Shadowhunters and Downworlders: A Mortal Instruments Reader(28)

KENDARE BLAKE

I’ve caused a lot of consternation among fans with the Jace/ Clary sibling plotline. I know this because of the amount of AUGH and ICK that have come my way over time. But isn’t that what we want from a story? For it to make our hair stand on end? For it to make us question our assumptions about what sort of love is acceptable to us, and why?

You can probably tell that I’ve written about this too much already, as evidenced in my language having devolved to “AUGH” and “ICK,” which is why I’m so glad Kendare has swooped in with this articulate essay, rescuing me from any further embarrassment.


BROTHERLY LOVE

JACE, CLARY, AND THE FUNCTION OF TABOO



There’s a reason that stories end at Happily Ever After. Happy couples are boring. Bo-ring. It’s all kissy faces and “honey-bear this” and “snuggle-pie that.” It’s sweet, and deep, and meaningful. And it makes us want to close the book. As readers, we’re drawn in by the struggle, by the drama, by the desires of the characters. There are few things in literature more enthralling to read than the tale of two people who yearn to be together. The great love stories tell us that to be truly engaging, couples should yearn against seemingly insurmountable obstacles. The more a couple has to overcome, the more forbidden the romance, the more we root for them. The young lovers of Romeo and Juliet defied a family feud and married in secret. Jack Twist and Ennis Del Mar fought against societal constraints and shame in Brokeback Mountain. Lancelot and Guinevere overcame the constraints of common sense and decency. In Cassandra Clare’s Mortal Instruments series, Jace Wayland and Clary Fray overcome the taboo of sibling incest, and they do it without ever crossing the gross-out line.





Taboo as Titillation


Taboo (noun): a custom prohibiting or restricting a particular practice or forbidding association with a particular person, place, or thing

When Jace is shown to be Clary’s brother, the two have been falling in love for the better part of a book. The reader has invested in them. But the introduction of incest still should throw up a significant barrier for romantic enjoyment. It should stop us in our tracks, turn us 180 degrees, give us that slimy feeling we get when we remember that time we accidentally watched Flowers in the Attic on TV.

This is not the reader response it evoked. Readers wanted Jace and Clary together anyway. The question is: Why? And the answer lies in the very fact that they aren’t supposed to be.

Everyone loves a good taboo. Tell a person they can’t or shouldn’t do something, and well, you know what happens. As many people as the taboo discourages, it seems to encourage that many more. Even when it’s incest. If you need evidence, just Google “incest stories” and watch the hits roll in.

But what is it about taboo that makes it so appealing? Why are we so much more desperate for Jace and Clary to be together simply because they can’t be? The simple (probably oversimple) answer is human nature. People have a tendency to want what they can’t have and to want to do what people tell them they shouldn’t. It’s the old Pandora’s Box problem. “Don’t open that,” someone says, and instantly, a box you might never have looked twice at becomes much more interesting. Why can’t we open it? What would happen if we did? What’s in there? It’s curiosity, and the need to learn for ourselves, and before we know it, the box is wide open. Or maybe humans just have a deep-seated need for suffering and strife. The impact of taboo is complicated, and mired in layers of psychology.

When we see Jace and Clary struggling with their urge to be together despite knowing that it’s “wrong” and that they shouldn’t feel that way, we identify with it on a basic level. We want to know what is in them. We want to know what would happen if they were together. But the function of taboo when it comes to Jace and Clary’s romance is more complex than just that. Every literary relationship has to have conflict. The incest taboo heightens this conflict, introducing a new dimension that wouldn’t be present if the characters were grappling only with inner demons and neuroses—say, a fear of commitment or a fear of intimacy. The obstacle that Jace and Clary face is outside of themselves, something they believe they cannot change. Incest is no minor taboo. It’s a genetic imperative to avoid disease and defects due to inbreeding. It’s illegal in most countries and carries a hefty prison term, and rules against it have been in place in some shape or form for the entirety of recorded history. Historically, people have been executed for it. It’s a real hurdle, one that can’t be overcome by a heart-to-heart or a good cry.

Okay, so the incest taboo functions as an effective romantic obstacle. But really, it’s not just that incest is forbidden that matters here. It’s the reason that incest is forbidden. It comes down to the nature of love and—prepare to be titillated—the nature of sex.

Sex is like the mother sauce of taboo. So many taboos find roots in sex and manage to grow so many interesting branches. Think about it: Sex in itself is a complicated thing in our culture (and in most), twisted through with guilt and consequences as well as ideals and passion. On one hand it is held as necessary and exalted, something to be celebrated, but on the other it is introduced to us as something whispered about behind closed doors, something denied to us until we are older, wiser, and not biologically related. “You’re going to do it, but not until you’re older.” “You can do it, but not until you’re married.” “You’re doing it, but don’t talk about it!” The limits placed on sex increase our curiosity about it tenfold! And sex wouldn’t be half so appealing if this weren’t the case. Filmmakers, artists, and writers have delighted in breaking down barriers of the sexually and romantically forbidden practically since the invention of film, art, and writing. If sex and love were simple, straightforward concepts, why would we care to explore them, in art or in life? They would be completely uninteresting. And so the incest taboo works to complicate and elevate Jace and Clary’s relationship in this respect as well. The two dance around feelings of what should and shouldn’t be, alternately standing firm against the taboo and giving in to their desires, until it seems that the pair will be doomed to yearn indefinitely. Luckily, they’re granted a last-minute reprieve, but by then the taboo has already done its work, investing the reader in them completely by keeping them apart for so long.