Narrative Twists
Spiraling Time and Projected Identities in the Hair of Vertigo ’s Madeleine
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 12587635 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Alison Criddle (Freddie Mac (United States), corresponding author) |
| Year | 2018 |
| Volume | 22 |
| Issue | 6 |
| Pages | 677-697 |
| Publication date | 2018-11-02 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | No |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Fashion Theory (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 1362-704X • E-ISSN: 1751-7419 |
| Publisher | Routledge (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1080/1362704x.2018.1533344 |
| OpenAlex | W2916955696 |
| Language | EN |
| References cited | 8 |
This article explores the ways in which hair entwines memory, identity and character to establish multiple modes of consuming Alfred Hitchcock’s Vertigo (1958). As the female protagonist of Vertigo, the character of Madeleine Elster, with her recognizable, oft-cited icy white-blonde chignon, is a projected identity staged as fantasy. Threaded across a dizzying narrative, the twisted spiral of hair forms a lens for viewing and reading multiple identities, configurations, actions and endless interpretation. From Hitchcock’s misty, dreamy San Francisco to Vertigo’s origins as a Parisian detective novel, to Marcel Proust’s madeleine cake via the biblical Mary Magdalene by way of Kristevan literary analysis, and Chris Marker’s movie-homage, Madeleine’s hair is both portal and projection through which to fall into a complex sensory encounter that traces the moving image as transposed into written word
Aesthetics · Art · Literature · Narrative · Vertigo · Visual arts · Cultural History and Identity Formation · Medicine · Renaissance Literature and Culture · Spanish Literature and Culture Studies
| Citation velocity | historical |
|---|---|
| Highly cited | No |