Insensibility and Imagined Objects in Lucy M. Montgomery’s The Blue Castle

This article analyzes The Blue Castle, a novel by Lucy Maud Montgomery, through the lens of recent affect theory, focusing on the concept of “insensibility” and its feminist implications. This article traces Valancy Stirling’s emotional journey from numbness within a constraining patriarchal family to her transformation through her imagined sensual life at her imaginary Blue Castle and her real interactions with two social outcasts, Cissy and Barney. Drawing on contemporary feminist affect theory, particularly the works of Xine Yao, Wendy Lee, and Sara Ahmed, this article argues that Valancy’s cultivation of insensibility functions both as a coping mechanism and a form of resistance against oppressive social and familial expectations of women. Valancy’s detached emotional state paradoxically facilitates personal liberation, allowing her to form meaningful relationships beyond societal norms. Additionally, the article situates Valancy’s emotional detachment within broader discussions of sympathy, biopolitics, and care work, challenging conventional narratives around the gendered emotions and women’s agency in early 20th-century fiction. This critical approach broadens our understanding of Montgomery’s work, positioning The Blue Castle as a significant feminist text that subverts traditional emotional expectations and celebrates the power of self-imagined emotional worlds and insensibility.