An Introduction Hybridity In Jeffrey Eugenides S Middlesex
An Introduction to Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides
“I was born twice; first, as a baby girl… and then again, as a teenage boy.” (Middlesex, 3) From just its opening line, Jeffrey Eugenides’s sophomore novel, Middlesex, provides an interesting paradox. The book’s title instantly suggests a biological ‘in-between’ of literally being of a middle-sex, whereas the opening line introduces the issues of gender, birth and self as a binary of being one or the other. This juxtaposition poses an intriguing question of normality at the heart of the narrative. This revelation of Cal’s indeterminate biology isn’t shocking or horrifying, nor is it the cue for reader sympathy; it is revealed with dignity (and slight tongue-in-cheek), and establishes the protagonist’s voice, which is essential to Middlesex’s attempt to be a hybrid text – using a metanarrative structure by mirroring Greek mythology with Cal/lie’s own family heritage, which elicits to a conflicting life of either being the ‘other’ or the ‘in-between’.
Duality is incredibly significant to Middlesex’s narrative structure – modern and myth, Greek and American, male and female, and how they all coincide with one another. For example, when The Simultaneous Fertilization happens, the birth of this is the ‘Hellenic theme’ (107) of The Minotaur, the play the couples are going to see, which is also suggested as being Lefty and Desedemona’s first trip to the theatre in America. The plot of the play foreshadows Cal/lie’s existence, as there’s a distinct parallel between his/herself and Asterius – the half-man/half-bull character of the play. By incorporating the play into the narrative during the first section of the Stephanides family history, it foreshadows the implications of Lefty and Desedemona’s incestuous relationship, and is a warning of what will happen further down the line.
According to Eugenides, what he aimed to achieve in Middlesex was “mythological connections without making the character a myth” (Bedell) -
“I was born twice; first, as a baby girl… and then again, as a teenage boy.” (Middlesex, 3) From just its opening line, Jeffrey Eugenides’s sophomore novel, Middlesex, provides an interesting paradox. The book’s title instantly suggests a biological ‘in-between’ of literally being of a middle-sex, whereas the opening line introduces the issues of gender, birth and self as a binary of being one or the other. This juxtaposition poses an intriguing question of normality at the heart of the narrative. This revelation of Cal’s indeterminate biology isn’t shocking or horrifying, nor is it the cue for reader sympathy; it is revealed with dignity (and slight tongue-in-cheek), and establishes the protagonist’s voice, which is essential to Middlesex’s attempt to be a hybrid text – using a metanarrative structure by mirroring Greek mythology with Cal/lie’s own family heritage, which elicits to a conflicting life of either being the ‘other’ or the ‘in-between’.
Duality is incredibly significant to Middlesex’s narrative structure – modern and myth, Greek and American, male and female, and how they all coincide with one another. For example, when The Simultaneous Fertilization happens, the birth of this is the ‘Hellenic theme’ (107) of The Minotaur, the play the couples are going to see, which is also suggested as being Lefty and Desedemona’s first trip to the theatre in America. The plot of the play foreshadows Cal/lie’s existence, as there’s a distinct parallel between his/herself and Asterius – the half-man/half-bull character of the play. By incorporating the play into the narrative during the first section of the Stephanides family history, it foreshadows the implications of Lefty and Desedemona’s incestuous relationship, and is a warning of what will happen further down the line.
According to Eugenides, what he aimed to achieve in Middlesex was “mythological connections without making the character a myth” (Bedell) -