Page 15

As we've been reading Wide Sargasso Sea, I've slowly been trying to put the pieces of Antoinette together, to figure her out. She seems like one of the most ambiguous characters that I've read this semester, but I think this uncertainty about her personality is something that Jean Rhys is purposely trying to achieve. I feel as confused as Rochester as I struggle to figure out how Part One Antoinette becomes Part Two Antoinette.

At the between-parts break, I felt a huge disconnect between the child Antoinette as I thought I knew her, and the young woman Antoinette who seems even more confusing and distant once we start seeing her through Mr. Rochester's perspective. In part one, Antoinette is confused and conflicted over her place in the complex social world that she is born into. She craves attention from her mother and when her mother pushes her away, she finds a maternal figure in Christophene. There isn't an important male figure in her life (Mr. Mason certainly doesn't fit the bill). She identifies more with black Caribbean culture than white Creole, and not to mention, English culture (exemplified best by the looking-glass analogy we looked so closely at in class).

Then in part two, we learn that she's been married off thanks to Mr. Mason's son and with a laaarge dowry that drew the interest of Rochester. Antoinette loves the feeling of security that Rochester provides ("She'd liked that -- to be told 'you are safe.'") and the happiness she feels at finally being accepted and seemingly loved by someone who can make her feel safe. In this way, she still seems kind of childish or really reminiscent of herself in part one. A lot of her doubts and insecurities from her childhood are still there as a young married woman, and Rochester is able to allay those old uncomfortable feelings, if only for a while.

Antoinette's cultural identity, meanwhile, does seem to have changed from part one. While Rochester sees that Antoinette is obviously comfortable with the black people of the island, Antoinette also seems much more comfortable ordering them around and establishing a definite distance between her and them, as servant and mistress (it's kind of like a role-reversal of her childhood, where she is now wealthier than they are and holds more power over them -- and she seems to be enjoying that turn of the tables, almost in a childish way?). When Antoinette describes Christophene, of all people, to herself as an "ignorant, obstinate old negro woman, who is not certain if there is such a place as England,"  it's apparent that while Antoinette still loves Christophene dearly, the racial tensions that had been confusing her as she grew up have finally forced Antoinette to make a kind of decision about which culture she most identifies with. She seems to be leaning toward not Creole, but English culture, especially with Rochester playing such a big role in her life in part two. She asks Rochester about England a lot in the beginning of part two, and when Christophene advises her to leave Rochester and go to Martinique later on in part two, Antoinette says she would much rather go to England.

As I continue to read part two of the novel, I'm still piecing together Antoinette's dynamic personality because it only seems to change further (but also remain the same) as the book goes on.



-----------------------------------
In case anyone is wondering about the title of this post, page 15 in my version of the novel is the page that marks the part-one-to-part-two transition.