The tradition of metamorphosis in literature has been prevalent throughout written history and has been a key element in the
mythology of ancient civilizations ranging from the Phoenicians and Egyptians,
to the Greek and Romans. Perhaps the most famous story involving the
metamorphosis of the main character from the great Roman Empire era is The Golden Ass by Apuleius. The story
follows Lucius, a man driven by his curiosity and voracious desire to see and
practice magic. Inevitably, his snoopiness gets him into trouble when, trying
to replicate the magic of Milo’s wife, he turns himself into an ass, or donkey.
The remainder of the story revolves around Lucius’ quest for his old self while
being punished (rightfully and wrongly) for his past misdeeds and eventually
returns to his old body when he joins the cult of Isis, an ancient Egyptian goddess
of nature and magic and the symbol of the ideal mother. Apuleius uses
metamorphosis in the traditional sense as a means to teach an over-arching
moral and lesson to the reader. On the other hand, up to now at least, it
appears as if the metamorphosis used in Cock
and Bull by Will Self is a metaphor for the discovery of one’s sexuality.
The protagonist, Carol, is a young woman who has near to no sexual experience
when she first sleeps with Dan, her husband to be within a year. Already not
able to completely satisfy his newlywed (‘three sandpapery strokes’ is all he
needs to cum), Dan plunges into alcoholism causing him to constantly have a ‘brewer’s
droop’, therefore unable to even perform for a measly ten seconds. As a result,
spurred by the sexual mentoring of her quasi-lesbian friend, Beverley, Carol
learns how to satisfy her newly found sexual urges. It is at this point that
Carol begins her metamorphosis, but unlike Lucius, it is not her entire body
that is transforming, but only her reproductive organ, her vagina. The ‘gristly
frond’ that continuously keeps growing is described as being like a testicle.
She begins to feel ‘with her probing digit, actually feel some kind of structure to the frond; some
internal viscosities of its own that suggested that it was not simply a
raggle-taggle end of gristle.’ Sentences such as this one lead me to believe
that Carol is undergoing a change in sexuality, in parallel with the
increasingly ‘manly’ point of view she has towards her sexuality. Just like men
who pride themselves in the power of their penis, Carol begins to be enthralled
by ‘the access of power’ found by masturbating. This is the same sense of power
that young teenage boys experience when first discovering that the rubbing of
their penis brings pleasure which leads to the abuse of the power of
masturbation. Likewise, Carol begins to masturbate on a daily basis, a
replacement for the sex that her husband is supposed to satisfy her with.
It is
definite that Self’s use of metamorphosis breaks away from the traditional use,
that of teaching a moral through the loss of a character’s ordinary body.
Instead, I believe that he is using metamorphosis as a means to critique the
differences found in the male and female social norms of sexuality. Beverley
already appears to be Carol’s mentor as she begins to masturbate on a daily
basis, a stereotype for young men but not for young women. It’ll be interesting
to see to what extent Will Self pursues this metamorphosis.
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