I thought this short story was appropriately summed up by the narrator himself when his sister said "oh for you, it was a spectacle" (pg. 137). "A White Night" seemed concerned with the woman as an object. The environment of the story especially contributes to this objectifying; the narrator and his fellow travelers witness an elaborate, sacrificial tableau in which a woman is tortured (?). The fact that the woman serves as the center of the tableau and there are religious men (most likely white and celibate men), performing this act further prescribes the woman to her role as merely an object. What I found most striking was how the three travelers were more enthused about simply watching the woman be tortured/sacrificed instead of trying to assist her. What was it about the almost surrealistic scene that prevented the travelers from helping her? Perhaps it was because the narrator perceived it as "an acquiescence in a rather splendid crime" (pg. 137) more so than a spectacle. What was it that made the crime so splendid?
I was also surprised that this "sacrifice" (if that is the best word to describe it) involved the woman wearing white. If she committed a crime, I would've thought that the woman would be clothed in red or maybe black. The white represents purity or innocence; unless this sacrifice was some type of religious honor killing (which is definitely a possibility), I would think that the woman would wear a color other than white. The mystery and surreality of this story also represents, in itself, the woman. Her identity is withheld as is the reason for the spectacle taking place.
I completely agree with the idea that the woman played the role of an object in the ritual. Yet something that I found striking is that the character of Cameron did not seem to see his sister in this way; "the young person's passion for the strange bore her robustly through the risks and discomforts of those wilder districts which at best, perhaps are hardly woman's ground". Though he is acknowledging her as being a woman he seems to admire her adventurous spirit and looks past this matter.
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