ipl-logo

Sexism In The Wide Sargasso Sea

1080 Words5 Pages

“If I was bound to hell let it be hell. No more false heavens. No more damned magic. You hate me and I hate you. We’ll see who hates best (Rhys, p. 170). In the highly revered novel “The Wide Sargasso Sea”, the author Jean Rhys, attempts to illustrate the prevalence of ingrained racism, sexism and white male despotism through a story of lust and tragedy. Likewise, set on a post-Emancipation Proclamation plantation in Jamaica, the audience is initially introduced to the young daughter of the ex-owner, Antoinette. In this, due to her father’s untimely death, her mother’s mental decline and the fact that all of the former slaves who continued to inhabit the plantation deeply despised her family, Antoinette was essentially left to fend for …show more content…

Rochester are apparent through their shared struggles and emotional misgiving. Likewise, considering both of her parental figures were not wholly present, Antoinette suffers great loneliness and feelings of being out of place. In furtherance, along with her father dying at a very young age and being shunned by the former slaves who held an indelible grudge against her family, her mother Annette, grew very cold and distant towards her as a result of her mental issues and grief regarding her ailing son, Pierre, and thus Antoinette was all but abandoned by all except from her housemaid Christophine, who at times acted as a motherly figure. Due her solitude, Antoinette creates a lonely world for herself to exist in, in which a wall is built in order to protect herself from experiences which could mimic her past of pain and …show more content…

Rochester as her housemaid Christophine, is often seen acting as a motherly figure and acts as her protector against Mr. Rochester’s attempts to control and abuse her. In furtherance, although they have a strange relationship, seeing that Christophine was given to her mother as a wedding present, she and Antoinette still share a nurturing relationship which Mr. Rochester simply does not have. In further detail, though, Antoinette still suffers from not having two parental figures, she still has somewhat of a caretaker and “base” to report back to when she needs it. Despite, Antoinette 's lack of two paternal parental figures who deeply care for her, Christophine acts as a pseudo-mother figure who looks after Antoinette, which counters she and Mr. Rochester’s

Show More
Related

  • Genealogical Research Of Andrea Stuart Sugar In The Blood

    963 Words  | 4 Pages

    This book overall is effective on establishing how hard it was to begin a life on the island, how plantations developed and how the slaves were treated. The novel describes how hard it was to go to the island of Barbados and start a new life. Andrea Stuart’s ancestor George Ashby arrived from England on a ship to Barbados. She describes the journey as a hard one because

    Read More

  • When Was The Gruesome Account Of Olaudah Equiano

    405 Words  | 2 Pages

    The gruesome account of Mittelberger aboard one of these ships was similar to the account of Olaudah Equiano, a freed slave. The journey across the Atlantic during the 17th century was one plagued with disease, hunger, and death. The perils of the journey were not restricted to those with white skin or those with black skin. Equiano’s account is filled with confusion since, like many other slaves, he did not know where he was going or why he was going there. As he entered the ship Equiano’s thoughts painted an imagine of a frightened and confused slave.

    Read More

  • Comparison Between 'Caloya And Frederick Douglass Narrative'

    1662 Words  | 7 Pages

    Simms’s “Caloya” and Frederick Douglass’s Narrative both utilize the antagonists, Mingo in “Caloya” and slave owners in Narrative, however, “Caloya” focuses on Mingo’s race and supposed natural tendencies to represent black men as sex hungry, while Narrative focuses on slave owners’ abuse of power to gain sexual favors to represent white men as sexually crude. Through these representations, each author creates an underlying portrayal of slavery: Simms portrays slavery as a necessary system

    Read More

  • Exploitation In Michelle Cliff's Down The Shore

    1526 Words  | 7 Pages

    Michelle Cliff’s short story Down the Shore conspicuously deals with a particularly personal and specific, deeply psychological experience, in order to ultimately sub-textually create a metaphor regarding a wider issue of highly social nature. More specifically, the development of the inter-dependent themes of trauma, exploitation, as well as female vulnerability, which all in the case in question pertain to one single character, also latently extend over to the wider social issue of colonialism and its entailing negative repercussions, in this case as it applies to the Caribbean and the British Empire. The story’s explicit personal factor is developed through the literary techniques of repetition, symbolism, metaphor, as well as slightly warped albeit telling references to a distinct emotional state, while its implicit social factor is suggested via the techniques of allusion, so as to ultimately create a generally greater, undergirding metaphor.

    Read More

  • Summary Of The Novel's Inhuman Traffick

    1011 Words  | 5 Pages

    As the boom from the transatlantic slave trade was being put into a question of universal humanity and morality, millions of Africans were still being sold into a life of victimhood. Amongst those millions were freemen being stripped from their homes, because of their race, in the core and coastal regions of Africa. The Neirsee Incident occurred on, “January 21st, 1828” at a “British owned palm oil house near old Calabar” (Blaufarb and Clarke 71). The Neirsee as it was stopped at the port near the British owned palm oil house, was interrupted by a character name Feraud who “slipped out of old Calabar on the Neirsee”, where the ship was eventually seized after it had, “just loaded its human cargo” (Blaufarb and Clarke 72). The incident had led to innocent British citizens lives being sold into the slave trade.

    Read More

  • Their Eyes Were Watching God Character Analysis

    2253 Words  | 10 Pages

    St. John gets to know her fairly quickly and realizes that she is amazing and beautiful woman. This is why he gets her the job as the governess for Mr. Rochester’s adopted daughter Adele. Jane teaches Adele how to speak English, while at the same time falls madly in love with her father. Who at first glance is not an attractive man by any means. This is a big way that Jane proves herself as a strong and beautiful woman because she never judges a book by its cover.

    Read More

  • A Habit Of Waste By Nalo Hopkinson Summary

    530 Words  | 3 Pages

    The effects of colonialism are intergenerational, this story exposes the raw feelings of victims of colonization and the internalization of racist ideologies that often occurs as a result of Caribbean history being wrongly painted. Conforming to the standards of society is often easier than bearing the challenges associated with being an outlier; however, conformity leads to resentment and hatred. Cynthia chooses to conform to society's standards of white supremacy, which results in her discarding her own body for the figure of a white woman. Unfortunately, Cynthia begins to form a deep hatred for herself and her culture which her parents and strangers are subjected to.

    Read More

  • Olaudah Equiano Literary Devices

    852 Words  | 4 Pages

    People consider a slave ship in the 1700s one of the scariest and most dangerous places on Earth at the time. Equiano describes the wicked conditions of the transatlantic slave trade and its affects on him and his peers. Equiano writes, “One day, when we had a smooth sea and moderate wind, two of my wearied countrymen who were chained together, preferring death to such a life of misery, somehow made through the nettings and jumped into the sea,” (Equiano 173). In these lines Equiano gives the reader an idea of the horrifying events on the ships including the death of his companions. Portraying this to readers helps them empathize with his experiences through the imagery of his work.

    Read More

  • Gender Roles In Charlotte Brontë's Jane Eyre

    1691 Words  | 7 Pages

    Both characters, venturing out of their gender roles, find ways to compliment and figure out who the other person really is, and, in the end, a burgeoning love fully blooms. When examining the gender roles of Mr. Rochester and Jane, both are a blend of each and life seems better when conventional gender roles are forgotten. In Rochester and Jane’s first meeting, the two begin to show their blended gender roles immediately. Rochester is first described as having a “dark face” with “stern features”, with a complexion that seems, “ireful and thwarted” (146).

    Read More

  • Examples Of Courage In Jane Eyre

    769 Words  | 4 Pages

    Rochester is not a guy who is told “no” often. The fact the Jane was able to accomplish that, really shows how strong and powerful Jane truly

    Read More

  • The Miller's Daughter Belonging Analysis

    1454 Words  | 6 Pages

    The sense of belonging to a place seems to be important for people as an assistance to find their own identity that will define them as a person. In most of cases, people belong to one place, but for those who find themselves trapped in an uncertainty of whether they belong to a place or to another this search of identity becomes a much more complicated task. It is then when racial prejudices arouse, but they emerge not only from the person who is looking for his identity, but from those surrounding him. Each of them has grown up in a manner that will determine the way in which they see the rest of people, and because not all of them have grown up in the same way, some differences and controversies will show up at the time of determining where

    Read More

  • Point Of View Of Olaudah Equiano On Slavery

    1117 Words  | 5 Pages

    The primary source, “Olaudah Equiano on Slavery (1789)” reveals to its audience a first point of view of a child who undergoes the process of enslavement. Gustavus Vassa or better known as Olaudah Equiano was a mere child when he was abducted from his village; he describes his journey to the unknown with a flood of different emotions “[A]stonishment, which was soon converted into terror… [E]veryone of their countenances expressing dejection and sorrow” indicates how African people were not fully aware of the situation of the outside world. Therefore, it was valid to say that Africans on board of a slave ship visualize the worse possible outcome, which in Equiano’s case was the anxiety of being devour by the white men.

    Read More

  • Sugar In The Blood Summary

    1413 Words  | 6 Pages

    The book expounds more information on race information of the slaves in the land of the Caribbean. It further clarifies on the sexual relationship that existed between the masters who owned the slaves and enslaved women of color in the Caribbean Island. The author gives more light on the sexual assaults against young black girls had to undergo while in the hands of white planters who owned large track on sugar plantation on the Island, unlike the white who lived freely. Though Stuart is girl barely out of childhood age, she sees the glaring proof of affection as well as obligation on her part do something concerning dehumanization of women through sexual assault. Stuart knows pretty well that she can hardly speak of dedication or desire or choice in such unequal situation may be living in a hell of sexual assaults.

    Read More

  • Thornfield's Influence On Jane Eyre

    1044 Words  | 5 Pages

    Rochester was a major influence on Jane as this was a critical time she was maturing, yet she did not let him get in the way of her work. The work that was expected of her what always her top priority, Rochester was her second. “I believe he is of mine;—I am sure he is,—I feel akin to him,—I understand the language of his countenance and movements: though rank and wealth sever us widely, I have something in my brain and heart, in my blood and nerves, that assimilates me mentally to him” (Bronte 266). The relationship between Rochester and Jane was undeniable.

    Read More

  • Theme Of Marriage In Jane Eyre

    805 Words  | 4 Pages

    - Edward is an economically independent man with a favorable status and influential connections still looking for a profitable match. Jane will be the one in charge to unmask him to the audience: “I saw he was going to marry her [Blanche Ingram] for family, perhaps political reasons, because her rank and connections suited him” (Brontë 205) This manner of conduct converts Mr. Rochester from a hero into a villain, a perpetrator and “his project of

    Read More

More about Sexism In The Wide Sargasso Sea

Open Document