In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

  • Erectile Dysfunction and the Post War Novel: The Sun Also Rises and In Country
  • Elizabeth Klaver (bio)

I have given my numb young dick for democracy.

Ron Kovic Born on the Fourth of July

In the literature of war’s aftermath, very often the dysfunctional soldier coming home is a subject of considerable interest, whether the soldier’s hardship lies in the body’s disability or in the mind’s emotional turmoil, conditions which are both activated in Ron Kovic’s memoir, Born on the Fourth of July, for instance. The focal point of the hardship frequently centers on problems of male sexuality, more specifically on the difficulties of impotence and erectile dysfunction and the associated strife of a contested masculinity. Though often interpreted as a trope for the emasculating effect of war, the dysfunctional penis that novelists confront is a real medical condition. Based on his treatment of veterans of the Great War, prominent physician and psychiatrist Wilhelm Stekel, in his monumental book Impotence in the Male, estimated that hundreds of thousands of soldiers were rendered impotent as a result of the war, though one must keep in mind that his definition of impotence is very broad.1 The medical community has continued to work on the problem of male sexual dysfunction, war related and otherwise, to the present day.

Though coming from different traditions, literary discourse and medical discourse can meet in the arena of a medicalized culture, where both disciplines attempt to mediate the war-torn penis. I’m particularly interested in the novelist’s part in this project, which is to make available the medicalized culture in which medical discourse with all its foibles, successes, and failures becomes readable. Indeed, I want to examine how literary discourse navigates medical discourse [End Page 86] with respect to war-related erectile dysfunction in two post war novels: Ernest Hemingway’s The Sun Also Rises and Bobbie Ann Mason’s In Country. These novels appeared at a considerable time span from each other, 1926 and 1985 respectively, one after the Great War, the other after the Vietnam War. Medical discourse about erectile dysfunction changed during this time span and continues to change, as I discuss below. The Sun Also Rises and In Country both reflect and contest their contemporaneous medical discourses, though often in unexpected ways.

The characters in question are Jake Barnes of The Sun Also Rises and the minor figure of Tom, and to some extent Emmett, of In Country. Throughout the course of the novels, the men suffer from erectile dysfunction, Jake as a result of a mutilated penis obtained on the Italian Front and Tom as the apparent effect of some Vietnam-related psychological problem. Two methods of literary analysis immediately spring to mind as possible avenues for unpacking this subject: disability studies and trauma studies. In terms of disability studies, there is some question as to whether erectile dysfunction should be considered a disability. On the one hand, according to the medical model of disability, the dysfunctional penis would be considered an impairment to the body and a reduction in the quality of life; on the other hand, according to the social model of disability, the fact of penile impairment does not necessarily point to the inability of an individual to function well in everyday life.2 On a more practical level, given the rates of erectile dysfunction today, disability legislation and services would have to be redrawn drastically to deal with the sufferers of erectile dysfunction.

Since the focus of trauma studies tends to be on memory and the reliving of particularly terrifying experiences, whether individual and/or cultural, trauma studies would work well as a methodology for In Country, less so for The Sun Also Rises. This is because Jake’s injury is a medical trauma and an anatomical impairment. It is a constant, physical reminder, not a memory, though it certainly occupies his thoughts and has psychological and behavioral consequences. In terms of the sort of erectile dysfunction that Tom experiences, memories of the Vietnam War or some other traumatizing event may be responsible for his condition, though such a distinct cause is not entirely made clear in the novel, as...

pdf

Share