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The human face consists of three dimensions: (1) the visible, static sur-face, (2) the mobile dimension, which communicates thoughts, emotions, and states of mind, and (3) the invisible dimension, the face as pars-pro-toto for the whole person who owns the face. In this latter sense, the human face is at the center of Emmanuel Levinas’ theory of ethics: We encounter each other face-to-face, he argues, and it is the other’s face that calls for my ethical response to the holiness of his/her wholeness and essence. The primary ethical imperative is: “Thou shalt not kill.” When we encounter a facially disfigured person, we usually fail to respond ethically because we concentrate on the disfigurement. The second dimension, as a result of the disfigurement, is often impaired and thus incapable of communicating in such a way that we can “read” the face. With our gaze fixed on the disfigured part of the face, we lose sight of the person as a whole. Metaphorically speaking, we could even say that we “kill” the person. Levinas conceives of the other’s face not in its plastic manifestation. But the encounter with the other does at first take place as embodiment. According to Merleau-Ponty, this encounter is by definition interactive and dialogical. In Willa Cather’s short story “The Profile,” young beautiful Virginia marries a portrait painter after he has finished her portrait in profile. The left side of her face is severely disfigured because of a burn. Her husband is waiting impatiently for her to talk about “it” and the suffering it must cause her in order to “heal” her with his love, but she behaves as if it did not exist and even likes to dress extravagantly. In the following analysis of the short story, it will be illustrated how the husband fails to respond to his wife’s face’s invitation to interact with it and get in touch with the wholeness of her person that it stands for. Instead, he reduces her to the disfigurement. When he finally names the scar, he metaphorically “kills” her, as well as their marriage.

Stuck with the Sur-face: An Ethical Approach to Facial Disfigurement in Willa Cather’s “The Profile”