Florence is almost sent into hysterics when she touches a knife but the "why" is never explained. Was a scene explaining this deleted?
shareHugh Grant mentioned it earlier in the film, but with no explanation. Just one of those things (like her fear of running out of potato salad).
shareShe was a highly strung nutcase
shareI think it had to do with the injury that ended her piano career (which was promising before the injury and syphilis). Maybe she stumbled and injured her hand by falling on a sharp object?
shareDon't you think it has something to do with her syphilis. She's had it since she was 18 and lived with it for 50 years. All her eccentricities are probably linked to psychological problems that came with the disease... and so was the nerve damage, I would think.
shareNot sure of course. Just a theory I think is funny. I think her hand injury was unrelated according to wiki. In the movie the doctor called it something I didn't quite catch though.
And yeah it's an eccentricity but I don't think you can blame all of them on syphilis.
The hand injury was related to a chancre, the initial stage of syphilis. It's a painless but awful looking sore, generally large. In her case, going by the conversation with the doctor, the chancre had appeared on Florence's hand, leading to some sort of tissue damage and her inability to play the piano thereafter.
shareYou may have a point about the syphilis condition. I noticed Cosme assures her that his kitchen knife is sheathed???
shareMy impression of her fear of knives, or anything "pointy," was... well, Freudian. The doctor who visits her mentions the "five-year rule" to Bayfield in regards to their abstinence (with each other), but I got the feeling that Jenkins - at least, in the film - didn't have sex with Bayfield not solely because of the disease, but because her first marriage basically scarred her. She was terrified of sex.
Let that kind of neurosis percolate for a few decades, and boom, pointy objects freak her out.
http://greens-end.myminicity.com
I watched a documentary about her life. She was extremely superstitious, particularly about sharp and/or pointy things. If a friend gave her a gift with a sharp edge, it was refused because it could "sever their friendship". Pointed objects were an omen signifying that she might be stabbed or ki!led in the near future (especially if the pointed object pricked her finger or something similar). Apparently during FFJ's fittings with her dressmakers, no one was allowed to make a sound.
The documentary is on Youtube if you're interested.
"Oh what a falling off was there"... (Hamlet)
There are a lot of superstitions when it comes to Bridal Showers. You don't give someone a knife set because it is bad luck. (There is a way to offset it-- the recipient gives the giver a coin to effectively "buy" the gift from them.)
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Never say never...
Knowing that the real Florence was superstitious is helpful. That was probably the major reason for her aversion to sharp instruments.
shareI don't know but I hate them too.
share