The Madwoman in the Attic of Labuwangi: Couperus and Colonial Gothic

Abstract

In chapter 3, Rosemarie Buikema analyzes the Dutch colonial novel De stille kracht (The Hidden Force) (1900), by Louis Couperus. It evaluates the plethora of Gothic machinations in the novel not only against the background of the changing Dutch colonial policy of around 1900 but also in relation to the corresponding specific kinship relations as they were engrained in notions of masculinity, femininity and European identity at the time. The downfall of both colonial European power and the colonial patriarchal family in the novel pivots upon the position of the colonial woman who with her arrival drove the indigenous wife off the colonial stage.