPSKOHW RQ ³&XUDWRODWU\ ´ mocking those women who fatuously admire and respect their religious authority figures and saying that sermons are rarely worth listening to. She is also involved LQ DQ RQJRLQJ FRQIOLFW ZLWK WKHLU FKXUFKœV FXUDWH ZKRVH DXWKRULW\ VKH FRQVLVWHQWO\ rejects. This religious certainty is reflected in her attitude toward illness. She, never ill herself, is confident about her ability to cure other people through her own homeopathic remedies. She has a dispensary in her work room from which she doses whomever she can with healing globules. Claiming she has done great WKLQJV LQ KHU GLVWULFW DQG ZRXOG GR PRUH ³EXW IRU SUHMXGLFH´ VKH DUJXes that women should become homeopathic doctresses instead of governesses. Yonge XVHV VLFNQHVV DV D ZD\ WR UHIOHFW VSLULWXDO LVVXHV KDYLQJ WKH FKDUDFWHUVœ WUXVW RI medical authority mirror their trust in religious authority. <RQJHœV QRYHO LV VWLOO TXLWH engaging and readable today²particularly with Christian students who are more inclined to sympathize with her worldview. One of the highlights of the novel is a moment of spiritual despair, which rings true to human nature in a similar way to the moment in Jane Eyre we analyzed earlier. :KHQ 5DFKHOœV FKDULWDEOH LPSXOVHV OHDG KHU WR IRXQG WKH )HPDOH 8QLRQ IRU (QJOLVKZRPHQœV (PSOR\PHQW D NLQG RI WUDGH VFKRRO IRU ODFH-making girls in the village, she is swindled out of her money by the false philanthropist Maddox, her partner in this enterprise. Maddox is a villain who starves and mistreats the girls of the school. /RYHG\ .HOODQG WKH YLOODJH JLUO ZKR LV 5DFKHOœV FKDULWDEOH guinea pig and who is abused by Maddox) is stricken with diphtheria, which is the turning point of the novel. Everyone, including Rachel herself, believes that /RYHG\œV LOOQHVV LV 5DFKHOœV RZQ IDXOW The guilt prostrates her spiritually and physically. Rachel, who has always been healthy, is afflicted with diphtheria after Lovedy dies. Rachel realizes that she should use illness as she has seen the godly men in the novel use it, to grow spiritually stronger²in one of her musings she DGPLWV WKDW ³VKH KDG KHDUG RI EHQGLQJ WR WKH URG DQG ILQGLQJ D FURVV´ ²but VKH FDQœW GR LW AlthRXJK VKH UHIHUV WR KHU VXIIHULQJV DV ³WKRUQV ´ ZKLFK OLNH WKH $SRVWOH 3DXOœV WKRUQ LQ WKH IOHVK VKRXOG DOORZ WKH ³SRZHU RI &KULVW´ WR UHVW XSRQ one (2 Cor. 12:9, ESV), Rachel is unable to make this transition from illness to spiritual growth. Rather, RachHOœV LOOQHVV OHDGV KHU LQWR GRXEW She connects her physical suffering directly to her religious uncertainty: 7KH IHYHULVK PLVHU\ WKDW VXFFHHGHG /RYHG\œV GHDWK KDG EHHQ utterly crushing, the one load of self-accusation had prostrated her, but with a restlessness of agony, that kept her writhing as it were in her wretchedness; and then came her gradual increase of physical suffering, bearing in upon her that she had caught the fatal