ABSTRACT Skin is a material surface for writing, a figure for interpersonal touching, and a medium for thinking about the self. In the medieval tradition of the Charter of Christ and theatrical costumes, actors playing Christ sometimes wore a white leather skin-suit to simulate the naked flesh. The putting on of the leather skin-suit is an act of reception that evokes Christ as a crucified parchment on the cross. This article reads the white leather skin-suit through Didier Anzieu’s psychoanalytic theory of the Skin Ego. The author examines select North American early modern and modern traditions of religious theaterand poetry that deploy the tropes of the Charter of Christ and the leather skin-suit. Finally, Kao reads Emily Dickinson’s poetry, in which medievalism often operates as an interface of reception, as well as an interpersonated performance. The poem’s medievalism thereby shapes an interface of reception moving beyond individual interpellation to collective implication.
Wan-Chuan Kao (Mon,) studied this question.