Wide Sargasso Sea

10 Pages 2456 Words

Jean Rhys wrote “Wide Sargasso Sea” in 1966. It tells the story of a young woman, Antoinette Conway. When her family is ruined, as many plantation owners were, by the abolition of slavery, she is left to grow up entirely neglected, unacceptable both to the white community and to the former slaves living around the plantation. It is only when the family fortunes are restored after her mother makes a second marriage that she attends school. This upbringing and her disastrous relationship with her stepfather sow the seeds of Antoinette’s strangeness, but it is not until her own marriage to deeply conventional Englishman that his attempts to force her to live more like a young society woman begin to turn eccentricity into madness. She is completely trapped, for the law of the time meant that she would have no right to any property if she should leave him – it all passed absolutely to him on their marriage.

Antoinette’s narrative in Part Three works to humanize our conception of her. Given the emptiness of Antoinette’s days and her isolation from the outside world, she necessarily loses track of time and place. Otherwise, Antoinette seems to be lucid, as she questions the reasons for her captivity and abuse. The reader is able to see firsthand the horror of her entrapment, which calls to mind the slavery in her native land.

Two of the major themes in the book are slavery and British colonialism. The emancipation of slavery had already taken effect. Slaves were now free, however, they still labored for a wage. This stipend, unfortunately, was not being given to the slaves. Because of this, the now freed slaves were very angry with the white people, and some were uprising against this injustice.

Slavery--although a thing of the recent past in Antoinette's experience--taints everything. Entire estates are in decay, and the creole landowners are suspicious and live in fear. The specter of slavery and entrapme...