Hysteria: A Wider Perspective...

19^th Century England was a time when men were in power and women were looked down upon. It was a time when men would get whatever they pleased and women were denied even their most basic rights, for example the right to education and the right to vote. The movie, ‘Hysteria’, is an account of the invention of a particular appliance that brought with it the emergence of women’s rights in the Victorian era. The movie is told through the eyes of a man by the name of Dr.Mortimer Granville. Dr. Mortimer is an ambitious medical doctor who wanted to use scientific methods to cure illnesses, in contrast to the old, orthodox ways of his colleagues. In this regard, he had a falling out with many people and thus his career was in jeopardy. It was at this time that he was accepted as an assistant to Dr. Robert Dalrymple, who specialized in treating womens' nervous disorders, particularly hysteria.

At the time, hysteria was regarded as one of the most serious of diseases, and it affected only women. It was described as excessive emotional outburst, causing women to lose self-control and behave uncontrollably. It was thought to be caused by disturbances of the uterus and many women were forced to have their uterus removed. Dr. Dalrymple, however, had a different way of combating this illness. His treatment considered rubbing or massaging the affected women between their legs such that their blood flow to their uterus increased, and this happened till the women achieved ‘hysterical paroxysm’ and their symptoms waned. Now Dr.Dalrymple had two daughters, Emily and Charlotte, and while Emily was a simple, educated girl studying phrenology, Charlotte was diagnosed with hysteria. She, however, dedicated her life to the poor and needy. Charlotte wanted to raise the standards of women in society. It was her dream that women should have equal rights as men, because at the time women were being suppressed by men and they were too scared to fight back for anything.

As time passed and Mortimer continued Dr.Dalrymple’s method of treatment, his hand became numb from all the massage he was doing and he couldn’t do any effective treatments. He was engaged to Emily Dalrymple at the time and his wedding had to be called off because Dr.Dalrymple fired him for his ineffective treatments. With no job and his hand still numb and hurt, Mortimer went to consult his good friend and well-wisher, Edmund St. John-Smythe, who happened to be toying with an electrically powered duster. Mortimer realized that when he put the duster to his hand, he instantly felt better and the pain reduced. He tweaked the device a little bit and as a result, he invented the vibrator.

It so happened that on the day he was to marry Emily, Charlotte was put in jail.

Mortimer defended her in court, saying that hysteria is a fiction. He said that it is nothing but a ‘diagnosis for women without opportunity, forced to spend their lives attending to domestic chores and selfish, prudish husbands who are unwilling or unable to make love to them properly or often enough’. From a sociological perspective, hysteria was a condition made up by the powerful to keep a check on the non-powerful. It was perhaps a way for men to make sure they had power and control over women. Francis Bacon once said, ‘Knowledge is power’. Perhaps this was true here because common knowledge of the 19^th Century said that hysteria was a real medical condition when in reality, it wasn’t. Women were being looked down upon for something that didn’t even exist. Such was society in the late 1880s.

After having successfully defended Charlotte in court, Mortimer realized that he was falling in love with her, for he felt that she was a woman like no other. By then, his invention had become so popular that Mortimer was becoming a very rich man. He, therefore, gave her the 2000 pounds she needed to help in the education of the poor children. In this way, Charlotte Darlymple was able to help play a part in the upliftment of women and lower class people in the Victorian era.

Apart from portraying the invention of a self-pleasuring tool for women, 'Hysteria' is also a social commentary on the class and gender roles of the era, exemplified in the binary opposite personalities of Dr. Dalrymple's daughters, Emily and Charlotte. Today, hysteria is not considered a medical ailment any longer. One can attribute this to Herbert Spencer's theory of 'Social Darwinism', saying that the notion of hysteria being a disease did not fit the ever-changing society. Today, it is nothing but a myth.