Jean Rhys's Wide Sargasso Sea

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Jean Rhys's Wide Sargasso Sea
Norton Critical Ediction. NY Norton, 1999.

• Creole Identities,
• and Racial/Gender Relations between Antoinette
  Rochester

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Outline

• Antoinettes personality and the causes for it
• Antoinettes personality
• Annette a) The Creole Identities of Annette b)
  Annette as a Woman c) madness ? GenderRace
• Antoinette a) loss of mother b) as a creole 3)
  convent
• The problems in Rochester and Antoinettes
  marriage
• Race Gender marriage
• Good moments
• Causes a) cultural difference 2) Rs racial
  prejudice 3) Rs self-centeredness 4) the
  letter 5) As sense of doom 6) Cs role

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WSS Settings

• Part I (Martinique), Jamaica Coulibri estate,
  near Spanish TownPart II Granbois, Dominica,
• Part III Great House England

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Rhys on Jane Eyre

• "The creole in Charlotte Bronte's novel is a lay
  figure -- repulsive which does not matter, and
  not once alive which does.  .  . . For me . .  .
  she must be right on stage.  She must be at least
  plausible with a past, the reason why Mr.
  Rochester treats her so abominably and feels
  justified, and the reason why he thinks she is
  mad and why of course she goes mad, even the
  reason why she tries to set everything on fire,
  and eventually succeeds.  . . " (Gregg 82
  emphases added)

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Central Questions

• How does Rhys characterize Antoinette? What are
  the causes for her personalities?
• Mother-daughter relationship
• Her identity as a Creole and her childhood
  experience
• Convent education
• How does she explain the problems between
  Antoinette and Rochester?
• their socio-historical context19th Century
  Victorian/Colonial world? ? Race Gender
• Anything we can related to?

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Background Before and after the Emancipation

• Backgrounds on Race I. white masters, New Old
• Old Masters death of Mr. Lutrell and Mr. Cosway
• New masters after the Emancipation of slaves p.
  15
• Mr. Mason 19, 21

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Background (2) Before and after the Emancipation

• Post-Emancipation Problems
• Recompensation,
• Importation of contract laborers
• Annettes distrust of Christophine, Godfry, and
  Sass leaving p. 12
• Riot The presentation of the black mob p. 23, 25

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Antoinettes personality 5 examples

• Childhood e.g. the horse p. 10 garden 13 16
• recurrent dreams pp. 15, 27, 36
• Attempt to turn down the marriage p. 46
• the two rats the moon p. 49
• death impulse p. 54
• ?Insecure in lack of a firm sense of identity
  (lack of love, fear of others and societys
  criticism, feeling excluded.)
• ? Fatalistic (fear of madness as a hereditary
  trait) ? childhood as a creole woman

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Creole Womens Positions Annette

• Annette 1) multiple alienations of the creole
• from the white people in the Spanish town (9
  17)because she is Creole, from Martinique and
  poor
• -- from the blacks (they) because she is
  former slave-owner and poor pp. 10, 11
• -- both Annette and Antoinetteseen as white
  cockroaches (13)/white nigger (14)

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Creole Womens Positions Annette

• Annette -- 2) As a woman
• Cosway a womanizer calls Daniels mother sly
  boots p. 74 halfway house p.57
• widowed
• Antoinette (solitary life) ?? Antoinette (planned
  and hoped) p. 10
• -- marooned her son 11
• -- borrow a horse from the new Lutrelles? gay
  and a good dancer
• Mason does not understand the racial relationship
  (19, 21)

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Creole Womens Positions Annette

• Annette -- 3) as a creole woman
• Why does she care so much about the parorot CoCo?
  25
• The climax in Part I are the black people just a
  violent and insensible mob? (p. 26)
• Antoinettes account of what happened to Annette
  78 80-81

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Creole Womens Positions Antoinette

• Antoinette (1) loss of motherly love
• Her love rejected by Annette p. 11 13,
• The mother cares more about Pierre 16
• Annette ashamed of her 15  
• Being pushed away after her madness pp. 28-29
• missing her mother in the convent 34
• The mothers death 36

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Creole Womens Positions Antoinette

• Antoinette (2) Race Relations
• Christophine helpful but fearful
• like a substitute mother
• feared by Antoinette 18 -- Combination of
  Catholicism and voodoo
• (1. Antoinettes seeking for help p. 67, 68, 70
• 2. Put in jail once and may still be. P. 86)

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Creole Womens Positions Antoinette

• Antoinette and Tia
• friendship (13-14),
• divided by racial differences (27)
• The boy and the girl 29-30

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Creole Womens Positions Antoinette

• Antoinette (3) Gender and the Convent
• the second refuge in the convent p. 32 33 34

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Creole Womens Positions Antoinette ( Annette)

• Imagery Garden
• the biblical myth of the garden--(11)
• ? associated with snake and forest
• Imagery Mirror
• Annette 10 p. Antoinette Tia the convent

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Part II What causes the problems between
Antoinette Rochester? Is Rochester completely
to blame?
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Sargasso Sea Race and Gender

• Why is the marriage between Rochester and Bertha
  unhappy?
• Why is Bertha mad? Beast, madness in the family,
  driven mad, or not really mad?
• 
  Man Women Man
• Women
• 
  Obeah woman

Race White Creole --Black
Gender Marriage Inheritance system
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Gender/Race Relationships among the Character
Spanish Town Whites p. 17
Father E. Rochester
Mr. Cosway,
The Masons Richard
Pierre Daniel
Godfry Sass Myra
Aunt Cora
p. 18, 68-69

• Antoinette

Annette
Christophine
Amelia
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Good Moments in their relationship

• Rochesters sense of peace in nature P. 41
• Arrival at Granbois p. 42
• The first night 49-50

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Gender/Race Relations Women

• Unequal Relationships in Marriage
• (about Masons marriage p. 17)
• Gender Rochesters Marriage and Inheritance p.
  41 69
• Dear Father letters p. 39
• But there are other factors . . .

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What causes the problems between Antoinette
Rochester

• 1. (Race) Cultural differences
• A. her limited understanding of the world --
• -- p. 42 Oh England, England, 66-67
• -- p. 47 her Paris Is it true,' she said,
  that England is like a dream?
• B. his illness and discomfort p. 40, 41, blanks
  in his mind 45 p. 55 insecure

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Part II Causes for the conflicts between
Rochester and Antoinette

• 2. (Race) Rochesters prejudice and racial
  superiority p. 39 p. 43
• ? Rochesters connection with the priest
• the priest's ruined house--Pere Lilievre--Pere
  Labat pp. 62-63 83
• 3. Gender Rochester's self-centeredness,
  possessiveness and pretentiousness
• Agreed to everything 39 not yet
• not love her perform and hide things p. 45, 61
• P. 55 watch her die many times
• Turning Antoinette into Bertha pp. 68, 81

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Part II Causes for the conflicts between
Rochester and Antoinette (2)

• 4. Race Gender the letter from Daniel
  
• Rochester's suspicion of Antoinettes
  madness (pp. 56 - )
• 5. Race Gender Antoinette's temperament--sense
  of doom and insecurity
• (6. Race Gender 7. Antoinettes seeking for
  help from Christophine)

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For next time The Turning Point

• Are Christophines suggestions practical? pp. 65
  - What stops her from being helpful?
• Would their marriage have been saved without the
  voodoo?