Wide Sargasso Sea LitChart

LitCharts The best way to study, teach, and learn about books.
Wide Sargasso Sea

Jean Rhys came of age and had already begun her career as a
INTR
INTRO
O writer during the later years of an era of feminism known as
“first-wave” feminism in the United States and Europe. This
BRIEF BIOGRAPHY OF JEAN RHYS movement sought to overturn de jure, or officially mandated,
Ella Gwendolyn Rees Williams was born in 1890 to a Welsh gender-based inequalities, particularly restrictions on women's
doctor and a Creole woman of Scots ancestry on the Caribbean voting and property rights. Many of the reasons for Annette’s
island of Dominica, then a British colony. At sixteen she was and then Antoinette’s unhappiness in Wide Sargasso Sea are a
sent to England, where she studied to be an actress. Williams direct result of these inequalities, and are discussed at length
struggled in her studies with being ostracized for her between Antoinette and Christophine, who bemoans the legal
Caribbean heritage and accent, and eventually was taken out of constraints that prevent Antoinette from retaining the financial
school because her instructors deemed her unable to rid independence to leave her husband. By the time Wide Sargasso
herself of the West Indies accent that would prevent her from Sea was published, second-wave feminism, or women’s
gaining significant stage roles. She then subsisted in Britain for liberation, had already begun in the United States and was
nearly a decade on small acting roles and chorus girl parts, with spreading to the U.K. and the rest of Europe. Among many
brief stints in nude modeling and prostitution. After suffering a other issues, second-wave feminism brought into the spotlight
near-fatal abortion paid for by a former lover, Williams began de facto, or unofficial, inequalities, such as domestic gender
to write. In 1924, in the midst of a tumultuous marriage, Ella roles and standards of beauty, which are also thematic subjects
Williams made the acquaintance of the acclaimed English of Wide Sargasso Sea.
novelist Ford Madox Ford. Ford took her in as both a protégé
and mistress, suggesting that she change her name to Jean
RELATED LITERARY WORKS
Rhys, and eventually facilitating the publication of her work,
which often dealt with her own experiences of alienation as a Wide Sargasso Sea is a rewriting of Charlotte Bronte’s classic
woman at the hands of unjust lovers and an exclusionary nineteenth-century gothic bildungsroman Jane Eyre (1847). In
society. The three major novels that Rhys produced during the Bronte’s novel, Bertha Mason is more monster than human,
1930’s—After Leaving Mr. Mackenzie, Voyage in the Dark, and locked away for a decade in secret, in the attic of Thornfield
Good Morning, Midnight—were met with mixed critical success. Hall, where her demonic laughter and “savage” snarls disturb
It wasn’t until 1966, after several decades of anonymity marked the residents of the mansion, including Jane Eyre. Evidence of
by two more failed marriages and an ever deepening problem her existence enters the novel through unexplained violent
with alcoholism, that Rhys published Wide Sargasso Sea and was incidents, including the attack on Richard Mason that is
rocketed to literary fame. Wide Sargasso Sea remains her most included in Part Three of Wide Sargasso Sea. Her identity is only
acclaimed work, having garnered her several major literary revealed when Rochester attempts to marry Jane Eyre,
awards and a place in the canon of postcolonial literature in without ever having mentioned that he is already married to
English. Rhys died in 1979, in Exeter, UK. Bertha. Rather than being told from her point of view, Bertha
Mason’s story in Jane Eyre is given only in terms of Mr.
Rochester’s history and psychology. Her violent suicide, which
HISTORICAL CONTEXT
ends Wide Sargasso Sea, merely clears the way for Jane and
Wide Sargasso Sea, which takes place in colonized Jamaica and Rochester to marry in Bronte’s novel. Other major postcolonial
deals with problems of identity and inequality that arose as a novels published in the same period as Wide Sargasso Sea
result of French and British colonization in the Caribbean, was include Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart (1958), which deals
completed and published during an era of widespread with the influence of British colonialism on a nineteenth-
decolonization. The 1960‘s in particular saw many important century Nigerian village, Ngugi wa Thiong’o’s Weep Not, Child
gains in political independence among the British colonies in (1964), which deals with the Mau Mau Uprising against British
the Caribbean, including Jamaica and Trinidad & Tobago, which rule in Kenya, and Tayib Salih’s Season of Migration to the North
achieved independence from Britain in 1962, followed by (1966), which follows a young narrator’s return to his native
Barbados in 1966, the year Wide Sargasso Sea was published. Sudan after spending seven years studying in England. These,
The issues of conflicted cultural identity and alienation that like Wide Sargasso Sea, are written by authors who hail from
Antoinette and Jamaican society at large face in the wake of formerly colonized nations, and deal with themes of cultural
emancipation from slavery in Wide Sargasso Sea mirror many of identity, alienation, assimilation, inequality, racial
the issues these newly independent nations faced in their time discrimination, and other issues that arise as a result of
of fledgling political emancipation from their former colonizers. colonialism and subsequent decolonization. The novel
©2016 LitCharts LLC www.LitCharts.com | Follow us: @litcharts | v.005 Page 1

published during this period that is perhaps most closely
related to Wide Sargasso Sea is A House for Mr. Biswas (1961), by PL
PLO
OT SUMMARY
fellow Caribbean author V.S. Naipaul. The novel describes the
Antoinette Cosway, a creole, or Caribbean person of European
island of Trinidad during the final decades of its status as a
descent, recounts her memories of growing up at her family’s
British colony, from the perspective an Indian immigrant.
estate, Coulibri, in Jamaica in the 1830‘s. Her family, consisting
of her mother, Annette, and her mentally disabled younger
KEY FACTS brother, Pierre, are destitute and isolated after her father’s
• Full Title: Wide Sargasso Sea death and the passage of the Emancipation Act of 1833, which
freed Jamaica’s slaves. Annette becomes withdrawn and
• When Written: early 1950’s–1966
depressed, shunning Antoinette and talking to herself.
• Where Written: Cornwall, UK, and Devon, UK Antoinette seeks refuge in the gardens and the company of her
• When Published: 1966 nurse Christophine, who is known for her practice of obeah, a
• Literary Period: Postcolonialism, Postmodernism voodoo-like folk magic. Antoinette has a short-lived friendship
• Genre: Postcolonial novel, revisionist novel, coming-of-age with a little black girl, Tia, until the two fall out over a bet while
novel (bildungsroman), 20th-century feminist writing, they’re swimming, and Tia runs away with Antoinette’s money
postmodern novel and clothes. After seeing Antoinette in Tia’s dirty dress,
Annette resolves to lift the family out of poverty. She soon
• Setting: 1830’s Jamaica
marries Mr. Mason, a wealthy Englishman. Mr. Mason has
• Climax: Antoinette and Christophine return to the house at
Coulibri completely renovated. The show of ostentatious
Granbois to confront the husband after his infidelity,
wealth causes resentment in the neighboring village of poor ex-
Christophine and the husband argue, he makes the decision to
leave Jamaica slaves. Annette and Aunt Cora, fearing retribution, urge Mr.
Mason to move the family out of harm’s way, but he ignores
• Antagonist: The husband, Daniel Cosway
them. One night, a mob sets fire to the house at Coulibri. The
• Point of View: First person, multiple points of view; Part One is family narrowly escapes, but Pierre is badly injured. Antoinette
in Antoinette’s point of view, Part Two switches back and forth descends into a fever for six weeks. When she finally awakes,
between Antoinette’s and the husband’s points of view, and
she learns that Pierre has died, and that her mother Annette is
Part Three between Antoinette’s and Grace Poole’s. In all
being kept at a convalescent house in the country. Antoinette
sections of the novel, each narrator is looking back at the
events that occur from an unspecified future vantage point. goes to visit her, but finds her mother unrecognizable, mad with
For Antoinette in Part Three, this means that she narrates grief.
from beyond the grave. Antoinette begins to attend an all-girl’s convent school. The
nuns there instill the values of chastity and good behavior in
EXTRA CREDIT their students, and place a high premium on appearance.
The Madwoman In the Attic. Jean Rhys was not the only author Antoinette is comforted by the routines of the convent, but
moved to feminist critique by the character of Bertha Mason. In fails to find faith or solace in prayer. After eighteen months,
1979, Sandra Gilbert and Susan Gubar published The during which time Annette has died, Mr. Mason comes to visit
Madwoman In the Attic: The Woman Writer and the Nineteenth- her and informs her that he is taking her out of the convent
Century Literary Imagination. In it, Gilbert and Gubar use the school, implying that there is a suitor waiting for her.
work of female authors like the Bronte sisters, Emily Dickinson, Antoinette has a recurring nightmare about a stranger leading
Jane Austen, and George Eliot to show that nineteenth century her through the woods and up a flight of stairs.
women were confined to portraying female characters as either Part Two of the novel begins during Annette and her new
“angels” (like Charlotte Bronte’s Jane Eyre) or “monsters” (like husband’s honeymoon, on the island of Granbois, near Jamaica.
Bertha Mason). They urge female writers to break down this This section is narrated from the point of view of the husband,
dichotomy. Though published a decade before this seminal an unnamed Englishman who feels menaced by the strange
work of feminist criticism, Wide Sargasso Sea seems to enact landscape, language, and customs of the Caribbean. He
precisely what Gilbert and Gubar call for in their book. Rhys distrusts the servants, particularly Christophine and the young
takes the “monster” figure of Bertha and revises it with and defiant Amelie. He has married Antoinette for her money,
Antoinette, who is neither angel nor monster, but contains and sees her as a beautiful but unsettling stranger. The two
elements of both in a fully imagined, if deeply troubled, female spend afternoons swimming and nights making passionate love,
character. until one day the husband receives a letter from Daniel
Cosway, who claims to be Antoinette’s half-brother, the
product of an illicit relationship between her deceased father,
Old Cosway, and one of his slaves. The letter warns the

husband that madness runs in the Antoinette’s family on both Antoinette, was visited by Richard Mason and attacked him
sides, relating rumors that both Antoinette’s mother and father with a knife. Antoinette does not remember this. That night,
died “raving.” Daniel Cosway insists that Antoinette’s family, she has her recurring nightmare for the last time. It is clear that
especially Richard Mason, deceived the husband when making the stairs she has dreamt of her whole life have led here. In this
the marriage arrangements. The husband does not mention version of the dream, she takes a candle and sets fire to the
this letter to Antoinette, but becomes distant and cold. house, sits out on the roof watching it burn while recalling the
Christophine leaves Granbois because of her dislike of the fire at Coulibri. In the dream, she hears the husband calling to
husband, which devastates Antoinette. Shortly after her and jumps to her death. When she wakes, she is filled with a
Christophine’s departure, the husband gets lost in the woods sense of purpose, lights a candle and descends into the house
and is sure he sees a ‘zombi,’ or the walking dead, near an to act out her dream.
abandoned house. He is finally found by Baptiste, the butler,
who refuses to answer his questions about the house.
The narration switches to Antoinette’s point of view. She goes
CHARA
CHARACTERS
CTERS
to Christophine’s house to beg her to use obeah to make the Antoinette Coswa
Coswayy – The protagonist and partial narrator of
husband love her again. Christophine refuses at first, advising the novel, Antoinette Cosway is a creole, or person of
Antoinette to act for herself. Antoinette eventually wears her European descent born in the Caribbean. Throughout the
down, though, and Christophine supplies her with a bottled novel, her relationships with others are marked by alienation,
liquid. exclusion, and cruelty, so that she consistently seeks solace in
The narration shifts back to the husband’s point of view. He the natural world. She watches her family home burned to the
goes to see Daniel Cosway, who attempts to blackmail the ground by a mob of disenfranchised former slaves, and
husband into giving him five hundred dollars. That night, the witnesses her mother’s descent into madness as a result. She is
husband and Antoinette argue, and he demands to know the married to an Englishman she barely knows, for his financial
truth about her past. She tells him of Coulibri burning, Pierre’s benefit. After a disastrous honeymoon, her husband finally
death, and her mother’s descent into madness. It is revealed locks her away in his attic, from which her only escape is
that her mother was sexually abused at her convalescent home. suicide.
The husband begins to call her Bertha, which disturbs her. The The Husband – Though never named in the novel, Antoinette
two go to bed, and Antoinette hands him a glass of wine, after Cosway’s husband is understood to be Jane Eyre’s Mr.
which point the husband loses all memory of the rest of the Rochester, an English gentleman. The husband is deeply
night. The next morning, he realizes that Antoinette has disoriented, even disturbed, by the Jamaican landscape and
drugged him, and runs into the woods. When he returns, culture, and sees Antoinette as emblematic of both. Though he
Amelie tends to him, and they sleep together. When he experiences a short period of passion with Antoinette during
emerges from his room, Antoinette, who listened to their tryst their honeymoon, his feelings of distrust and animosity
from the next room, has fled the house. She returns with eventually outweigh his love, so that he ends up imprisoning
Christophine several days later. As a distraught Antoinette her in the attic of his English manor.
barricades herself in her room and drinks to excess,
Christophine and the husband argue. When the husband Christophine – Antoinette’s nurse, Christophine is respected
threatens to go to the police and report her practice of obeah, and feared among blacks and whites alike. She is a practitioner
Christophine, though outraged, has no choice but to relent. She of obeah (a voodoo-like magic), which both accounts for her
leaves without saying goodbye to Antoinette. The husband power over others and ultimately gets her in trouble with the
decides that they must leave Jamaica. Antoinette is numb and law, rendering her powerless to help Antoinette. Other than
silent on the day of their departure. The husband is overtaken the landscape, Christophine is the only real constant in
with remorse, but the hatred between himself and Antoinette Antoinette’s life, until she too abandons her to her fate with the
soon outweighs it. husband.
Part Three opens in the point of view of Grace Poole, Annette – Antoinette’s mother, Annette is a widow at the start
Antoinette’s caretaker in England. It is revealed that Antoinette of the novel, sunk into debt after the death of her husband. Her
is being kept against her will in the attic of the husband’s house, relationship with Antoinette is distant, owing partially to her
in conditions that make Grace Poole uncomfortable, but she is preoccupation with her sick, mentally handicapped son, Pierre.
paid twice what the other servants are for her silence. She marries a rich man, Mr. Mason, in order to save her family
from destitution in the wake of Emancipation, and goes mad
The narration switches to Antoinette’s consciousness. She is
with grief as a result of the destruction brought about partially
unsure of where she is or how much time has passed. She often
by his failure to listen to her warnings about the anger of the
steals Grace Poole’s keys and explores the rest of the house at
black residents at his shows of wealth.
night. One day, Grace Poole tells her that the night before she,

Mr
Mr.. Mason – Annette’s second husband, Mr. Mason is an Baptiste – The butler at Granbois. He quietly distrusts the
Englishman who, like the husband, seems incapable of husband and is sympathetic with Antoinette, giving her rum to
understanding Jamaican culture. He ignores Annette’s calm her down after the husband’s affair with Amelie.
warnings of the danger presented by the nearby village of Louise de Plana – A fellow student at the convent school, and
disgruntled former slaves, preferring to view them as benign role model to Antoinette. Louise de Plana and her sisters are
children. As a result, he is unprepared when the villagers burn revered for their deportment, cleanliness, and beauty.
down Coulibri.
Gr
Grace
ace P
Poole
oole – Antoinette’s caretaker in the husband’s manor
Amélie – A maid at Granbois, Amélie is disdainful of both the in England, Grace Poole is paid handsomely for her discretion,
husband and Antoinette, but fears Christophine. She engages which she maintains despite her misgivings regarding the
in a sexual relationship with the husband within earshot of husband's treatment of Antoinette. A partial narrator of Part 3
Antoinette, and expresses to the husband her plans of moving of the novel, she often drinks to excess and falls asleep, allowing
to Rio and using men for money. Antoinette to steal her keys and roam the rest of the house.
Daniel Coswa
Coswayy – Possibly the half brother of Antoinette Mr
Mr.. Luttrell – A neighbor of the Cosway’s, Mr. Luttrell is a
through an illicit affair between her father Old Cosway and one former slaveowner who commits suicide early on in the novel,
of his slaves, Daniel Cosway is deeply embittered by his unable to adjust to the changes in Jamaica post-Emancipation.
exclusion from the Cosway fortune. He writes to the husband, His death rattles Annette, who feels completely isolated
informing him of the madness that runs in Antoinette’s family, without his presence.
and attempts to blackmail him. Daniel Cosway is obsessed with
gaining vengeance for his disenfranchised and marginalized Mr
Mr.. F
Frraser – A magistrate, or member of law enforcement
existence, for which he holds Antoinette and her family acquainted with the husband in Jamaica. Mr. Fraser informs
responsible. the husband that Christophine is a practitioner of obeah with a
criminal record, and he considers her dangerous.
Aunt Cor
Coraa – A rich widow, Aunt Cora represents a stabilizing
force in Antoinette’s life. She takes her in after Coulibri is Pierre – Antoinette’s younger brother, Pierre is mentally and
burned, arranges for her education at the convent school, and physically handicapped. His death from injuries suffered in the
attempts to provide for her by giving her jewelry to sell after fire at Coulibri precipitates Annette’s grief-stricken decline
she is disinherited by her marriage. into madness.
Richard Mason – The son of Mr. Mason and stepbrother of The Y

Young
oung Bull – A porter who accompanies the husband and
Antoinette, Richard Mason oversees Antoinette’s marriage Antoinette on their journey to Granbois, and attempts to
arrangements following the death of his father, signing over the impress the husband with his knowledge of English and his
entirety of Antoinette’s inheritance to the husband. When he disdain of his fellow servants.
visits the husband’s manor in England, Antoinette attacks him Sister Marie Augustine – A nun at the convent school who
with a knife. offers Antoinette hot chocolate after she wakes up from her
Old Coswa
Coswayy – Antoinette’s, Pierre’s, and possibly Daniel recurring nightmare. She is unable to answer Antoinette’s
Cosway’s father. He is dead before the start of the novel, but question about why terrible things happen in the world.
his licentiousness, brutality, and potential madness affect the Hilda – A young servant girl at Granbois, Hilda fears the
lives of his family members for years to come. He leaves his husband and communicates mainly in bashful giggles.
family deep in debt when he dies. Mannie – One of the few servants who remained in the
Tia – A black girl, Tia is Antoinette’s only childhood friend. They Cosway family’s employ after Emancipation. He and Sass play
share a close friendship until they fall out over a bet. During the an instrumental role in helping the family escape when fire is
attack on Coulibri, Tia hits Antoinette in the forehead with a set to the house.
rock and they both weep. Servant bo
boyy – The unnamed servant boy at Granbois weeps
Sandi – The second cousin and lover of Antoinette, Sandi disconsolately when the husband and Antoinette leave for
actually appears in the novel only once. The ramifications of his England. According to Antoinette, he weeps because he loves
affair with Antoinette, however, return repeatedly to trouble the husband, and wants to continue working for him, without
Antoinette’s relationship with the husband, and later to haunt pay.
her memories during her imprisonment in the husband’s attic. Sass – One of the few servants who remained in the Cosway
Godfre
Godfreyy – The butler at Coulibri, Godfrey is caught between family’s employ after Emancipation. His full name is Disastrous,
the black community and his white employers. He maintains a because his godmother liked the sound of the word.
detached moral stance as the conflict between the Cosway’s Jo-jo – Christophine’s son. Christophine likens him to a “leaky
and their black neighbors escalates, but is ultimately horrified calabash” because of his inability to keep a secret.
at the attack on Coulibri, calling the mob “brute beasts.”

Mrs. Eff – The housekeeper at the husband’s manor in England, tragic loss of her son, her home, and her sanity. The mob at
Mrs. Eff is very loyal to the husband and defends him against Coulibri, angry at the disenfranchisement and exclusion that
Grace Poole’s suspicion. the Mason’s opulent house symbolizes, is driven to commit the
Leah – A maid at the husband’s manor in England. violence and arson that destroys Annette and Antoinette’s
family. Later in the novel, Daniel Cosway, the mixed-race,
illegitimate child of Alexander Cosway, is obsessed with
THEMES avenging his marginalized existence. His exclusion from the
Cosway family leads him to write a series of letters to
In LitCharts each theme gets its own color and number. Our Rochester maligning Antoinette and her family. These letters
color-coded theme boxes make it easy to track where the disturb Rochester, and form the catalyst for his ultimate
themes occur throughout the work. If you don't have a color distrust and distaste for Antoinette.
printer, use the numbers instead. The consequences of alienation become both increasingly
isolating as well as increasingly dire as the novel progresses.
1 OTHERNESS AND ALIENATION The tensions at the start of the novel are between groups, “us”
The problem of otherness in the world of Wide Sargasso Sea is vs. “them.” Race and class difference leads an entire mob to
all-pervading and labyrinthine. The racial hierarchy in 1830’s burn down the house at Coulibri, and the family escapes
Jamaica is shown to be complex and strained, with tension damaged but together. Over the course of the novel, however,
between whites born in England, creoles or people of European the family is drawn apart, and by the end, Antoinette is
descent born in the Caribbean, black ex-slaves, and people of alienated even from herself. Rochester denies her even her
mixed race. The resentment between these groups leads to own identity by repeatedly calling her “Bertha,” and in her
hatred and violence. Antoinette Cosway and her family are madness and captivity she speaks of “the ghost of a woman
repeatedly referred to as “white cockroaches” by members of they say haunts this place,” unaware that she is referring to
the black population, and are eventually driven from their home herself.
by a mob of discontented former slaves. These dynamics are
further complicated by the fact that inclusion and exclusion in 2 SLAVERY AND FREEDOM
the novel are based not solely on race, but also on geographical Freedom in the novel is double-edged and troubled. Its ideal is
origin, appearance, wealth and status, and fluency in shared presented in stark contrast, again and again, to its reality. At the
cultural symbols and values. start of the novel, we see that the Emancipation Act of 1833
As such, the major characters in Wide Sargasso Sea are primarily leaves discontent and violence in its wake. Mr. Luttrell, a white
defined by their separateness from any cultural group. The former slaveowner and neighbor to the Cosways, commits
novel opens with Antoinette explaining, “They say when trouble suicide after Emancipation, unable to adjust to the new social
comes close ranks, and the white people did. But we were not in and economic landscape. At Coulibri, the local population of
their ranks.” Antoinette and her family, though white, do not black former slaves is deeply angry. As Antoinette remembers
belong to the dominant class of white Jamaicans, for many at the start of the novel, “They hated us.” Even the children
reasons including local disapproval of her mother Annette threaten and enact violence on white people. A girl follows a
Cosway’s behavior, appearance, and French origins, as well as young Antoinette singing, “White cockroach, go away, go away.
the family’s poverty after the death of Alexander Cosway, Nobody want you.” Antoinette’s one-time friend Tia, a black girl,
Antoinette’s father. Christophine, Antoinette’s black nurse, ends up hitting Antoinette in the head with a rock as the mob
suffers a similar type of exclusion. A native of Martinique, she is burns her family’s house down.
set apart from the other black people of the region. As In Wide Sargasso Sea, freedom can mean abandonment or
Antoinette describes, “Her songs were not like Jamaican songs, isolation, the fear of which leads many to enter complacently
and she was not like the other women.” The novel makes and sometimes even willingly into their own imprisonment. We
repeated reference to Christophine’s headdress and clothing, see this with various black servants who elect or wish to stay on
which she styles “Martinique fashion,” despite having lived and with their former slave masters, including, notably, one young
worked in Jamaica for many years. When Rochester arrives in boy who cries “loud heartbreaking sobs” because Rochester
Jamaica to wed Antoinette, he is repeatedly disoriented and refuses to bring him to England to continue in his service. Of
paralyzed by his failure to understand Caribbean culture and this boy, Antoinette tells Rochester, “He doesn’t want any
custom. money. Just to be with you.” This holds true for relationships as
It is alienation that leads the characters of the novel to the well. After Annette’s marriage to Alexander Cosway, which was
destructive acts at its center. Annette, driven by her family’s characterized by repeated infidelities, ends in his death, she
exclusion from white society, is driven to seek remarriage to the becomes preoccupied with her isolation, referring to her new
wealthy Mr. Mason, a union that ultimately brings about the status as being “marooned,” and enters into another marriage,

to Mr. Mason, with restrictive and then disastrous results. largely because of her expertise in obeah, a Caribbean folk
When Antoinette’s marriage to Rochester first begins to magic, and Antoinette depends on her. Christophine tries to
deteriorate, she imagines leaving him, and is urged by counsel Antoinette to protect herself and her fortune by telling
Christophine to “pack up and go,” but does not. This decision her that “Woman must have spunks to live in this wicked world,”
leads to her literal imprisonment by Rochester. and, “All women, all colours, nothing but fools. Three children I
Even if it is violent and ultimately tragic, freedom is shown to be have. One living in this world, each one a different father, but
inevitable, the necessary path to redemption in the novel on no husband, I thank my God. I keep my money. I don’t give it to
both a societal and personal level. Oppression and no worthless man.” There is also Aunt Cora, a widow who does
imprisonment are unsustainable. Antoinette ends the novel and not remarry. She is a relatively stable force in Antoinette’s life,
her life by setting fire to the house in which she is imprisoned able to control her own health and movements, able to provide
by Rochester. Her narration ends with a sense of purpose and for Antoinette’s childhood. She promises safety for the young
self-knowledge that she lacked in the rest of the novel. In Antoinette and follows through on it. Amelie, though a minor
reference to her own emancipating destruction, she says, “Now character, is also pivotal in demonstrating that power comes to
at last I know why I was brought here and what I have to do.” women only outside of traditional marriage. She manipulates
This fire connects her to the angry mob that, in an act of protest sex to exercise control over her employers, Antoinette and
against their own oppression, sets fire to her family’s house Rochester. After sleeping with Rochester, she receives money
early on in the novel. Both seek freedom in the flames. from him, and speaks of her plans to move to Rio to continue
this tactic: “She wanted to go to Rio. There were rich men in
Rio.”
3 WOMEN AND POWER
Female independence is shown to be temporary, though.
The female characters in Wide Sargasso Sea must confront
Women who do assert themselves outside of or in direct
societal forces that prevent them from acting for and
defiance of the system of marriage are ultimately thwarted by
sustaining themselves, regardless of race or class. The two
men in some significant way. It eventually comes out that
socially accepted ways for a woman to attain security in this
Christophine is wanted by Jamaican law enforcement for her
world are marriage and entering the convent. Marriage ends
practice of obeah, and Rochester plans to turn her in. Even
disastrously in most cases, especially for the Cosway women.
Aunt Cora is ignored when she attempts to persuade Richard
Husbands have affairs, die, ignore their wives’ wishes with
Mason to secure Antoinette’s inheritance, and she despairs to
tragic results, imprison them, take their money, drive them to
Antoinette, “The Lord has forsaken us.”
madness. In Annette Cosway’s case, her marriages destroy not
only her life, but also her children’s lives. Her first husband,
Antoinette’s father, carries on multiple affairs publicly, one of 4 TRUTH
which yields a child, Daniel Cosway, who eventually has a hand Wide Sargasso Sea is a revisionist novel, written to complicate
in destroying Antoinette’s happiness. When Alexander Cosway and push up against the accepted truth of Antoinette or
dies, he leaves the family destitute. Annette’s second husband, “Bertha” Cosway’s character as it is put forth in Charlotte
Mr. Mason, ignores her pleas to move the family away from Bronte’s Jane Eyre—the archetypal “madwoman in the attic.”
Coulibri, leaving them vulnerable to the attack that destroys The novel questions the very nature of truth in its premise,
their home, kills her son Pierre, and precipitates Annette’s form, and content.
decline into madness. For Antoinette’s part, it is clear that her Within the novel, truth is shown to be slippery at best, difficult
marriage is for the financial benefit of Rochester, who sleeps if not impossible to recognize and trust. Every story has at least
with their servant Amelie within earshot of Antoinette while two competing versions. The narration itself is unstable,
still on their honeymoon, and eventually imprisons Antoinette switching between the perspectives of Antoinette and
in the attic of his home in England. It is claimed in a letter from Rochester, often giving the reader contradictory perspectives
Daniel Cosway to Rochester that madness runs in the Cosway and opinions on the same characters and events. Daniel
family, but for both Annette and Antoinette, their descent into Cosway, in his letters to Rochester, provides a troubling version
madness is a direct result of the grief and desperation brought of the history of the Cosway-Mason family, at odds with
to them by their husbands. The nuns at the convent school, Antoinette’s narration, thereby injecting a third competing
though seeming to be outside of this system, spend their lives narrative. Cosway’s version highlights Alexander Mason’s
training their female students to be respectable wives of depravity, and casts Annette, Antoinette, and Christophine as
wealthy men. self-serving liars.
The female characters who embody strength and agency are Many of the characters’ identities are forged in gossip and
those who elect to remain outside of these structures. The hearsay. Christophine, in particular, is a character with multiple
most notable example is Christophine, a powerful and backstories. When Rochester writes to Mr. Fraser inquiring
respected figure in her community. Other servants fear her, about her, there are shown to be conflicting accounts of her

whereabouts (“my wife insists that she had gone back to “Better, better than people.” Conversely, a major feature of her
Martinique... I happen to know that she has not returned to nightmares, which turn out to be of England, is the unfamiliarity
Martinique”) and even her name (“the woman in question was of the trees. The husband, on the other hand, who finds the
called Josephine or Christophine Dubois.”) When Rochester people and customs of Jamaica disorienting and even
decides to turn her in, he highlights the indeterminacy of her disturbing, is similarly disoriented and disturbed by the
identity in the novel, “So much for you, Josephine or Jamaican landscape. He becomes lost and delirious in the
Christophine. So much for you, Pheena.” Even Antoinette is not jungle, and says that the landscape is, “not only wild but
entirely sure of Christophine’s abilities, and can only speculate menacing. Those hills would close in on you.”
at the scope of her obeah prowess. Rochester’s interactions
with Antoinette are also riddled with confusion about the truth. CLOTHING AND HAIR
He tells her, “So much of what you tell me is strange, different
from what I was led to expect,” and in his narration remembers, The state of women’s dresses and hair represent their
“She was unsure of fact—any facts.” desirability as well as their agency in the novel. When Tia and
Antoinette fall out early on in the novel, Tia humiliates
Even the senses are not to be trusted. Vision plays tricks on
Antoinette by stealing her dress. Annette’s effort to lift the
people, and hallucinations abound. As a child, Antoinette
family out of destitution begins with the making of new dresses
cannot be sure whether she sees or imagines seeing feathers
for herself and Antoinette. When Antoinette wakes from her
and chicken’s blood, remnants of obeah rituals, in
fever, she knows that she has been ill and a great change has
Christophine’s room. While at Granbois, Rochester becomes
occurred because she sees that her hair has been cut. Louise
lost in the woods and stumbles upon a paved road, where he
de Plana, the ultimate ideal female in the novel, is constantly
frightens a child walking by. Later, he is assured that there was
dressed in white, and has hair that Antoinette tries and fails to
never a road there. Of Granbois and the mysterious instability
emulate. The husband’s physical attraction to both Antoinette
of the senses that he experienced there, Rochester remembers,
and Amélie is at various points directed towards their dresses,
“it kept its secret. I’d find myself thinking, ‘What I see is
and in the case of Antoinette even her dress on its own, without
nothing—I want what it hides.”
her in it, is enough to arouse the husband. Christophine’s
Denial or madness are shown to be the two alternatives for intimidating presence is often connected with the bold colors
dealing with the crushing and confounding nature of truth in of her dress.
the novel. Either a character can “turn her face to the wall,” and
deny the complexity and tragedy before them, as Christophine
accuses Aunt Cora of doing, or go mad with grief, as Annette
FIRE
and Antoinette both do. Rochester ultimately takes the path of Fire is the ultimate destructive and redemptive force in the
denial by imprisoning Antoinette, shutting her away forever novel. The fire at Coulibri is an act of retribution and defiance
rather than reconciling the truth of her nature and their on the part of the nearby black community, but it destroys the
marriage with what he’d expected, or been led to believe. Even life that Antoinette has known as a child. Both Coco the parrot
Christophine finally retreats into denial, or refusal, when and the moths that fly into the flames of candles throughout
Rochester and Antoinette leave for England. Rochester offers, Antoinette’s and the husband’s honeymoon foreshadow
“You can write to her,” to which Christophine replies, “Read and Antoinette’s own fiery suicide, through which she finally gains
write I don’t know. Other things I know,” and walks away freedom at the end of the novel.
without saying goodbye.
QUO
QUOTES
TES
SYMBOLS The color-coded and numbered boxes under each quote below
Symbols appear in red text throughout the Summary and make it easy to track the themes related to each quote. Each
Analysis sections of this LitChart. color and number corresponds to one of the themes explained
in the Themes section of this LitChart.
THE NATURAL LANDSCAPE: GARDENS,
JUNGLE, TREES PART 1 QUOTES
Throughout the novel, the natural world reflects Antoinette’s The Lord make no distinction between black and white. Black
and the husband’s respective feelings of comfort and/or and white the same for Him.
alienation. When Antoinette is rejected by her mother and •Speak
•Speaker
er: Godfrey
ridiculed by her peers, she hides in the gardens at Coulibri and
feels that even biting ants and sharp, stinging foliage are

•Related themes
themes: Otherness and Alienation, Slavery and •Theme T
Trrack
acker
er code
code:
Freedom
1 2 4
•Theme T
Trrack
acker
er code
code:
1 2
They say when trouble comes close ranks, and so the white
people did. But we were not in their ranks.
I was bridesmaid when my mother married Mr. Mason in •Speak
•Speaker
er: Antoinette Cosway
Spanish Town...their eyes slid away from my hating face. I had
•Related themes
themes: Otherness and Alienation, Slavery and
heard what all these smooth smiling people said about her
Freedom
when she was not listening and they did not guess I was.
•Theme T
Trrack
acker
er code
code:
•Speak
•Speaker
•Mentioned or related char
characters
acters: Annette , Mr. Mason 1 2
•Related themes
themes: Otherness and Alienation, Truth
•Theme T
Trrack
acker
er code
code: ‘Such terrible things happen. Why? Why?’
‘You must not concern yourself with that mystery. We do not
1 4 know why the devil must have his little day. Not yet.’
•Speak
•Speaker
er: Antoinette Cosway, Sister Marie Augustine
No one had ever spoken to me about obeah— but I knew what I •Related themes
themes: Truth
would find if I dared to look.
•Theme T
Trrack
acker
er code
code:
•Speak
•Speaker
4
•Related themes
themes: Truth
•Theme T
Trrack
acker
er code
code:
And if the razor grass cut my legs and arms I would think ‘It’s
4 better than people.’ Black ands or red ones, tall nests swarming
with white ants, rain that soaked me to the skin— once I saw a
snake. All better than people. Better. Better, better than people.
Old time white people nothing but white nigger now, and black
nigger better than white nigger. •Speak
•Speaker
•Speak
•Speaker
er: Tia •Related themes
themes: Otherness and Alienation
characters
acters: Antoinette Cosway •Theme T
Trrack
acker
er code
code:
•Related themes
themes: Otherness and Alienation, Slavery and 1
Freedom
•Theme T
Trrack
acker
er code
code:
Mr. Mason did not approve of Aunt Cora, an ex-slave-owner
1 2 who had escaped misery, a flier in the face of Providence.
•Speak
•Speaker
You have lived alone far too long, Annette. You imagine enmity •Mentioned or related char
characters
acters: Mr. Mason , Aunt Cora
which doesn’t exist. Always one extreme or the other. Didn’t •Related themes
you fly at me like a little wild cat when I said nigger. Not nigger, Freedom
nor even negro. Black people I must say... they’re too damn lazy
•Theme T
Trrack
acker
er code
code:
to be dangerous, I know that.’
‘They are more alive than you are, lazy or not, and they can be 1 2
dangerous and cruel for reasons you wouldn’t understand.’
•Speak
•Speaker
er: Annette , Mr. Mason
We stared at each other, blood on my face, tears on hers. It was
•Related themes
themes: Otherness and Alienation, Slavery and as if I saw myself. Like in a looking-glass.
Freedom, Truth
•Speak
•Speaker

characters
acters: Tia •Mentioned or related char
characters
acters: Antoinette Cosway,
•Related themes
themes: Otherness and Alienation Annette , Old Cosway
•Theme T
Trrack
acker
er code
code: •Related themes
Freedom
1 •Theme T
Trrack
acker
er code
code:
PART 2 QUOTES 1 2
If I was bound for hell let it be hell. No more false heavens. No
more damned magic. I take up my pen after long thought and meditation but in the end
the truth is better than a lie...you have been shamefully deceived by
•Speak
•Speaker
er: The Husband
the Mason family...That girl she look you straight in the eye and talk
•Related themes
themes: Truth sweet talk— and it’s lies she tell you. Lies.
•Theme T
Trrack
acker
er code
code:
•Speak
•Speaker
er: Daniel Cosway
4 •Mentioned or related char
characters
acters: Antoinette Cosway, The
Husband
If she were taller, one of these strapping women dressed up to •Related themes
the nines, I might be afraid of her. •Theme T
Trrack
acker
er code
code:
•Speak
•Speaker
er: The Husband 1 4
characters
acters: Antoinette Cosway
•Related themes
themes: Otherness and Alienation, Women and I was tired of these people. I disliked their laughter and their
Power tears, their flattery and envy, conceit and deceit. And I hated
•Theme T
Trrack
acker
er code
code: the place. I hated the mountains and the hills, the rivers and the
rain. I hated the sunsets of whatever colour, I hated its beauty
1 3 and its magic and the secret I would never know. I hated its
indifference and the cruelty which was part of its loveliness.
Above all I hated her. For she belonged to the magic and
What I see is nothing— I want what it hides— that is not nothing.
loveliness.
•Speak
•Speaker
er: The Husband
•Speak
•Speaker
er: The Husband
•Related themes
themes: Truth
characters
acters: Antoinette Cosway
•Theme T
Trrack
acker
er code
code:
•Related themes
4 •Theme T
Trrack
acker
er code
code:
1 4
As for my confused impressions they will never be written.
There are blanks in my mind that cannot be filled up.
All women, all colours, nothing but fools. Three children I have.
•Speak
•Speaker
er: The Husband One living in this world, each one a different father, but no
•Related themes
themes: Truth husband, I thank my God. I keep my money. I don’t give it to no
worthless man.
•Theme T
Trrack
acker
er code
code:
•Speak
•Speaker
er: Christophine
4
•Related themes
themes: Otherness and Alienation, Women and
Power
But they are white, I am coloured. They are rich, I am poor. •Theme T
Trrack
acker
er code
code:
•Speak
•Speaker
er: Daniel Cosway 1 3

But I cannot go. He is my husband after all. •Theme T
Trrack
acker
er code
code:
•Speak
•Speaker
er: Antoinette Cosway 1
characters
acters: The Husband
•Related themes
themes: Slavery and Freedom, Women and Power These people are very vulnerable. How old was I when I learned
•Theme T
Trrack
acker
er code
code: to hide how I felt? A very small boy.
2 3 •Speak
•Speaker
er: The Husband
•Related themes
It doesn’t matter what I believe or you believe, because we can •Theme T
Trrack
acker
er code
code:
do nothing about it.
1 4
•Speak
•Speaker
•Related themes
themes: Truth PART 3 QUOTES
•Theme T
Trrack
acker
er code
code: What am I doing in this place and who am I?
4 •Speak
•Speaker
•Related themes
Justice. I’ve heard the word. It’s a cold word. I tried it out...I •Theme T
Trrack
acker
er code
code:
wrote it down. i wrote it down several times and always it 1 4
looked like a damn cold lie to me. There is no justice...My
mother whom you all talk about, what justice did she have? My
mother sitting in the rocking-chair speaking about dead horses The rumours I’ve heard— very far from the truth. But I don’t
and dead grooms and a black devil kissing her sad mouth. contradict, I know better than to say a word. After all the house is
•Speak
•Speaker
er: Antoinette Cosway big and safe, a shelter from the world outside which, say what you
like, can be a black and cruel world to a woman. Maybe that’s why I
characters
acters: Annette
stayed on...Yes, maybe that’s why we all stay— Mrs Eff and Leah and
•Related themes
themes: Otherness and Alienation, Slavery and me. All of us except that girl who lives in her own darkness. I’ll say
Freedom, Women and Power, Truth one thing for her, she hasn’t lost her spirit. She’s still fierce. I don’t
•Theme T
Trrack
acker
er code
code: turn my back on her when her eyes have that look. I know it.
1 2 3 4 •Speak
•Speaker
er: Grace Poole
characters
acters: Antoinette Cosway, Mrs. Eff
, Leah
Woman must have spunks to live in this wicked world.
•Related themes
•Speak
•Speaker
er: Christophine Freedom, Women and Power, Truth
•Related themes
themes: Otherness and Alienation, Women and •Theme T
Trrack
acker
er code
code:
Power
1 2 3 4
•Theme T
Trrack
acker
er code
code:
1 3
SUMMARY AND ANAL
ANALYSIS
YSIS
This a very wild place — not civilized. Why you come here? The color-coded and numbered boxes under each row of
Summary and Analysis below make it easy to track the themes
•Speak
•Speaker
er: The Young Bull throughout the work. Each color and number corresponds to
characters
acters: The Husband one of the themes explained in the Themes section of this
LitChart.
•Related themes
themes: Otherness and Alienation

PART 1 Antoinette overhears her Mr. Luttrell’s discontent and
mother one day speaking to suicide are the first things that
The novel opens with The complexity of Caribbean
Mr. Luttrell, a white neighbor Antoinette explicitly associates
Antoinette’s narration, looking racial dynamics is introduced.
and Annette’s only friend. He with the Emancipation Act,
back at her childhood in Antoinette does not explain that
laments the delayed arrival of setting the tone for her troubled
1830’s post-Emancipation Annette’s Martinique
the financial compensation understanding of freedom. The
Jamaica. Antoinette and her background divides her from
that white former slaveowners parallel superstitions of the white
family are isolated, socially and white society because
such as himself were promised and black populations regarding
geographically. Antoinette Martinique is a French colony.
as part of the Emancipation Mr. Luttrell’s abandoned estate
explains that their exclusion This makes Annette Creole, while
Act of 1833. Not long after, indicate the close, if fraught,
from white society is a result the Jamaican ladies that
Mr. Luttrell, “tired of waiting,” relationship between these two
of disapproval by “the Antoinette mentions are of
commits suicide. His property cultural groups. The tension
Jamaican ladies” of her mother English descent. Instead,
is left abandoned, pronounced between Antoinette’s family and
Annette’s youth, physical Antoinette addresses the reader
unlucky by local whites and the nearby population of former
beauty, and origins from as if we are insiders who would
considered by the black slaves is introduced, as well as
Martinique. When Antoinette understand these distinctions
population to be haunted. the family’s relatively recent
asks her mother why they have naturally. This mode of address is
Annette is left completely poverty. Annette in particular is
so few visitors to Coulibri, a central feature of her narration,
friendless after Mr. Luttrell’s increasingly vulnerable, having
their estate, her mother tells and it means that many key
death, and the Cosway’s are now lost the protection and
her that it is because of the truths are implied rather than
now the only white people in support of both her husband and
poor condition of the road stated directly. Here we are
the immediate area. Now the only other white man she
leading from the nearest town, similarly left to deduce that her
when Annette travels around trusted.
and that “road repairing was father is dead, and that the
the area she is alone, and the
now a thing of the past.” deteriorating roads are a 1 2 3
family’s black neighbors often
Antoinette laments the loss of consequence of a diminished
gather to jeer at Annette as
her father, of regular visitors, workforce in the wake of
she rides by, particularly at the
of feeling safe in her home, as Emancipation.
increasing shabbiness of her
all things that now belong to
1 2 4 appearance.
the past.
One day, Antoinette finds her Godfrey’s reaction to the killing
mother’s horse dead of the horse introduces the
underneath a tree, and tells no difficult position of the black
one, because she believes if servants who’ve chosen to
she doesn’t speak of it, it might remain in the employ of former
turn out not to have happened. masters in the novel. Rather than
When the horse is discovered declare his loyalties one way or
later by their servant and the other, Godfrey attempts to
former slave, Godfrey, it is remain neutral. Annette’s
clear that it has been poisoned desperation increases after this
by their black neighbors. While crime, as her means of
Godfrey maintains a kind of independent mobility is taken
detached moral stance, (“The form her with the loss of the
Lord make no distinction horse. Antoinette’s belief that she
between black and white”), might be able to make something
Annette angrily holds him not true by not speaking of it is
responsible and places him on also introduced. The complicated
the side of their hostile connection between words and
neighbors, saying, “The old truth plays a major role in the
hypocrite...He knew what they novel.
were going to do.” Without the
horse to travel, Annette 1 2 3 4
pronounces the family
“marooned.”

A doctor comes to pay a visit to Annette’s helpless retreat into When Antoinette asks her Annette’s distrust of her servants
Antoinette’s younger brother, herself foreshadows her later mother about Christophine, it is reiterated and
Pierre, who is disabled. descent into madness, and marks is clear that she is the only emphasized—she can’t
Antoinette is never told what a shift in her relationship with servant that Annette still understand why they would
the doctor says during this Antoinette. Antoinette is trusts. Annette believes all the choose to keep working at
visit-- she knows only that perplexed by the alienation she others have stayed at Coulibri Coulibri after being set free,
afterward her mother feels from her mother, and lacks only “because they wanted unless their goal was to take
descends into a depression, even the means to understand its somewhere to sleep and advantage of her. Christophine’s
and refuses to leave the house. cause, because she is kept in the something to eat,” and angrily powerful status in the house is
Annette instructs Antoinette dark about the truth of Pierre’s denounces them. Antoinette further emphasized as the sole
repeatedly to leave her alone, condition. The garden and the offers to fan her mother in the servant who remains in Annette’s
and begins to talk to herself, natural world are introduced as a heat after this angry outburst, good graces. The rift between
which frightens Antoinette. refuge for Antoinette as well as a but Annette again shuts her Annette and Antoinette grows,
When Annette does stand symbol for the tension between out and tells her to leave. and hair is introduced as a
outside of the house , to look order and freedom that pervades Antoinette reflects on times symbol of female security and
at the sea, she is gawked at by the novel. The garden, like when she was allowed to comfort.
passersby. Antoinette Antoinette, is being left in neglect remain close to her mother
describes how the gardens at by its caretakers. While it is free almost constantly, and 1 2 3
Coulibri during this time are to grow beautiful and wild, it is remembers in particular a
allowed to grow beautiful and also permeated with decay. feeling of safety and comfort
wild from neglect, without while watching her mother
anyone to work on them now 1 2 3 4 comb her hair.
that slavery has ended. She
One day, Antoinette is Antoinette feels the sting of
remarks on the smell of dead
followed down the road by a racial hatred personally for the
flowers mixed in with the
little black girl singing, "White first time, and seeks refuge in the
fragrance of living ones.
cockroach, go away, go away. garden, her place of freedom and
To avoid her mother, Christophine is introduced as a Nobody want you." Antoinette escape. The term "white
Antoinette begins to spend foil, or contrast, to Annette. hides in the garden, where cockroach" implies the way that
most of her time with her Though they are similar in some Christophine finds her many the native blacks who were
nurse Christophine. respects, particularly their hours later, lying on the enslaved and now freed see the
Christophine is also from Martiniquais heritage, ground covered in moss. whites as an infestation,
Martinique, and therefore just Christophine is strong and able something that doesn't belong.
as isolated in the black (and black) where Annette is
community as Annette and weak and changeable (and 1 2
Antoinette are among white white). Christophine nurtures
society. Antoinette describes Antoinette and keeps her
her distinctly Martinique company when Annette shuts
songs and attire. She also her out, and while Annette’s
observes that the girl servants relationships with her servants
who help Christophine with are often fraught, as we saw with
the washing are afraid of her, Godfrey, the girls who work for
and that it is this fear that Christophine fear and revere her.
keeps them working for her. Christophine’s mysterious power
She doesn’t pay them, and they over others is referenced here,
even bring her presents of but not yet explained.
fruit and vegetables.
1 2 3

The next day, Christophine Tia and Antoinette briefly When Antoinette arrives Antoinette’s disheveled
introduces Antoinette to Tia, provide a model for cooperation home, her mother has visitors, appearance mortifies Annette
the daughter of Christophine’s between their respective cultural relatives of Mr. Luttrell who because it highlights the family’s
only friend, another non- groups. However, when money is have come to claim his estate. poverty and exclusion from the
Jamaican black woman. Tia brought into the equation, the These visitors laugh at ranks of polite society, to which
and Antoinette become good girls quickly fall out. This childish Antoinette’s dirty clothes, the Luttrell’s belong. The
friends for a time, until one day bet and disagreement reflects the causing her to run away and symbolic significance of clothing
they get into an argument over socio-economic disparity Annette and Christophine to expands further into an
a bet. Christophine has given between whites and blacks that argue about the state of argument between Annette and
Antoinette some pennies as is at the center of racial tension Antoinette’s wardrobe. Christophine about the poor
spending money, and Tia bets in the area, and drives the Annette insists that Antoinette nature of Annette’s parenting as
Antoinette three pennies that growing discontent among the must have another dress for indicated by Antoinette’s
she cannot do a somersault black neighbors surrounding Christophine to put her in, and inadequate wardrobe. As
under water. Antoinette ups Coulibri. The girls, in their Christophine tells her angrily Christophine dresses Antoinette
the ante to all of the pennies, argument, even repeat language that she does not, that it is in a dress that is too small for her,
and when she does the and opinions clearly drawn from shameful and caused by a further humiliation, it is clear
somersault there is a dispute adults in their respective neglect, “She run wild, she that the Luttrell’s reaction to
over its adequacy. Tia takes the communities. The fact that Tia grow up worthless. And Antoinette’s attire sparks an even
money, and Antoinette calls steals Antoinette’s dress as well nobody care.” Christophine larger topic of
her a “cheating nigger.” Tia as her money highlights the dresses Antoinette in an old discontent—Christophine sees in
replies by mocking symbolic significance of dress that is too small for her, their disdain the very nature of
Antoinette’s poverty, saying appearance and attire with while bitterly criticizing the the new white power in Jamaica.
“old time white people nothing respect to female power and new Luttrell relatives for their
but white nigger now.” When security in the novel. treatment of Antoinette and 1 2 3
Antoinette looks away, Tia their attitude of ownership in
leaves with her money as well 1 2 3 the area. She tells Antoinette
as her clothes, forcing that though there is no more
Antoinette to walk home in slavery, the new white people
Tia’s dirty dress. in power still have the law on
their side and are worse than
the old.

The rest of the night, Annette The incident with the Luttrell’s Annette remarries, to Mr. Annette attains the security and
does not look at or speak to pushes Annette and Antoinette Mason, an Englishman. inclusion that she sought
Antoinette, and Antoinette is even further apart. It also moves Antoinette, serving as a through marriage. Information
sure that her mother is Annette to seek security and bridesmaid, regards the that Antoinette has not shared in
ashamed of her. Antoinette has belonging through the only English guests at the wedding her narration enters the novel
a nightmare that night, that method available to with hatred, because she through gossip and hearsay. It is
she is walking through a her—courtship and marriage. She remembers overhearing many unclear whether Antoinette does
strange forest with someone takes action, in the form of of them gossiping about her not know the truth about her
who hates her, out of sight. She ordering new dresses to be made, and her family while visiting father before now, or whether
screams and wakes up, to find to make herself and Antoinette Coulibri: they gossiped about she leaves it out of her narration
her mother there. Annette appear to be a part of the society Mr. Mason’s predatory for the same reason that she
chastises her for waking up her to which she aspires to belong, financial motivations for being doesn’t speak of the poisoned
brother, Pierre. Antoinette though she does so as a last in Jamaica, about Antoinette’s horse to her mother, in hopes
goes back to sleep watching resort, selling off her jewels, father, Old Cosway, whom that not speaking of it might
the light in Pierre’s window. which must be close to her last they called an alcoholic and erase its truth. The idea is
The next day, Annette has source of money. Meanwhile, in philanderer with many introduced that Christophine’s
“yards of muslin” and ribbon her alienation from her mother, illegitimate children, and claim power in the community might
purchased to make new Antoinette again finds refuge and also that Annette come from obeah, a voodoo-like
dresses for herself and order in nature, and sees nature “encouraged” him. They also folk magic. Antoinette mentions
Antoinette. Antoinette as being better—less cruel—than gossip about Christophine and obeah in her narration without
suspects that her mother has people. In this part of the novel her practice of obeah. After explaining its significance. Again,
sold the remainder of her Antoinette's nightmare is the wedding, Antoinette and she is addressing the reader as an
jewelry to make these introduced, and associated with her brother are sent to stay insider, assuming the reader has
purchases. Her mother also newcomers and courting. with their Aunt Cora, a enough contextual knowledge to
begins to spend whole days at wealthy widow, while Coulibri just understand (though of
parties given by the new 1 3 is renovated and restored with course the reader doesn't,
Luttrell’s, and Antoinette Mr. Mason’s money. creating a bit of a sense of being
responds by roaming the lost and alienation in the reader
Coulibri estate, seeking solace that mirrors Antoinette's own
in nature, which she proclaims, alienation from the white and
even when being bitten by ants black societies around her).
or cut by sharp grasses, to be
“Better, better than people.” 1 3 4
When the family returns to Antoinette returns to her home
Coulibri, Antoinette finds that to find it a completely alienating
much more than its environment. This change is
appearance has changed. The emphasized by her new fear of
new black servants brought by Christophine, whom she has
Mr. Mason gossip about grown up trusting and being
Christophine and obeah, nurtured by. Her fear is based on
instilling a new fear of overheard gossip, however, and
Christophine in Antoinette. she struggles to determine what
Antoinette says that though no is true. It is unclear to both
one has ever spoken to her Antoinette and the reader
directly about obeah, she whether the evidence of obeah
knows what she would find if that she sees in Christophine’s
she looked around in room is real or imagined.
Christophine’s things. One day,
she sees or imagines seeing “a 1 3 4
dead man’s dried hand” and a
bleeding chicken in
Christophine’s room.

Annette is also affected by the The disenfranchised black On her way to bed, Antoinette Antoinette’s suspicion that the
new gossip, particularly the population is growing goes into Pierre’s room to say true nature of Pierre’s possible
constant and increasingly increasingly embittered at the goodnight, and finds him cure would mean merely making
hateful commentary among new show of opulent wealth at already asleep. As she watches him “exactly like other people”
the surrounding community of Coulibri now that Mr. Mason has him sleep, she thinks to herself amounts to a questioning of
ex-slaves about the new renovated it. Annette, who has that Mr. Mason has promised whether the rewards of belonging
wealth brought to Coulibri by lived among these people for to bring Pierre to England to in a community are worth the
Mr. Mason. A year into their many years, knows that the be cured, and wonders what cost, harkening back to her claim
marriage, Annette feels so family is in danger, but Mr. that might mean. She that anything the natural world
threatened by their black Mason ignores her appeals. It is concludes that it would mean has to offer, even pain and
neighbors that she tries to clear that he, an Englishman, making Pierre “exactly like sickness, is “Better, better than
convince Mr. Mason to move lacks the cultural fluency to other people,” and questions people.” The whispering outside
the family away from Coulibri, understand the black people of whether this would be a good Pierre's window raises the
but he laughs off the idea, Jamaica or even take them thing. She leaves his room and suspicion of the angry black
saying that the ex-slaves are seriously. He also doesn't take his goes to sleep in a state of neighbors gathering secretly
too lazy to be dangerous. wife—or, maybe more broadly, unease, sure she has heard outside the house—though it's
Annette cautions him, saying the opinions of whispering among the bamboo unclear if she really hears these
that he misunderstands and women—seriously. And Annette, outside Pierre’s window. whispers or they are just
underestimates black people, though desperate to leave manifestations of her
that they are “more alive” than Coulibri, must acquiesce to her nervousness.
he is, and accuses him of failing husband’s wishes. She has no
to recognize their capacity for power to refuse or sway him. 1 4
both good and bad. Mr. Mason Antoinette is awoken in the The previously hinted at
agrees that he does not 1 2 3 4
middle of the night by her discontent in the black
understand, but does not mother, who tells her to dress community comes to a head, and
agree to leave Coulibri, though quickly and come downstairs. the depth of Mr. Mason’s
Annette continues to insist Antoinette is struck by the capacity for denial is revealed, as
that they must. disheveled state of her he maintains his insistence that
One evening, on their way Mr. Mason continues to display mother’s hair. When she gets the family is not in danger even
back to Coulibri estate from an his ignorance and his downstairs, Antoinette sees in the face of a violent mob. It is
outing, the family notices that unwillingness to understand the that all of the adults are up, clear that many, but not all, of
the huts of their black black people who live and work and many of the servants are the servants have left the house
neighbors are abandoned. Mr. among them, as well as his missing. There is an angry mob to join the crowd, a further
Mason thinks they must be at disregard for the wishes and outside. Mr. Mason attempts illustration of the split loyalties
a dance or a wedding, but fears of his wife and sister-in-law. to address the mob, still not among black servants remaining
Antoinette and the rest of the Meanwhile Antoinette, Annette, believing that they are there to in white employ post
family are uneasy, saying that and Aunt Cora can easily read hurt the family, and is greeted Emancipation.
there are never weddings in the signs of danger, recognizing with rocks thrown at him.
the abandoned huts as an Annette worries about 1 2 4
the community, and that they
would be able to hear drums if indicator of some unusual whether to wake the still
there was a dance. This sparks activity in the village, and Mr. sleeping Pierre. Even as Mr.
another argument about Mason’s insulting and prejudiced Mason tries to insist to the
leaving Coulibri. At dinner, Mr. remarks as potentially quite family, yet again, that the
Mason speaks of importing damaging to their safety. crowd is harmless, the servant
workers from the East Indies, Mannie notices smoke coming
and is warned by Aunt Cora 1 2 3 from under Antoinette’s
not to speak about this in front bedroom door-- the mob has
of the black employees whom set fire to the house.
he’d be replacing. Mr. Mason
again expresses his belief that
black people are too childlike
to be a real threat.

As Aunt Cora embraces As Mr. Mason proves paralyzed Antoinette turns before The lines of the conflict are
Antoinette and tells her not to and ineffectual in this crisis, the entering the carriage and sees blurred as chaos reaches a fever
worry, that she is “quite safe,’’ women of the family take action. women in the crowd who are pitch. Black women from the
Annette rushes to Pierre’s Aunt Cora comforts Antoinette crying, insisting they only came village are in the crowd weeping
bedroom to save him, carries and takes charge of the family’s to see what had happened. As for Antoinette’s family, denying
him out in her arms. He is escape, while Annette risks her she watches the house and the their own involvement in the
badly burned, and she herself own safety to save Pierre. When gardens burn, Antoinette attack. After Antoinette watches
is singed. The servant who was it is clear that Pierre is badly mourns the loss of the the destruction of the garden, her
supposed to be caring for injured, Annette’s rage at Mr. beautiful trees and flowers. one place of freedom and refuge,
Pierre had left the house to Mason’s failure to protect the She sees her former friend Tia she throws herself desperately
join the mob. As Aunt Cora family overtakes her ability to act in the crowd, and runs to her into a brief fantasy of harmony
tears her own petticoat into rationally. because she sees Tia, in that and safety when she runs toward
strips to bandage Pierre, moment, as the only remaining Tia, seeing a kindred soul in Tia
Annette alternates between 1 2 3 token of the life she had despite their earlier
whispering in shock and known. Antoinette think that if disagreement. Lines are quickly
screaming angrily at Mr. she can stay with Tia she will redrawn, however—and the
Mason for not taking her not have to leave her home, violent reality of the situation
warnings seriously. The loyal that they will be able to go made clear to Antoinette—when
remaining servants, under back to the time that they Tia hits her with a rock. The final
Aunt Cora’s instruction, help played together as equals. image of the scene, with
the family out of the house and Before she reaches Tia, Antoinette seeing a weeping Tia
toward their carriage. though, Tia throws a jagged as a mirror image is profound: a
rock at her, hitting Antoinette mirror image is both the same
As a hysterical Annette is Amid the confusion of the
in the head. The two look at and opposite, both familiar and
being lead to the carriage, she family’s attempt to escape the
each other and both weep as completely inaccessible.
struggles ferociously to get violence brought onto them as a
Antoinette bleeds, and
back into the house to retrieve result of racial and economic 1 2 4
Antoinette sees herself in Tia,
her parrot, Coco. The mob disparity, the image of Coco the
“Like in a looking-glass.”
laughs and hurls insults at the parrot dying in flames briefly
family, becoming more and unites the two sides of the Antoinette wakes up with Antoinette’s next moment of
more worked up. Antoinette conflict. Both whites and blacks Aunt Cora by her bedside, at consciousness is marked by
notices that many of the recognize the dying parrot as a Aunt Cora’s home in Spanish confusion. Despite Aunt Cora’s
people in the mob are carrying bad omen. Aunt Cora’s cool- Town. The first thing she nurturing presence, Antoinette
weapons. The crowd suddenly headed navigation of their notices is that her hair has feels displaced and disoriented
goes quiet as Coco the parrot escape and encounter with one been cut off, and she asks Aunt without her mother and her
emerges from an upper particularly angry man from the Cora about it. She learns that brother. The loss of the family
window of the house, crowd illustrates her role as one she has been very ill for six home has coincided with the
screeching, his wings on fire. of the few strong and weeks, which is why her hair destruction of her family, and her
Antoinette begins to cry, independent women in had to be cut. Aunt Cora also disconnection from herself. Her
remembering that it is Antoinette's life. tells her that Pierre is dead, disconnect with her identity is
considered very bad luck to kill and that her mother is in the symbolized by the loss of her
a parrot or even to watch a 1 2 3 country, recovering. hair, and echoed by her
parrot die. The members of the Antoinette remembers recollection of the parrot’s
mob seem to remember this as hearing, during her fevers, her question, “Qui est la?” or “Who is
well, for they begin to flee. As mother raving with grief and there?”
the family and Christophine alternately echoing the parrot
reach their carriage, a man in Coco’s signature phrase, “Qui 1 2 3
the crowd confronts them, but est la?” and screaming
Aunt Cora threatens him accusations and threats at Mr.
calmly with hellfire and eternal Mason.
damnation, and he falls back.

Antoinette does not mention Again, Antoinette elects not to After a time of living and In a move that is by now typical
her awareness of the truth to speak of troubling truths to those getting well at Aunt Cora’s of Antoinette’s narration, clearly
Aunt Cora, who promises her around her. The song that she house, Antoinette is sent to stated information about
that she is safe and sings to her requests that Aunt Cora sing to the local convent school. On emotionally difficult events enter
to try to get her to go to sleep. her, or at least the specific the way to school on her first the novel through the talk of
Antoinette interrupts her and excerpts of the song that day, she is bullied by two strangers. Annette’s madness,
asks her to sing a song entitled, Antoinette remembers, suggests children, one black and one and her acts of violence against
“Before I was set free.” a complicated and troubled mixed race. The girl mocks her, her family, are now subjects of
Antoinette only remembers attitude toward freedom. saying, “Look the crazy girl, you gossip in the town. The dynamics
one lyric before falling asleep, crazy like your mother,” and of belonging and otherness in
“The sorrow that my heart 1 2 4 goes on to harass her by saying this scene are shifting and
feels for.” that her mother had tried to complex. Children who are black
kill Mr. Mason, had tried to kill and of mixed race menace
One day, Antoinette is taken Annette has been driven mad by
Antoinette as well, and that Antoinette, but are close enough
to visit her mother at the grief. But Antoinette relays the
they both have eyes “like to her socially to know details of
house where Annette is events of her visit to her mother
zombie.” The boy threatens gossip about her family. Sandi, on
recuperating. Antoinette without emotional commentary
repeatedly that he will, some the other hand, is technically a
insists that Christophine go or analysis—as readers we are
day soon, catch her alone, member of Antoinette’s family,
with her, and no one else. left to conclude the fact of her
implying physical violence. though he also belongs to the
When they arrive, Antoinette mother’s madness by the
They begin to push her around, black community. It would seem
runs as fast as she can from presence of the two caretakers
but when a boy named Sandi that both cruelty and mercy here
the carriage to the house in and Annette’s treatment of
comes over to them, the bullies transcend racial boundaries.
her excitement to see her Antoinette. The silence between
run away. Sandi is a relation of
mother. At first, Antoinette Christophine and Antoinette on 1 4
Antoinette’s through one of
does not recognize her the ride home is a further
her father’s affairs, ands he
mother, and only sees that indication of the trauma of the
refers to him as her cousin. He
there is a black man, a black event, as Antoinette is rejected
promises to make sure the
woman, and a white woman in by her mother. She has no family
other children don’t bother her
the room. She cannot see her any longer.
again.
mother’s face, but soon
recognizes her by her 1 3 Antoinette is crying and dirty Antoinette is comforted by order
damaged hair. They embrace, when she arrives at the and beauty upon arriving in the
and Antoinette struggles to convent. The nuns clean her up alien environment of the
express to her mother that, and offer her milk to sooth her, convent—she calms down when
though Pierre is dead, she is but she chokes on it. When one she observes the pleasant look of
here for her. In response, of the nuns tells Antoinette to the nun, and the beauty of Louise
Annette flings Antoinette look at her, that Antoinette will de Plana. She also welcomes the
away from her and loudly not be afraid of her, she takes presence of the convent’s well-
refuses her. Christophine in the nun’s clean and pleasant kept gardens, a much more
takes Antoinette back to her appearance and begins to calm orderly version of the gardens in
aunt’s house, and they do not down. The nun tells her that which she has grown up seeking
speak of what happened. she will not have to walk to solace. The nun, as well as fellow
school alone anymore, and students like Louise de Plana,
then introduces her to Louise represent a new kind of woman
de Plana, a fellow student. in Antoinette’s life: calm,
Louise connects with unmarried, and in control.
Antoinette by joking with her
about the nuns, and as they 1 3
walk through the convent
Antoinette is comforted by
Louise’s beauty as well as by
the trees and flowers in the
convent’s gardens.

At the convent, in a hot and The point that Antoinette takes Antoinette prays for her The nuns and fellow students
sticky classroom, Antoinette away from her lessons is that the mother as if she is dead, gradually replace Antoinette’s
and her classmates practice major feature of saints is their though she is still living, and family as the closest and most
needlework while listening to wealth, beauty, and handsome says to herself that she must nurturing people in her life. Her
the nuns read from a book suitors. Antoinette seems to have forget her. The rest of education at the convent school
about the lives of the saints. a hard time taking the nuns’ Antoinette’s family drifts from connects the narrative of Wide
Antoinette notices that all of teachings at face value, as she her-- Christophine goes away Sargasso Sea even further to
the saints they hear about are questions the existence of a to live with her son, and Mr. Jane Eyre, in which the orphan
beautiful and wealthy, “loved supposedly eternally preserved Mason visits only rarely. Jane is educated at a boarding
by rich and handsome young rose formerly belonging to a Eventually, Aunt Cora travels school, and goes on to teach and
men.” When it is claimed saint. back to England for her health, find companionship at a school
during one of these lessons and Antoinette moves into the run by a clergyman.
that a rose belonging to one of convent full-time.
these saints has never died, 1
and still exists, Antoinette Antoinette thinks of the Though comfortable at the
privately questions this, convent as a refuge, finding its convent, Antoinette struggles to
thinking, “Oh but where? structure and routine really connect with and believe in
Where?” comforting. She learns and the doctrine of the church.
The nuns place high emphasis Though the nuns are celibate, it recites her prayers by rote, but Eventually, the contradictions
on appearance, as well as is clear that they are training wonders about the low she finds within Catholic
chastity and deportment. their students to be good wives in premium placed on happiness teachings lead her to abandon
Though there are no mirrors at polite society. The premium in their teachings-- “But what prayer altogether. This brings
the convent, Antoinette once placed on appearance and about happiness, I thought at Antoinette again to the
sees a young nun admiring her manners even affects some of first, is there no happiness? Oh compromise that seems at the
own appearance, in a cask of the nuns themselves. Antoinette happiness of course, center of the notion of freedom in
water. Louise de Plana and her becomes caught up in these happiness, well.” Antoinette the novel—one can be happy and
sisters are repeatedly held up values as well, fixating on the de marvels at the clear-cut free or safe, but not both.
by the nuns as examples of Planas as models of ideal contrasts in convent life,
impeccable manners, hygiene, femininity. She idolizes Louise between light and dark, 1 2 4
and beauty. Antoinette greatly and comes to associate her Heaven and Hell. She learns
admires them and envies one closely with her own mother. from one of the nuns that a
of the sisters’ hair, asks her feature of Heaven is that all its
how to style hers to look the 1 3 inhabitants are transcendently
same. Antoinette admires beautiful, and prays to be dead
Louise in particular. When so that she might experience
listening to the nuns read this Heaven. She then
about the saints and their remembers that this, like so
European origins, Antoinette many other thoughts, is
constructs an image in her considered a mortal sin, and
mind of France that is “a lady gradually stops praying. This
with black hair wearing a white makes her feel happier and
dress,” and says that this is more free, but less safe.
because Louise, who was born
in France, has black curly hair,
and her mother, who is also of
French descent, liked to wear
white dresses.

After living in the convent for Mr. Mason’s news means that The night before she is to leave Antoinette’s recurring nightmare
eighteen months, Antoinette Antoinette’s time of safety and the convent for good, foreshadows many of the details
is paid a visit by Mr. Mason. He inclusion in convent life is coming Antoinette has her nightmare of her marriage to her future
brings her a dress, and tells her to a close, and she has no choice for a second time, now relayed husband, who will eventually hate
that he is taking her to live in the matter. Her feeling of in much more detail. In it, she is her, bring her to an unfamiliar
with him and Aunt Cora, who suffocation and dismay is being lead through a forest of place, and imprison her in his
has returned from England. augmented by the mention of a unfamiliar trees wearing a attic. In both the dream and real
Antoinette greets this suitor—the prospect of marriage beautiful white dress. She does life, barring her final suicide,
information with dismay. He is thereby linked to a loss of not know the man leading her, Antoinette makes no effort to
asks her if she has learned to freedom, to suffocation. This but she sees that he hates her escape. And when she shares the
dance, and she replies that she sensation is so distressing to and begins to cry. dream, she is told by those who
has not. Mr. Mason tells her Antoinette that she cannot even Nevertheless, she makes no are preparing her for life as a wife
that he has invited friends speak of it, again half-hoping effort to save herself, and in that it is the dream that is evil,
from England to come and stay that her refusal to verbalize it fact knows that if anyone were rather than the suffocating
with them, that one in might erase it from reality. to try to save her, she would truths of marriage which she
particular is coming to see her. refuse. The stranger leads her senses in the dream.
Antoinette immediately feels a 1 2 3 4 up a flight of steps and the
suffocating sensation at her dream ends. Antoinette wakes 4
stepfather’s mention of a and shares her dream with
suitor, but refuses to mention Sister Marie Augustine, telling
it because, she feels, again, her that she has dreamt she
that if she doesn’t speak of it was in Hell. The nun tells her
might not be true. She notes to forget the dream, because it
that the nuns and the other is evil, and gives her chocolate
girls know why she is leaving, to drink.
and she resents their
The chocolate reminds Antoinette’s unwillingness to
cheerfulness, envies them for
Antoinette of drinking allow her mother’s death into the
their continued safety at the
chocolate after her mother’s narrative until a full year after it
convent.
funeral, which had taken place has happened is a testament to
more than a year before. This the trauma of the event. The
is Antoinette’s first mention of funeral is characterized by
her mother’s death. She thinks Antoinette’s feeling of
about the fact that no one told disconnection from the
her how her mother died, and proceedings, from the truth and
she never asked. She circumstances of her mother’s
remembers that she tried to death, and from the solace
pray at the funeral, but the promised to her by prayer. The
words gave her no solace. She ultimate failure of religion (and
does not share any of this with by extension the failure of
Sister Marie Augustine, but inclusion in a religious group) to
merely asks her tearfully why provide order and answers is
terrible things happen in the expressed with finality in Sister
world. The nun tells her sadly Marie Augustine’s sad and
not to concern herself with inadequate answer to
such a question, because “We Antoinette’s question.
do not know why the devil
must have his little day. Not 1 4
yet,” and puts her back to bed
to wait for her stepfather’s
arrival.

PART 2 Antoinette recognizes a The husband’s detachment from
woman in the door of a nearby Antoinette is clear. He thinks of
Part Two begins with The husband is disoriented. The
hut, and goes to speak to her. her as a stranger, and this
Antoinette’s new husband’s locals, the servants, the weather,
The husband analyzes her enables him to analyze her
narration. He is never named and the landscape all seem
appearance critically. He thinks appearance critically, without
in the novel. He and Antoinette unwelcoming to him. His opinion
of her eyes as “too large” and emotion or tenderness. Also clear
have just married and are on of Amélie can be extended to
“disconcerting... long, sad, dark, is his contempt for and
their way to spend their cover his view of Jamaica and
alien eyes.” He remarks to misunderstanding of the local
honeymoon in the Windward Granbois in general-- lovely in
himself that he had not had culture, as he considers the
Islands at Granbois, an estate appearance, but malignant. The
time to notice things like this language inferior, and refuses to
that had belonged to Annette. symbolic significance of names is
about Antoinette before their take the shelter offered to him by
They are stopped in a town introduced in this section. The
marriage, as they had married a local woman. The strange
called Massacre, and it is town named Massacre, of which
only a month after his arrival in power that Amélie will eventually
raining. He and Antoinette, no one remembers the history,
Jamaica, and he had spent capitalize on with the husband
along with several servants, presages the tragedy and loss of
three weeks of that month ill begins to take shape here,
wait underneath a tree for it to identity that will befall
with fever. He listens to communicated only through a
stop. One of the servants is Antoinette as a result of this
Antoinette and the woman look.
Amélie, whom the husband marriage. The fact that the
speak French patois, which he
finds “lovely” but “sly, spiteful, husband himself is never named 1 3 4
thinks of as “debased.” Despite
malignant perhaps, like so in the novel heightens his sense
his private complaints that the
much else in this place.” The of non-being in this foreign place.
rain is adding to his feelings of
husband asks Antoinette
1 2 4 discomfort and melancholy,
about the name of the town,
the husband refuses to take
whether slaves were
shelter in the woman’s house
massacred there. Antoinette
when Antoinette offers,
seems shocked at the idea, and
claiming to not mind getting
tells him that no one
wet. At this, Amélie gives him a
remembers the event that the
look that he feels is so
town is named for. Three little
malicious and intimate that he
boys come to stare at them,
has to look away.
and when the husband smiles
at one of them, he runs away
crying.

The husband leaves the The Young Bull’s self-given name They ride up into the Unlike Antoinette, her husband is
shelter of the tree to speak to perfectly illustrates his aggressive mountains toward Granbois. as alienated from and threatened
the two porters also desire for dominance. His the husband understands why by the landscape as he is from
accompanying them on their attitude toward his own the Young Bull called the place the people in it. Information
trip. One of them introduces countrymen is yet another wild, and thinks to himself that about the financial basis of their
himself as “the Young Bull,” demonstration of the it is, “Not only wild but marriage is revealed, and the
and tells the husband that this complicated social hierarchy menacing. Those hills would husband’s estrangement from his
island is wild, and the locals are among the black people of close in on you.” The husband own family is implied.
“not civilized.” He Jamaica at this time. His finds the colors and scale of
demonstrates by showing that behavior also indicates the the landscape overwhelmingly 1 2 3
the other porter, who was born enduring position of privilege, alien, and thinks of Antoinette
in Massacre, does not know his despite emancipation, that the as a stranger. As they ride, he
own age. The husband notices English occupy. The Young Bull is imagines writing a letter to his
that this porter is “by far the desperate to impress the father in England, in which he
gayest member of the wedding husband merely because he is reports that as part of the
party.” The rain stops, and as English, and he seeks to do so by marriage arrangement he, the
the group gets ready to depart, demonstrating his knowledge of husband, has been paid thirty
the Young Bull sings to himself and respect for what he thousand pounds “without
in English while glancing considers to be English values-- question or condition,” and
sideways at the husband, who fluency in the English language, that, as planned, no provision
finds him boastful and foolish. education, being “civilized.” As has been made in the contract
As they ride away from the husband observes that the to leave any of the money in
Massacre, the husband less educated porter is the Antoinette’s name. In this
remembers waking very early happiest, happiness is set in imagined address to his father,
the previous morning while opposition to other desired the husband remarks that he
Antoinette was still sleeping, qualities in the novel, just as it has sold his soul so as not to
and feeling a sense of was during Antoinette’s stay at have to beg his father or older
contentment as he watched the convent school. brother, “the son you love,” for
black women walk through the money any longer.
streets selling cakes and 1 2 4
They ride on and arrive at As Antoinette and her husband
sweets.
Granbois. Antoinette offers begin to connect, their
the husband a drink of water differences are made more and
from the mountain stream at more clear. Antoinette’s attempts
the boundary of the estate, at affection are channeled
and the husband remarks to through her love of the land, and
himself that it is the first time the husband’s tentative affection
he has felt “simple and natural” for her can only be expressed in
with her, and that she “might terms of how closely she
have been any pretty English resembles an English girl. His
girl.” He enjoys the water, and discomfort with the place rests in
finds its color beautiful. They his personification of it-- he
arrive at the house, which the attributes malicious intent to the
husband describes as “more trees and mountains, as well as
awkward than ugly, a little sad sadness to the house they are to
as if it knew it could not last.” stay in.

Antoinette introduces the The husband equates Antoinette shows the It is unclear whether the
husband to the servants, appearance with content of husband to their suite, where husband crushes the wreath
whom she has known since character in a similar way to the they toast their happiness with intentionally or not, but his
childhood. Among them is nuns in the convent. His rum punch, and see that two careless treatment of their
Baptiste, a dignified man who dismissal of Hilda and wreaths of flowers have been wedding wreaths foreshadows
speaks English well and Christophine is based on the laid on the bed for them. The his careless treatment of their
reproaches a younger girl appearance of their hair and husband wears his for a marriage. He verbalizes his
servant, Hilda, when she clothing. Just as the moment, then drops it on the conflation of appearance and
begins to giggle during the manipulative dynamic between floor and steps on it. dress with personal character in
introductions. the husband Amélie and the husband was Antoinette explains her his and Antoinette’s discussion of
observes that Hilda’s dress is introduced and communicated connection to Granbois: “This Christophine. The real letter that
spotless, but thinks that her merely through glances, the is my place and everything is he writes to his father lacks all of
hair, arranged in many small tense power struggle that will on our side.” They discuss the emotional content that his
braids, makes her look ensue between the husband and Christophine briefly, and the imagined letter did, and it is
“savage.” Hilda runs into the Christophine begins here, with a husband remarks that if she unclear whether he ever sends it.
house because she cannot silent stare-down. were taller, and “dressed to the
cease giggling. Antoinette nines,” he might be afraid of 1 4
introduces the husband to 1 2 3 her. The husband goes into his
Christophine. The husband private dressing room and
takes in her clothing and writes a real letter to his
decides to himself that she father. The letter informs him
seems “insignificant.” They simply that the marriage “has
stare at each other for a gone according to your plans
minute, and when the husband and wishes,” briefly describes
looks away first, Christophine Granbois, and explains the
smiles to herself. husband’s delay in writing as
owing to his fever. The letter
also reveals that Mr. Mason
died before the husband
arrived in Jamaica. The
husband puts the letter in a
drawer without sending it.
The husband’s narration looks The truth of the husband’s
back to his initial courtship of intentions with Antoinette are
Antoinette, and their wedding. explicitly stated for the first time.
Of Jamaica and Antoinette, he The remembered scene of their
says they both “meant nothing marriage is an echo and an
to me.” He describes all of his inversion of the earlier scene of
actions in the courtship as Annette’s marriage to Mr. Mason.
merely playing a pre-scripted This time, though, it is the groom
role, delivering “a faultless rather than the bride seeking
performance,” and remembers financial security, and the black
that only the black servants servants rather than the white
seemed to doubt his sincerity. guests who suspect. Despite his
At the wedding ceremony, he success in delivering the
suspects that his guests are performance necessary to
looking at him with pity or guarantee his financial security,
ridicule, and he wonders why, the husband feels powerless and
since he has benefitted so pitied.
much financially from the
union. 1 3 4

The husband describes the It seems that Richard Mason, After dinner, the husband and Antoinette’s allusions to sleeping
morning before the wedding, Antoinette’s step brother, is Antoinette go for a walk. underneath the full moon imply
when a panicked Richard complicit and perhaps even has a Antoinette tells him of a night madness and melancholy, which
Mason, who in the wake of his person interest in the financial during her childhood, while will eventually overtake her. As
father’s death is now in charge arrangement of the marriage. spending the summer at the husband and Antoinette
of arranging the financial The extent of the husband’s Granbois, that she awoke to continue to grow closer, their
particulars of Antoinette’s deception is demonstrated, as he find two very large rats on the affection continues to be colored
wedding, informs him that shows affection and promises windowsill staring at her. She by symbolic premonitions of
Antoinette is refusing to go happiness to Antoinette, despite spent the night on the veranda doom-- his song again recalls the
through with the wedding. The the fact that he is motivated by in a hammock, sleeping under symbolic burning bird, aborted
husband responds with financial interest and a desire not the full moon. The next flight.
impatience, wanting to know to be embarrassed by a Creole, morning, according to
why. He thinks to himself what someone he considers to be of a Antoinette, Christophine 1 4
a fool he would seem, lower caste than himself. chastised her, telling her that it
returning to England “jilted by was “very bad to sleep in the
this Creole girl,” and so goes to 1 2 3 4 moonlight when the moon is
Antoinette to find out why full.” Antoinette asks the
she’s changed her mind. He husband if he too thinks she
speaks softly to her, kisses her, has slept too long in the
promises her peace and moonlight. He replies by
happiness, and she relents. holding her close and singing
to her. Antoinette listens to
The husband falls asleep As the husband warms toward
him sing, and joins in, singing
remembering his wedding day, Antoinette, he understands and
the refrain with him, “Shine
and when he wakes up he finds expresses his feelings through
bright, shine bright Robin as you
Antoinette waiting for him, the commentary on her apparel.
Even as the two grow closer, they die.” They return to their
dinner table set lavishly with
remain entrenched in their bedroom and drink to their
flowers and candles. He
oppositional cultural identities, happiness.
wonders why he has never
realized how beautiful she is, discussing their conflicting
and compliments her dress. At understandings of each other’s
dinner Antoinette asks him if native landscapes. The moths
England is “like a cold dark that fall to their deaths in the
dream,” as it was described to candles’ flames harken back to
her in a letter by a friend who the burning parrot at Coulibri,
married an Englishman. The which was a bad omen
husband replies, annoyed, that recognized by all who saw it.
the West Indies seem like a
dream to him, “quite unreal.” 1 4
During dinner, moths
repeatedly fly into the candles
and fall dead on the tablecloth.

The next morning, the When Christophine calls her The husband describes The husband repeatedly
husband wakes to find coffee “bull’s blood,” her watching the sunset each conceals his true feelings from
Antoinette already up and aggression is connected to that evening with Antoinette, when Antoinette. His interest in the
dressed, and Christophine already demonstrated by the he would wait for the scent of flowers that bloom at night is a
serving breakfast. Young Bull. Her offering “blood” the flowers that bloomed only symbolic manifestation of his
Christophine offers the for the husband to drink also at night. During one such fascination with the difference
husband coffee, calling it her subtly references obeah. Again, moment, Antoinette tells him between his and Antoinette’s
“bull’s blood,” which makes the the husband channels his about their neighbors at days and nights. During the day,
husband remember the Young opinion of a person (in this case, Granbois, who are either their are constant reminders of
Bull. He observes her attire Christophine) through his hermits or drunks. The the distance and incompatibility
closely, and criticizes her habit observation of her attire, and husband asks her if the place is between them, as exemplified by
of not lifting her skirt off the again is shown to lack as lonely as it feels to him, and their conflicting understandings
ground as she walks, understanding of local cultural she replies that it is, and that of the same landscape. But at
commenting to Antoinette values. The rose that the she loves it more than night, when the flowers bloom,
that her dress must get very husband touches recalls the anywhere else in the world, the come together.
dirty. Antoinette explains to eternally preserved rose from the and more than she loves any
him that when the women in nuns’ teachings. Where that rose person. She describes the re- 1 4
Jamaica don’t hold up their endured as a romantic symbol of opening of Granbois after her
dresses, it’s a sign of respect. virtue and blessedness, though, mother’s marriage to Mr.
She tells him that it is also this rose is in decay, suggesting a Mason. She tells him that
meant to indicate status, to wickedness connected to the Granbois had been almost
show that they can dirty their romantic relationship between completely overgrown, and
dresses because they have Antoinette and her husband. was transformed largely by the
others. The husband touches a efficient and trustworthy
rose on the coffee tray and its 1 2 3 Baptiste. The husband keeps
petals fall off. Antoinette sends his opinion of the black
him off to the bathing pools on servants to himself--
the estate. Antoinette trusts them, but he
does not. Antoinette tries to
The husband describes the Just as in the case of the town
teach the husband patois
pools and the surrounding called Massacre, facts in this
songs, which he
jungle as beautiful and world are shown to be unclear,
mispronounces.
untouched, “with an alien, fluid, the truth mutable. The
disturbing, secret loveliness,” husband finds the landscape to
and yearns to possess the be disturbing in its quality of
secret of this loveliness. He withholding secrets, a quality
spends afternoons swimming that is soon implied to belong to
with Antoinette, and observes Antoinette as well, as she refrains
that she is “undecided, from explaining to the husband
uncertain about facts- any her relationship with Sandi.
facts,” for example the
presence of poison in certain 1 4
or other of the snakes in the
swimming hole. He also
observes that Antoinette
throws like a boy when she
throws a rock to protect him
from a type of crab whose
name she can’t remember. He
asks her who had taught her to
throw, and she tells him simply
that it was a boy named Sandi.

During the day, Antoinette is At night, Antoinette is completely One day, Amélie delivers a Daniel Cosway is a vicious and
silent and distant, often under the husband’s power. The letter to the husband, from embittered product of an implied
“chattering” to Christophine in husband’s desire for Antoinette is someone who identifies coercive sexual relationship
patois. But at night, she opens not fueled by love, though. His himself as Daniel Cosway, the between a slaveowner and his
up and tells him intimate arousal by the sight of her empty “most unfortunate and poverty slave. His letters offer an
things, like that she never dress, as well as the conflation of stricken” of Old Cosway’s many alternate version of Antoinette’s
wished to live before meeting love and death here, suggest that illegitimate children, the childhood to that given in Part
him, and he questions his initial he is aroused not by Antoinette, product of one of his affairs One of the novel. In addition to
hesitation to marry her. The but rather the idea of the with his slaves. The letter tells contradicting much of what
husband describes a period of negation of her. Here, the natural the husband, in slightly broken Antoinette narrates, it also fills in
frequent and passionate world mirrors the emotional English, that Daniel Cosway some of the gaps she leaves, for
lovemaking with Antoinette. reality of the characters of the has heard about his marriage example about the character and
One of these nights, she says novel again-- all trace of the rain, to Antoinette and feels death of her father, and the
to him that if he said so, she as well as all trace of the couple’s compelled to warn the reason that her mother’s French
would die: “Say die and watch passion, disappears during the husband about her. He claims Creole heritage would isolate her
me die.” Despite all this day. that the husband has been from English society in Jamaica.
passion, the husband knows “shamefully deceived” by the The vindictive nature of his
that he does not love her. One 1 3 4 Mason family, that they’ve letters call into question his
night he is aroused merely by duped him into marrying reliability as a narrator, and this
the sight of her dress on the Antoinette without telling him invites the reader to in turn
floor, and makes love to her that madness runs in both question the motives and
“without a word or caress.” He sides of her family. The letter reliability of the other narrators
considers their relationship a describes the Cosways as and speakers in this story.
dangerous game, during which wicked slaveowners, hated all
“Desire, Hatred, Life, Death across Jamaica. He also claims
1 2 3 4
came very close in the that Old Cosway was an
darkness.” Each night he listens alcoholic who eventually went
to the rain, of which there is mad, died “raving just like his
very little evidence in the father before him.” He explains
morning. that Annette was left
friendless and destitute after
Cosway’s death because she is
French Creole from
Martinique, and the French
and English in Jamaica are
enemies “like cat and dog.”

The letter goes on to tell the Daniel Cosway’s letter presents a The husband is not surprised The husband’s interaction with
husband that in the wake of completely different by the letter, in fact he feels as the natural world again mirrors
“the glorious Emancipation Act,” understanding and opinion of the if he’s been waiting for it. He his interior landscape.
the estate at Coulibri went to Emancipation Act, as well as of walks back to the house after Disillusioned and suspicious of
bush because no one would Annette and Mr. Mason, than reading the letter and tramples Antoinette after reading Daniel
work for Annette. It describes those which Antoinette expresses some orchids that he Cosway’s letter, he tramples the
her as “worthless and spoilt,” in Part One. It is also clear that remembers recently admiring flowers that he previously
and says that the madness collective gossip is the source of and likening to Antoinette’s admired for their connection to
latent in her “and in all these much of his knowledge of beauty. He feels overcome by Antoinette. When Amélie’s
white Creoles” came out during Antoinette’s family. The letter the heat. When he arrives at comments rattle Antoinette to
this time, that many can attest neglects to mention the fire at the house, Amélie is informing the point of violence, it is made
to seeing her laughing and Coulibri, and so glosses over the Antoinette that Christophine clear that Amélie’s insolence
talking to herself. Daniel circumstances of Pierre’s death plans to leave. Antoinette is toward both the husband and
Cosway claims that Annette’s and Annette’s grief. upset, and Amélie teases her Antoinette is also rooted in racial
madness became worse after sarcastically about both tension and disparity.
her marriage to Mr. Mason,
1 2 3 4 Christophine’s and the
whom she tried to kill and was husband’s dissatisfaction with 1 2 3
then shut away, and who the “sweet honeymoon house,”
according to gossip “love her so at which point Antoinette slaps
much that if he have the world her. Amélie calls her a “white
on a plate he give it to her.” cockroach” and hits her back,
and the two women struggle.
Daniel Cosway then explains Daniel Cosway’s feelings of The husband tells Amélie to
that when he heard that the resentment and alienation are leave and fetch Christophine.
Masons were planning on rooted largely in racial identity. She complies, but leaves the
marrying Antoinette off to an His image of the husband is also room singing, “The white
Englishman “who know nothing incongruous with what the cockroach she buy young man/
of her,” he thought about husband’s own narration
The white cockroach she marry.”
warning him, but didn’t presents us with-- the husband
because “they are white, I am constantly distrusts and
coloured.” He writes that upon misunderstands the black people
hearing that the two were to around him.
honeymoon at Granbois, near
where he lives, he became 1 2 4
certain that God had made it
his duty to tell the husband
the truth, because he is a man
who he’s heard is “young and
handsome with a kind word for
all, black, white, also coloured.”
Cosway challenges him to ask
“that devil of a man” Richard
Mason to tell him the truth if
he doesn’t believe what’s in the
letter. He ends the letter with
a request that the husband
come see him, assuring him
that Amélie knows where he
lives.

As Antoinette waits for All women in Christophine’s Christophine calls Amélie The lines of affinity and
Christophine, she ignores the vicinity seem to bow to her worthless, and likens her to a alienation in terms of race and
husband and begins to shred influence. Antoinette feels centipede. She kisses class among these people are
her bed sheet in quiet distress. panicked and lost when she Antoinette on the cheek and shown again to be tangled,
When Christophine arrives, decides to leave, and Amélie is leaves. Antoinette asks the complex. No one is at home in
Antoinette asks her why she is uncharacteristically terrified and husband if he heard the song any group. Amélie refers to
leaving, and pleads, “What will obedient in the face of her Amélie was singing, and he Antoinette and the husband as
become of me?” Christophine threats. says he didn’t understand it. white cockroaches, but
tells her to get up and get Antoinette explains that she, Christophine calls Amélie, who is
dressed, that “Woman must 1 2 3 and all white people on the of the same race and class, a
have spunks to live in this island, “all of us who were here centipede, which is not so very
wicked world.” She cites a before their own people in far off from a cockroach.
mutual dislike between herself Africa sold them to the slave Antoinette and the husband are
and the husband as a reason traders,” are what Amélie both white and are united in
for leaving, not wanting to referred to as the “white marriage, but Antoinette when
cause tension in their cockroach.” She tells him that expresses her frustration at being
marriage, and she insists “I she’s also heard English excluded from English society,
have a right to my rest.” During women call her and her family she includes him as a culprit.
the conversation, Christophine “white niggers,” so she Also, though Antoinette has
catches Amélie giving the wonders, “between you I don’t displayed comfort with and
husband a sly and insolent know who I am and where is respect for black people
smile. Christophine tells my country and where do I throughout most of the novel,
Amélie in a quiet voice that if belong and why was I ever here even she espouses a deeply
she sees her do this again she born at all.” Before the racist account of the history of
will mash her face “like I mash husband has a chance to say the slave trade in her anger
plantain.” She goes on to anything, she tells him to leave toward Amélie.
threaten Amélie with sickness: the room so she can dress.
“Perhaps you don’t get up 1 2 3 4
again with the bellyache I give After a while, the husband The husband explicitly
you.” Amélie leaves quietly, knocks on Antoinette’s door articulates a clear difference
clearly frightened of and receives no answer. He between his and Antoinette’s
Christophine. sits down to eat, and sees that culture, in terms of emotional
Baptiste looks expression. He views the
demonstratively mournful as Caribbean way of displaying
he serves lunch, and he thinks emotion as weak, vulnerable as
to himself that the people here compared to the English reserve
in the Caribbean are very he learned at a young age.
vulnerable. He remembers
that he, unlike them, must have 1
been five or six years old when
he was taught to conceal his
emotions. When his meal is
done he goes into the
bedroom to find Antoinette
asleep, and is disturbed by the
silence of the afternoon. He
decides to go out walking.

While walking, the husband The husband’s aimless Once the husband recognizes Baptiste’s insistence that there
thinks of all the people who wandering through the forest Baptiste, he follows him back was never a road where the
must have known the truth of mirrors his emotional turmoil. He toward the house. He asks husband says he saw one casts
Antoinette’s background and loses track of his way as he walks, Baptiste about the abandoned further doubt on the scene the
not told him-- his father, his and becomes paranoid that house in the woods, and husband has described. Either
brother, Richard Mason, someone is watching him, in Baptiste tells him that a priest the husband was hallucinating,
Amelie. He reaches the forest, much the same way that he loses once lived there, long ago. The or Baptiste is hiding something.
which he sees as hostile, and a handle on the truth, and husband asks him about the Either way, the ideas of
walks into it. As he walks becomes paranoid that all are paved road on which he found perception and truth are
deeper into the trees, he lying to him. the and frightened the young muddled. This is the first mention
wonders how one can ever girl, but Baptiste tells him that of zombies in the husband’s
discover the truth, and 1 4 there was never a road there. narration-- presumably he has
concludes that it is impossible, The husband asks if there is heard the term used and has a
because no one will speak the “something wrong about the vague sense of what it might be.
truth to him. Along the way, he place,” but Baptiste says
becomes sure that someone is nothing. The husband presses 1 4
watching him. He comes upon him, asking if there is a ghost
the ruins of a paved road and a or “a zombi” there, but
house, overgrown, and notices Baptiste insists that he doesn’t
bunches of flowers, tied with know anything about it, and
grass, left underneath a tree repeats that there was never a
near the house. road there.
This mysterious place calms The husband’s senses seem to be Back at the house, the The husband does not narrate
the husband, but not for long. playing tricks on him in the husband goes into his private his reaction to what he has read.
He soon sees a little girl hostile environment of the drawing room and pulls out a We are left to imagine the impact
carrying a basket, approaching woods. He is sure he sees and book called “The Glittering of this description on his
the clearing. When she sees frightens this young girl, but his Coronet of Isles,” about the understanding of the experience
him, she screams, drops her failure to see where she has gone, West Indies, and turns to a he’s had in the woods. It would
basket, and runs away. He tries find the path he had been chapter entitled, “Obeah,” to seem that this description of the
to call out to her, but this walking on, or recognize Baptiste the section about the “zombi,” zombi, and obeah, confirms the
frightens her more. When he call into question the reliability of and reads it to himself. The husband’s suspicions about what
attempts to find the path he’d his senses. book says that a zombi is “a he’s seen as well as his mistrust
been on, he cannot, and dead person who seems to be of the people around him, black
becomes “lost and afraid 1 4 alive or a living person who is and white alike. However, it is
among these enemy trees.” He dead,” but that it can also be clear that this book was written
hears footsteps and a voice “the spirit of a place.” It goes on by an outsider, probably a white
calling to him-- it is Baptiste, to explain that a zombi is man, for the benefit of outsiders,
who has been looking for the usually a malignant force, to be so even its reliability is left open
husband for hours. The placated with gifts of flowers to question. It is also implied that
husband does not recognize and fruit. At this point, the the girl was so frightened of the
him at first, and does not husband remembers the tied husband because she believed
answer. bunches of flowers near the him to be the ghost or zombi that
abandoned house. The book occupied the place.
goes on to explain that black
people usually refuse to talk
1 4
about obeah, and often lie
about it when asked, and that
white people “pretend” to
dismiss it all as nonsense.

The narration switches to In the face of her husband’s Christophine lights her pipe, Christophine again possesses the
Antoinette’s point of view. She growing distance, Antoinette and after a moment replies, power and wisdom that other
is on horseback, on her way to seeks comfort in the closest thing "You ask me a hard thing, I tell women, especially Antoinette,
Christophine’s house. Her to home that she has, you a hard thing, pack up and lack. A rare thing that unites
horse stumbles along the way, Christophine. Unlike the go." Antoinette balks, asks people across race and class
so she gets off and walks. husband’s, Antoinette’s journey Christophine where she would divides, according to
When Antoinette arrives at into the woods yields comfort, go and says that she would be Christophine, is female
Christophine’s house, she finds security, and connection with her laughed at by all who know her foolishness in relationships.
her old nurse sitting on a box past and identity. Clothing again if she left, that there must be Though Antoinette is unhappy,
underneath a mango tree. takes on emotional valence, as something else she can do. she is too afraid to take
Christophine offers Antoinette Antoinette draws comfort from Christophine replies that it is Christophine’s advice and leave
a box, but Antoinette kneels on her memory of Christophine the husband who will be her husband.
the ground close to washing clothes at Coulibri. laughed at, not her, and tells
Christophine instead. She her that she cannot force the 1 2 3 4
breathes in Christophine’s 1 3 husband to love her, that
familiar, comforting smell of trying to will only make it
clean and starched cotton, and worse between them. When
remembers watching Antoinette continues to refuse
Christophine washing her this advice, Christophine spits
clothes at Coulibri. Antoinette over her shoulder and says, "All
looks around, takes in the women, all colors, nothing but
beauty of the wildlife and the fools.” She tells Antoinette that
sky, and feels a desire to stay in for a rich white girl, she is more
this place, her home. After a foolish than the rest, and tells
moment she tells Christophine her again to go.
that her husband does not love
Antoinette now explains to Christophine is surprised and
her, that he barely speaks to
Christophine that she is no angry at Antoinette’s
her and will not sleep in the
longer rich, that after the disenfranchisement, knowing
same room with her, and asks
marriage she has no money of that financial security is key to a
Christophine what she should
her own, as it has all been woman’s ability to act for herself.
do.
signed over to the husband. Nevertheless, she sticks to her
Christophine is furious, and advice, believing that Antoinette
blames Richard Mason for the can still be free of her
arrangement, calling him, unhappiness if she tries.
"worse than Satan." She
continues, however, to advise 4
Antoinette to leave the house,
this time suggesting that she
ask her husband nicely for the
money to visit a cousin, and
when she gets away to stay
gone. She tells Antoinette that
the husband will eventually
come to see where she’s gone,
and when he realizes that she
can get along without him, he’ll
want her back. Antoinette says
if she goes, she’ll have to go far
away, and says that she’d like
to see England.

Antoinette imagines what it Antoinette again equates setting Christophine, who has been Christophine’s and Antoinette’s
might be like to go to England and landscape with inner life, watching Antoinette closely understandings of truth,
alone. She thinks that she emotional reality, and identity. while she daydreams, evidence, and belief differ greatly.
could be a different person in She believes that if she goes to interrupts her by asking her if Unlike Antoinette, who relies on
England, and pictures England England, it will be possible for her she really believes that and trusts her geography book’s
to be “rosy pink,” the way it to become a different person. England exists. When account of England to shape her
appears in the geography book Even while she hopes, though, Antoinette expresses surprise knowledge of it, Christophine
map she studied in the she fears this unknown place. at this question, Christophine treats the entire idea of England,
convent. She remembers the replies, "I never see the damn a place she has never personally
page in the geography book 1 2 4 place, how I know?” Antoinette experienced, with skepticism.
that named its towns and asks her incredulously if she
regions, all unfamiliar to her. really does not believe that 1 4
She mentally compares fields there is a country called
of corn to fields of sugarcane, England. Christophine
and thinks that England’s hills answers testily that she hasn’t
must be half the size of said she doesn’t believe, but
Jamaica’s. She thinks over rather that she doesn’t know,
what she knows of the seasons because she only knows what
in England, wonders what she sees with her eyes and
snow is like- "White feathers she’s never seen it. She goes on
falling? torn pieces of paper to say that what she has heard
falling?" She then has a sudden of England makes it sound like
vision of the house in which a freezing cold place where
she will live with her husband people steal your money, and
in England, and feels that she wonders why Antoinette
already knows it. She fears would want to go there in the
that in this house she will finish first place.
the recurring nightmare she’s
had since childhood, but then
stops herself.

Antoinette briefly questions For the first time, Antoinette Antoinette continues to insist The power of speech to alter
her own trust in questions Christophine’s that Christophine use her reality is implied to be more
Christophine’s good counsel, authority and wisdom. She power to make her husband powerful than the magic that
wondering why she is seeking persists, however, and for the come to her bed for just one Antoinette is after. It is speech,
the advice of someone who first time in the novel speaks of night. She is confident that she gossip and slander that have
might not believe in the the subject of obeah with will be able to make her manifested the trouble in their
existence of England. She Christophine. Her fear of the husband love her again if this marriage, and the husband’s
presses on, though, saying to topic is evident in her continued happens. Christophine warns refusal to call her by her real
Christophine, "You knew what refusal to name what she is her that even if he sleeps with name has at least as profound an
I wanted as soon as you saw referring to, asking for what she her, he’ll hate her afterward, effect on her as the one
me, and you certainly know wants from Christophine only that nothing can make him love Christophine believes that obeah
now." Christophine tells through hints. Christophine her. Antoinette replies that her would have on him.
Antoinette to hush, that she warns Antoinette against this husband hates her already,
cannot make the husband love plan, pointing out that that he refuses to even call her 1 3 4
her, but Antoinette insists, Antoinette's knowledge of the by her name. Instead, he calls
"Yes you can, I know you truth of obeah is insufficient, that her Bertha. She explains
can...You can make people love she does not understand what desperately that she cannot go
or hate. Or... or die." At this, the consequences might be. away, that the husband would
Christophine laughs loudly, never allow it. Christophine
and tells Antoinette that 1 3 4 then explains to Antoinette
everything she’s heard about that she knows why the
obeah is “foolishness and folly.” husband has cooled from her,
She warns her that “bad bad that it is because someone is
trouble” will be the result if slandering Antoinette and her
they use obeah to meddle with mother to him, and he doesn’t
this. know what to believe. She
warns her not to trust anyone
in Jamaica.

When Antoinette asks if this Where Antoinette questioned Christophine again instructs Christophine’s warning that
extends even to Aunt Cora, Christophine’s wisdom just Antoinette to “have spunks,” to Antoinette should not trust
Christophine tells her that moments before, she is now in “do battle for yourself.” She anyone is amplified here, as she
Aunt Cora is now a resigned awe of her knowledge. She tells her to go to the husband apparently does not even trust
old woman, and that "she turn cannot imagine how and tell him the truth about her own son not to spread
her face to the wall." Christophine knows exactly what what happened at Coulibri, rumors. While Christophine still
Antoinette demands to know happened when Aunt Cora and explain what caused her believes in Antoinette’s power to
how Christophine knows this. fought for her and was defeated. mother to fall sick with grief. remedy her situation by telling
She is shocked at Christophine’s strength is She warns Antoinette to do it the truth, Antoinette seems to
Christophine’s phrasing, amplified in contrast to Aunt calmly, without crying. share her husband’s distrust in
because she remembers that Cora’s surrender. Antoinette responds that she the adequacy or attainability of
Aunt Cora did in fact turn her has already tried this, and that truth.
face to the wall, when Richard 4 it is too late, and thinks to
Mason was arranging the herself that “it is always too 1 4
financial agreement of late for truth.” She and
Antoinette’s marriage. Christophine finally agree that
Antoinette remembers if Antoinette first tries to
overhearing a quarrel between speak to the husband calmly,
Aunt Cora and Richard, in then Christophine will do what
which Aunt Cora urged she asks. Christophine’s son
Richard to have Antoinette’s Jo-jo arrives, and Christophine
interests protected legally. warns Antoinette not to speak
Richard ignored her, telling her in front of him, because he will
to shut up and calling her an surely tell everyone anything
old fool. Antoinette went to that he hears-- “Nothing but
her after the quarrel and found leaky calabash that boy.”
her in bed shaking, with her
face to the wall. She told
Antoinette, "The Lord has
forsaken us," and did not speak
again except to give Antoinette
two of her rings to sell in case
of an emergency.

Antoinette and Christophine Antoinette is disoriented. It The narrative re-enters the Daniel Cosway’s second letter is
go into Christophine’s two- seems to be implied that husband’s consciousness. On more urgent and hostile than the
room house while Jo-jo Christophine, for all her talk of the day that Antoinette goes last. He now resorts to blackmail
prepares Antoinette’s horse not trusting anyone, and not to see Christophine, Amélie in order to persuade the husband
for her departure back to the telling Jo-jo any of her business, delivers another letter from to come see him. This implies
house at Granbois. may now be telling Jo-jo what is Daniel Cosway to the that his motivation must not
Christophine hands her going on. Antoinette feels a sense husband. The letter begins by purely be a desire to get the truth
something wrapped in a leaf of betrayal, but cannot tell asking the husband why he to the husband, on the grounds
and tells her to listen while she whether she is the traitor or hasn’t written back, and that the husband is a good and
explains what to do. Antoinette Antoinette is. Belief systems threatens that if the husband unsuspecting man. The
tries to give Christophine class across cultures here, as does not come to see him, he husband’s preoccupation with
money in exchange, but concepts of guilt and devotion will show up at the Granbois Amélie’s dress and appearance
Christophine will not take it. that were taught to her in the house, "and bawl out your foreshadows the sexual
When Antoinette leaves, she context of Catholicism become business before everybody." The relationship that they will soon
looks back and sees that bound up in this, her first husband stops reading and enter into
Christophine is talking to Jo-jo, personal interaction with obeah. sends for Amélie. As he waits
and that he seems curious and When she leaves, her image of for her, he pictures the white 1 2 4
amused by what she is telling Christophine is as of a saint. dress that he knows she will be
him. She hears a cock crow, Considering Antoinette’s wearing, pictures her hair and
and remembers that this experience with Catholic religion, her bare feet. As he looks out
signifies betrayal, but cannot this implies that Antoinette’s at the mountains, now familiar
discern who the traitor is in trust in and devotion toward to him, he feels that he is in a
this situation. She thinks of the Christophine is now shifting and nightmare.
“ugly money” that she offered ambivalent, on the verge of
When Amélie arrives, the The husband wishes to have no
Christophine, and how she disappointment, but still steeped
husband asks her if Daniel more contact with Daniel
refused to take it, and she in a longing for peace and
Cosway is a friend of hers. She Cosway. Not even Amélie, who is
thinks of Judas. She leaves rootedness.
says no, but she knows him. He cited by Daniel Cosway as the
with the image of
1 3 4 instructs her to tell Daniel person that knows him, is sure of
Christophine, with her
Cosway not to write him any his real name or his origins, and
headscarf tied Martinique
more letters, that they annoy like, everyone else, relies on
fashion, frozen in her mind “for
him, and that if he does give general gossip to draw her
ever like the colours in a
her a letter to deliver to the conclusions. Amélie’s flirtatious
stained-glass window.”
husband, to give it back to him. mockery of the husband
Amélie smiles at him in a way continues.
that makes the husband feel as
if she is about to laugh loudly 1 2 4
at him. To stop this, he keeps
talking, and asks her why
Daniel is writing to him. She
teases him, saying that if the
husband himself doesn’t know
after reading two of his letters,
how should she know. Then
the husband asks if he is really
a Cosway, and Amélie replies
that some people say he is and
some say he isn’t, but that’s
what he calls himself.

Amélie goes on to describe The truth of Daniel Cosway’s The narration now jumps to Daniel’s Cosway is deranged
Daniel Cosway as a “very identity is further confused for the husband in Daniel with bitterness, and his home is a
superior man,” who read the the husband. It is clear, though, Cosway’s sitting room. It is kind of miniature inferno. The red
Bible and lived like a white that Daniel Cosway, like the very hot, and there is no tablecloth, the heat, his home’s
man. When the husband asks Young Bull, behaves in a way that breeze, because his house is location at the bottom of the
what she means by this, she indicates his desire to be much further down the mountain, and Daniel’s
explains that Cosway has a included in, approved of by the mountain than Granbois, obsession with vengeance, all
house “like white people, with white upperclass. almost at sea level. The first give Daniel a devilish, fiendish
one room only for sitting in,” thing the husband describes is quality.
and that he has portraits of his 1 2 4 the large table in the room,
parents on the wall. The covered in a red fringed cloth 1 2
husband asks if his parents are that seems to make the hot
white, and she says no, they room even hotter. Daniel is
are both black. When the telling the husband that he’s
husband protests that Daniel been waiting for his reply, and
Cosway told him his father wondering why it was so slow,
was white, was Antoinette’s all the while staring at a
father, Amélie just shrugs. She framed text hanging on his wall
says it is all too long ago for that reads, "Vengence is Mine."
her. She is plainly uninterested He addresses the wall hanging,
in the past. saying "You take too long,
Lord... I hurry you up a bit."
Amélie warns the husband Here we get from Amelie yet
that he should go and visit another account of the family Daniel tells the husband that Esau, which Daniel claims is or
Daniel Cosway before he connections in the Cosway his name is actually Esau, and should be his real name, is the
comes to the house to make family. This is the first time that that the only things he ever name of the older brother of
trouble for him, that he is a bad Sandi is mentioned since the received from his father were Jacob, son of Isaac, in the old
man who speaks like a husband asked Antoinette where curses. He describes his Testament. The biblical Esau is
preacher, and perhaps once she learned to throw, and it is the father’s tombstone, which calls famously cheated out of his
was a preacher. She also tells first time anyone has implied to him "pious," "loved by all," and birthright by Jacob, just as
him that he has a very wealthy the husband that Antoinette and "merciful to the weak," as Daniel feels that he has been
brother in Spanish Town Sandi had a romantic nothing but a tablet of lies, robbed of his birthright. It seems
named Alexander Cosway, relationship. With this new which he hopes will "drag him that the topic of discussion that
whose son Sandi, she heard, information, the expected power down to Hell in the end." He Daniel really wants to discuss is
once married Antoinette. She dynamic between the husband reiterates that he is telling the his own disenfranchisement,
goes on to express her belief and Amélie is flipped completely, husband all of this so that he rather than Antoinette.
that this marriage never and the reason behind all of her will be fairly warned about the
happened, because Antoinette mocking looks is revealed. family he’s married into. As the 1 4
is rich and white, and would husband listens, Daniel relays
never marry “a coloured man 1 2 4 an encounter between himself
even though he don’t look like and Old Cosway when Daniel
a coloured man.” As Amélie was sixteen years old, when, as
walks away, the husband again Daniel claims, Old Cosway put
believes her to be on the verge a curse on him. He describes
of laughing at him. He hears walking five hours to see his
her say in a very low voice, "I father at Coulibri to talk to him
am sorry for you," but when he about his “rights” as his son,
asks her what she said she and being received casually,
denies saying anything. but with disdain.

In Daniel’s memory, Old Daniel Cosway’s desire to be While Daniel is relaying this Daniel’s version of reality is, like
Cosway cannot remember distinguished from other black story to the husband, he all versions of reality in the novel,
Daniel’s name, and laughs in people in the eyes of Old Cosway drinks rum steadily. The shown to be suspect, biased. He,
his face when he makes a claim as well as the husband is husband asks him why he like Christophine, espouses the
on his right to a portion of the expressed again through his wanted to see him. Daniel tells belief that no one can be trusted,
Cosway fortune. He accuses insistence that he is not “a him it is because there is no even while calling his own
Daniel of constantly pestering nigger.” He even wishes to one else who will tell the truth, reliability into question with his
him for money, which Daniel separate himself from his own and that he should be careful inability to give details of
explains to the husband as mother. The issue of Daniel’s who he trusts. He explains that Christophine’s arrest. It seems
having been merely so that he paternity is Old Cosway’s word his half brother Alexander that his information is as
would not have to "go barefoot against his; the truth is never would never tell him the truth untrustworthy, as based in gossip
like a nigger. Which I am not." clarified. because he has become “two- and hearsay, as anyone else’s.
When Old Cosway denies his faced” in his prosperity. He Daniel’s insistence that he does
paternity of Daniel, Daniel 1 2 4 also names Christophine as not believe in obeah is
becomes angry and taunts untrustworthy, saying that she completely in line with the
Cosway for his age, his is the worst of them, and tells husband’s book’s assertion that
proximity to death, and the the husband that she is on this both black and white people will
youth of his new wife. Old island because she had to leave lie and pretend not to know or
Cosway becomes enraged, Jamaica after being sent to jail. believe in obeah. The husband
curses him, and throws a silver The husband asks what she did does not reflect on any of this
inkstand at his head. Daniel to be arrested, and Daniel explicitly in his narration, but
leaves, and never sees or hears cannot provide any details. He merely wishes to escape.
from his Old Cosway again, merely says that she is an
except for a small sum of “obeah woman,” and she was 1 4
money that was delivered caught. Daniel claims not to
without a note. believe in the “devil business”
of obeah like many others do.
The husband feels a strong
desire to leave.

Daniel goes on to imply that Daniel repeats and elaborates The husband and Antoinette The rift that is expressed verbally
Antoinette had a sexual the rumor that Amélie are having dinner, with an between Antoinette and the
relationship with Sandi, his introduced, of Antoinette’s “endless procession” of moths husband also manifests itself
half-brother Alexander’s son, relationship with Sandi. When it again flying into the candles symbolically in this passage. The
whom he describes as “like a is clear that the husband does and dying on the tablecloth. dying moths return in greater
white man, but more not want to hear any more, They argue. The husband numbers in this scene, bringing
handsome than any white Daniel gets to the point, and notices that she is wearing the with them their symbolism of
man.” At this, the husband gets demands money in exchange for same dress that once aroused bad luck and doom, and the
up to leave, but Daniel stops silence. It seems that all of his him so, but that now it looks husband’s impression of her
him. He tells him again that correspondence was fueled by a sloppy and too large for her. dress becomes disappointed,
Antoinette and her family have desire to regain a portion of the Antoinette demands to know where before it was admiring.
all lied to him with “sweet talk,” Cosway fortune, which he why the husband will not come Their respective belief systems
and that if he wants him, believes to be his birthright, and near her, kiss her, or talk to her. are brought into direct conflict
Daniel, to keep quiet about it, to enact revenge on the Cosway She demands to know if he has here as well-- where the husband
he will have to pay him five family for wrongs committed a reason, to which he replies, believes in God, Antoinette only
hundred pounds. The husband against him. “Yes, I have a reason, my God,” trusts the vocabulary of symbols
becomes disgusted and and Antoinette mocks him for in the natural world that she’s
enraged. Daniel sees this, and 1 4 his apparent belief in God. He grown up with.
steps aside to allow him to notices that in this moment
leave, but not without yelling she resembles Amélie, and 1 4
abuse at him, reminding him wonders if they are related. He
that he was not Antoinette’s asks her if she believes in God,
first, and threatening again to and she replies that it doesn’t
retaliate if the husband does matter what either of them
not produce the five hundred believe, because they cannot
pounds. The husband exits the do anything about it, like the
little house, and, dazzled by dead moths on the table.
the light after the darkened
room, rides home.

The husband asks Antoinette Antoinette’s belief system and The husband becomes Again, Antoinette’s emotions are
if her mother is alive, and understanding of truth is again uncomfortable and suggests inseparable from the landscape,
Antoinette responds that she shown in contrast to the that they talk about it another the setting-- she feels she cannot
died not long ago. The husband husband’s. The husband time. Antoinette demands that speak what she needs to in any
then demands to know why assumes that Antoinette lied to they talk now, and asks him in a other time or place. While the
she told him that her mother him when she said her mother mocking tone (“imitating a husband here attributes human
died when she was a child, and died when she was young, but negro’s voice”) if he is qualities like malice to the
Antoinette tells him that it is Antoinette believes in a different frightened to hear the answer landscape, Antoinette places it in
because she was told to say understanding of death than he to what he’s asked. He asks the realm of the divine by
this, and also because it is true: does--the mother that why they can’t talk about it the comparing its indifference to that
“She did die when I was a child. Antoinette knew and loved did next day, in the daylight, and of God.
There are always two deaths, die when she was a child, even if she says she might not be able
the real one and the one her body continued living. This to tell him in any other place or 1 3 4
people know about.” The fluid understanding of death is in time, and tells him he has no
husband then tells her that line with a belief system that right to ask about her mother
he’s been in contact with includes zombies, as described in and then not listen to her
Daniel Cosway. Antoinette the husband’s book, “a dead answer. He relents, but adds
quickly tells him that the man person who seems to be alive or that he feels like this place is an
who calls himself Daniel a living person who is dead.” enemy to him, that it is on her
Cosway has no right to the side. She tells him that he is
name, and is actually named 1 4 wrong, that the place is not for
Daniel Boyd, and that she either of them, it is “as
knows exactly what he would indifferent as this God you call
have said to the husband: that on so often.”
her mother was mad, her
Antoinette tells the husband This conversation offers yet
brother born an idiot, and she
about her mother. She tells him another shade or version of the
herself also mad. The husband
that after her father’s death events of Antoinette’s childhood,
asks her if it is true, and
Annette was very poor and this time intended to counteract
Antoinette pauses.
very lonely, but that her beauty the version that Daniel Cosway
must have given her hope. She has given to the husband.
says that they were alone in Though this telling and the
the loveliest place on earth, account in Part One are both in
that there could never be a Antoinette’s point of view, even
place as beautiful as Coulibri. these two versions contain subtle
She describes the royal palm discrepancies and differences in
trees, which had been cut emphasis. The information about
down, as lost trees, and tells of Sass’s real name, for example, is
the poisoning of her mother’s new to the novel. It is present in
horse. She tells the husband this conversation and not Part
how her mother would stay One, perhaps because the
out in the garden working long symbolic significance of names is
after the sun was too hot for something that grows in intensity
her and “they” would tell her to over the course of the novel.
go in. The husband asks who
“they” were, and Antoinette 1 2 3 4
names the servants who had
remained after emancipation--
Christophine, Godfrey, and a
boy named Sass, whose real
name was Disastrous, because
his godmother liked the sound
of the word.

Antoinette says that her One thing that is present in both Antoinette mentions the night Antoinette cannot bring herself
family would have died if versions of Antoinette’s story is that Coulibri was burned, and to detail the events of the night
Christophine had not been the comfort she finds in the becomes upset and very pale. Coulibri was burned, despite the
there to care for them. She natural world. The pessimism She does not go into detail fact that these events are crucial
explains that many people died about the truth that she about what happened that to understanding her mother’s
in those days, especially the articulates here is echoed night, but merely laments, collapse into grief and madness.
old, but that no one speaks of it throughout the novel, by the “They trampled it. It was a Antoinette’s belief that her
now, that the only thing people husband, Christophine, Daniel sacred place. It was sacred to mother was a part of Coulibri
remember are lies, because Cosway, herself, and Grace Poole the sun!” The husband and therefore should have
“Lies are never forgotten, they later in the novel. wonders silently how much of disappeared with it again blurs
go on and they grow.” The her story is true, how much of the distinction between setting
husband asks what Antoinette 1 3 4 it distorted or imagined. and emotion in the novel.
remembers of herself, and she Antoinette goes on to explain
says that she was happy in the that after that night, she spent 1 4
mornings, and in the garden, a long time with fever at her
where “every flower in the aunt’s home in Spanish Town,
world” existed, and she often during which time she
drank rainwater from the remembers hearing screams
leaves. She tells him that she and loud laughter. There, she
was not often happy in the was told that her mother was
afternoons, and never at night, ill and in the country. She says
because the house was that this made sense to her,
haunted. She goes on to because her mother was a part
remember “the day when she of Coulibri, and if Coulibri was
saw I was growing up like a gone then it was natural for
white nigger,” that after this her mother to be gone as well.
day her mother worked
Antoinette tells the husband When Aunt Cora says that the
feverishly to remarry, for their
that a rock was thrown at her rock will not “spoil” Antoinette on
security.
head the night Coulibri her wedding day, she is referring
burned. She recalls that Aunt to her physical appearance only.
Cora told her it would heal and Antoinette, however, is more
not “spoil” her on her wedding concerned with the lasting
day, but she fears that it did emotional trauma of the event,
spoil her, not only for her and considers this to be a more
wedding day but “for all days significant type of spoiling.
and nights.” At this, the Rather than giving comfort or
husband tries to comfort her solace to the husband,
by telling her that her days and Antoinette’s tale unsettles him
nights are not spoiled, and and fills him with more dread.
urges her to put the past
behind her. Even while he is 1 3 4
saying this, though, be feels his
heart to be “heavy as lead.”

Antoinette goes on to tell of The neglect and sexual abuse of They get up to go in to bed, The husband takes note of and
her one visit to her mother at Annette by her caretakers is and the husband again calls wonders about the specific
her country house, with a man something that Antoinette as a her Bertha, despite her number of candles in the room,
and a woman caring for her in narrator would not or could not protests. When they get into and the powder on the floor, all
her madness. Antoinette include in Part One. Reasons for the bedroom, the husband presumably put there under
remembers that her mother concealing, revealing, or glossing sees that there is white instructions from Christophine,
was in a fine evening dress, but over the truth in the novel are powder on the floor, which though he does not know this at
barefoot, and that the man myriad and complicated. It is Antoinette claims is to keep the time. Despite his feeling of
gave her glass after glass of possible that the younger cockroaches away. He notices alienation from Antoinette, and
rum so that she would “forget.” Antoinette glossed over this that there are six candles lit on his refusal to use her name, he
When her mother threw one trauma for the same reason that the dressing-table, and three insists that he felt love for her on
of the glasses and smashed it, she refused to speak to her on the table near the bed. He this night, without the
the man told the woman mother about her poisoned feels that the light changes enchantment she attempted to
caretaker to clean it up or horse-- in hopes that not Antoinette, makes her more put on him.
Annette would walk in it, and speaking about it could make it beautiful than he’s ever seen
the woman replied that if she not true. The fact that Annette’s her. She hands him a glass of 1 3 4
did it would be a good thing, caretakers were black further wine to drink, and he insists, in
that then maybe she’d keep complicates the situation, his narration, that he desired
quiet. Antoinette describes making it an echo and reversal of her before she gave him the
how her mother walked back the abusive, coercive sexual drink, that “she need not have
and forth and addressed Mr. relationships that went on done what she did to me. I will
Luttrell, who at that point was between masters and their slaves always swear that, she need
long dead, and that when she before emancipation. not have done it.” He puts out
sat down the man caring for the candles, and that is all he
her forced her to kiss him. 1 2 3 4 remembers of the night.
After this, Antoinette ran from
The husband awakes before Christophine’s predictions are
the house.
the sun rises, having dreamt proven correct-- when the
Antoinette finishes her story, Antoinette sees that her story that he was buried alive. He is husband wakes from the
and says quietly, as if speaking has not brought about a change cold and sick, in pain. He enchantment that Antoinette
to herself, that she has said all of heart in the husband, just as believes he has been poisoned. has attempted to put on him, he
she wants to, and nothing has she predicted when Christophine He gets up and staggers to his feels hatred for her. In his
changed. She laughs, and the urged her to tell him the truth. dressing room, where he distress, he runs through the
husband says, “Don’t laugh like The husband’s insistence on retches and vomits for what woods and finds himself at the
that, Bertha.” She replies that calling her “Bertha” at this point “seemed like hours.” When he place where he either saw or was
her name is not Bertha, and both deepens the distance is finished, he gets up, weak, mistaken for a zombie-- a living
asks why he calls her that. He between them and shows the and returns to the bedroom. person who is dead, or a dead
answers that Bertha is a name husband’s desire to control his He watches Antoinette person who appears alive.
he is fond of, so that is how he perception of Antoinette, to sleeping, feeling a cold hatred
thinks of her. He asks her make her something he is “fond for her despite her beauty. He 1 4
where she went off to earlier of,” rather than afraid of and picks up his wine glass from
that day, and she tells him that disconcerted by. Paradoxically, the night before and dips his
she went to see Christophine, now that Antoinette has decided finger into it to taste it,
and that she will tell him once and for all that the truth discovering that it is bitter. He
anything now, because she will have no power over him, she immediately dresses and runs
sees that words are no use. feels free to tell the husband from the house. He runs
She tells him that Christophine anything he asks her about. through the woods, exhausted,
has advised her to leave him. and finally finds himself at the
He is surprised, but replies 1 3 4 ruined house of the preacher,
that perhaps Christophine is where he falls to the ground
right, that he wants to do what and sleeps through the day.
is best for both of them and
maybe this will help.

When he returns to the house, It is clear that the husband’ tryst The husband goes back to Baptiste’s behavior, and the
the husband is fed and cared with Amélie is overheard by sleep, and is woken by cook’s resignation, imply that the
for by Amélie, and they spend Antoinette, and that the husband Baptiste telling him that the staff also overheard the
the night together. Though commits this act of infidelity in cook is leaving, quitting. He husband’s indiscretions with
Amélie expresses a small full knowledge of this fact. His notices that, though Baptiste Amélie. Rather than feeling
amount of apprehension at lack of remorse seems to signal does not comment explicitly on chastised, the husband seems to
Antoinette’s being right next his complete rejection of his The husband’s behavior, he no grow even more pleased with
door, on the other side of a marriage to Antoinette. Again, he longer calls him “sir” or himself, spending his days
thin partition dividing the two is taken by and attracted to “master.” Antoinette has gone lounging in the hammock, more
rooms, the husband says he clothing, this time Amélie’s. away from the house, and comfortable and content than
feels no remorse. The Amélie, who would have been a stays away for several days. he’s been since before his
following morning he slave just a few years before this, The husband is content, marriage to Antoinette. His letter
recognizes the complication uses manipulation and sex to spending most of the day in a to the magistrate suggests that
he’s created, and feels gain power over both the hammock on the veranda. On he is formulating a plan of
“satisfied and peaceful, but not husband and Antoinette in this the third day, he writes a letter retribution against Christophine.
gay.” Amélie dresses, and he instance. She clearly recognizes to Mr. Fraser, the magistrate.
admires her dress. He gives the power that she possesses, The letter says that the 1 2 4
her a large sum of money, and plans to continue husband has been reading a
which she accepts without capitalizing on it in Rio. book about obeah, and
thanks. The husband asks her remembers a particular case
what she plans to do with her 4 that the magistrate had
life, saying that she is beautiful mentioned, about a woman. He
enough to have anything she asks if Mr. Fraser knows the
wants. She agrees matter-of- whereabouts of this woman
factly, and says that she plans now.
to go to Rio, because there are
Fraser writes back at once, In his imagined address to
rich men in Rio. He asks her if
saying that the woman’s name Christophine, the husband uses
she still feels sorry for him, and
was “Josephine or Christophine,” all three names for her- the
she says she does, but that
and she was imprisoned in erroneous name that Fraser uses,
now she feels sorry for
connection with obeah before her real name, and Antoinette’s
Antoinette as well.
becoming a servant at Coulibri. pet name for her. His desire to
He says that her whereabouts obliterate her extends to every
now are unclear, but that she is possible version of her-- the
considered a “most dangerous rumor of her, the real her, and the
person.” He tells the husband idolized pet version that belongs
that if she lives near him and to Antoinette.
gets up to “any of her nonsense,”
that he should report it to the 4
police immediately, and Fraser
himself will make sure that she
does not get off lightly. After
reading this, the husband
thinks to himself, “So much for
you, Josephine or
Christophine. So much for you,
Pheena.”

One afternoon, Antoinette Like her mother before her, Antoinette reaches for In her grief, Antoinette feels a
returns to the house, closely Antoinette is given rum to calm another bottle of rum, and the strong connection to her
followed by Christophine. her in her distress. The servants’ husband tells her not to drink mother’s experience. She seems
Antoinette goes to her room loyalty to Antoinette, though, is anymore. She snaps back that to identify the husband with all
without looking at the clear. The husband sees that his he has no right to tell her what three of the destructive males in
husband, and rings for actions have upset Antoinette so to do. She accuses him of her mother’s life, implicitly or
Baptiste. Baptiste fetches a deeply that her appearance has hypocrisy, of having committed explicitly: When the husband
bottle of rum to bring her, and completely changed, and for the with Amélie the same acts of tells her not to drink, she bristles
ignores the husband when he first time feels a shock of emotion sexual coercion that went on at being told what to do by a
tries to intercept him. When in relation to what he’s done. during slavery, after he’d man who has ignored, betrayed,
the husband goes to expressed distaste for these and abandoned her, recalling Mr.
Antoinette’s room, he 1 3 very acts. She accuses him Mason’s ignoring, control and
discovers that she has acidly of liking “the light brown abandonment of Annette. Next,
blockaded the door with a girls.” The husband counters her condemnation of the
heavy piece of furniture. He that what went on during husband’s actions in the context
pushes the door open enough slavery “was not about liking or of race and class coercion recalls
to see her lying in bed with the disliking, it was a question of her father’s notorious
empty rum decanter next to justice.” She scoffs, saying that indiscretions with his slaves.
her on a chair. He leaves and justice is a cold word, a lie. She Finally, she explicitly connects
waits on the veranda. After a refers to her mother, demands the husband to her mother’s
while, Antoinette wakes and to know what justice her sexually abusive and neglectful
begins ringing and yelling for mother had, and likens the caretaker.
Baptiste and for Christophine. husband to her mother’s
The husband goes in to her abusive caretaker, the “black 1 2 3 4
room to find her extremely devil kissing her sad mouth.
disheveled, with her hair Like you kissed mine.”
hanging tangled and her face
The husband opens the Here, Antoinette is
swollen. He is at first too
window because it has become disempowered and alienated
shocked to speak.
unbearably hot in the room. from herself on three symbolic
When he turns back, fronts. First, the husband again
Antoinette is drinking again, imposes a false name on her, and
and he reproaches her, saying she feels that he is forcibly
simply, “Bertha.” She rails enacting a magic that is robbing
against him, saying that he is her of her identity. Next, she
trying to make her into expresses alienation from the
someone else by calling her by landscape that has always been
a different name, and warns so connected to and emblematic
him that this too is obeah. She of her feelings and cosmology
begins to cry, and tells him (for Antoinette, this is the worst
that, worse than his infidelity is of all possible offenses). Finally,
the fact that he has destroyed she displays a loss of faith in her
this place for her, this place own beauty, which, after learning
that she once loved. She tells from a young age (through her
him that she hates him, and mother and the convent school)
before she dies she will show that appearance is the locus of
him how much she hates him. power for a female, amounts to
She then quite suddenly stops an expression of
crying, and asks the husband, disempowerment.
"Is she so much prettier than I
am? Don’t you love me at all?” 1 2 3 4
The husband replies that he
does not, not at this moment.

Antoinette laughs a crazy Having lost all emotional or He goes back to his room, The husband knows that
laugh at this, and says that the symbolic power in the situation, where Christophine finds him. Christophine speaks the truth,
husband is cold, a stone. She Antoinette reaches a fever pitch They argue. She tells him she that the coldness that she sees in
says that it serves her right, of distress and turns to physical hopes he’s satisfied, that she him is the true core of his
because Aunt Cora had violence. Just as he has described knows what he’s done and feelings. This again silences him,
warned her not to marry him, the hostile landscape of the there’s no use lying to her. The allowing Christophine to
“not if he were stuffed with Caribbean as dreamlike, the husband demands to know continue speaking. As has been
diamonds.” She begins to speak husband again feels like he is in a what happened when the case many times throughout
and sing incoherently, and dream, faced with the hostility of Antoinette was with the novel, here it is speech that
takes another drink from the his wife. The only person who Christophine these last few holds the power to shape reality,
bottle of rum. The husband can still reason with and calm days. He calls Antoinette “my so it is Christophine who wields
tries to take the bottle from Antoinette is Christophine. wife,” and Christophine laughs the power in this instance.
her, and she bites him. He maliciously at this. She tells
drops the bottle. She smashes 1 3 him that everyone knows that 1 3 4
another bottle against the wall he has married Antoinette for
and threatens him with the her money, that he has taken
broken half of the bottle in her everything she has and now
hand, "Just you touch me once. wants only “to break her up,”
You’ll soon see if I’m a dam’ because he is jealous of her
coward like you are." She goodness. She says that the
proceeds to wildly curse the first time she, Christophine,
husband, and every part of his saw him, she could tell that he
body. The husband feels as if was cold, that he fooled
he is in a dream. She only Antoinette into thinking he
quiets when Christophine loved her. The husband thinks
comes in and tells her to stop silently that she is right, but
crying. She collapses onto the allows her to go on.
sofa and sobs.
She accuses him of making The power of Christophine’s
Christophine turns to the The husband does not answer love to Antoinette until she speech enacts a kind of magic or
husband and asks him sadly Christophine’s accusations. In couldn’t do without it, until she hypnosis on the husband. It
why he did what he did with the face of this conflict, as well as was completely in love with echoes and expands in his mind,
Amélie, why he didn’t at least the conflict that has just him, when all he wants is to so that, at this point in his
take her somewhere else to do occurred between himself and hurt her. Her words begin to narration, everything she says
it. She says that he and Amélie Antoinette, he is mostly silent, echo loudly in the husband’s appears at least twice. He is left
both love money, which must paralyzed. He feels powerless, head, as she accuses him of with no space, in his mind or on
be why they came together. At menaced again by his pretending to believe the lies the page, to respond or reflect,
this, the husband leaves the surroundings. that Daniel Cosway has told further amplifying Christophine’s
room and goes out to the him, so that he can have an dominance over the moment. It
veranda. As he wraps his 1 3 excuse to leave her. He accuses is unclear whether these echoes
bleeding arm, he looks out to her in turn of poisoning him. are created by actual magic, or
the trees and feels that they She corrects him, telling him are an effect of the husband’s
are menacing him, have that Antoinette begged her for remorse.
menaced him since his arrival. something to make him love
He hears Christophine singing her again, but that he doesn’t 2 3
softly to Antoinette while she love. She says that she knows
cries. he started to call Antoinette by
a different name in an effort to
control her, and that when that
didn’t work he bedded Amélie
and let Antoinette hear it, that
he meant her to hear it.

The husband again knows that Now Antoinette’s voice enters When he shakes his head, Just as was the case with the
she is right, that he meant for the fray, further crowding out the Christophine repeats that husband’s encounter with Daniel
her to hear what happened. husband’s thoughts and agency everything Daniel Cosway Cosway, any inclination toward
Now in addition to in the conversation. It is unclear, told him is a lie, and that she compassion or remorse is
Christophine’s words echoing again, whether the husband is would have warned him but extinguished when the
in his mind, he can hear imagining Antoinette’s distressed there was no time. She conversation turns to money. The
Antoinette’s voice as it pleas through a movement of reminds him that it is not husband’s priority becomes his
sounded or must have mind inspired by remorse, or Antoinette who traveled to own defense. Where just
sounded when she went to whether these thoughts have England to convince the moments before, he had listened
Christophine, telling her what been planted in his mind by husband to marry her, it is he to Christophine and knew she
happened between the Christophine. Either, or both, are who came here to beg her. She was right, he now suspects her of
husband and Amélie, that she possible and implied. asks him what he is going to do planning to take Antoinette’s
stayed up all night listening, "O with her money now that he money for herself.
Pheena, Pheena, help me." 2 3 doesn’t love her. At this
Christophine goes on to mention of money, the 4
explain that she gave husband stops feeling “dazed,
Antoinette something to help tired, half hypnotized,” and is
her sleep these last few days, ready to defend himself.
to calm her, but that the Christophine asks him why he
husband’s telling her he can’t just leave Antoinette half
doesn’t love her has undone all of her dowry and go back to
of her good work. She tells him England, if he doesn’t want her.
that she thinks he is neither The husband asks exactly what
the best nor the worst, but sum she has in mind, and she
that he can love Antoinette replies that he can fix it up with
again if he waits and tries. the lawyers, and she,
Christophine, can take care of
Antoinette. The husband
thinks to himself that
Christophine means that she
will also take care of the
money.

The husband asks While remorse seems to paralyze Christophine relents, but Christophine too connects
Christophine if she and the husband, he is driven to demands to know what he will Antoinette’s current misfortune
Antoinette would both stay decisive action by jealousy, anger, do with Antoinette. He says he and apparent future of
here at Granbois, and she says and desire for vengeance and will consult doctors and her imprisonment with the
no, they will return to control. When the idea of brother and follow their abandonment, imprisonment,
Martinique. She says that Antoinette marrying another advice. She spits on the floor in and abuse of Annette. For all
Antoinette will marry someone man comes up, he acts outrage, tells him that she their clashing and enmity, the
else and forget him. At this, a immediately and silences the knows he means to pretend husband recognizes in
pang of jealousy and rage once powerful Christophine by that she is mad, that she will Christophine the same talent for
shoots through the husband, utilizing his knowledge of her end up like her mother, who, concealing emotional
and he laughs at Christophine. arrest history, which he has by she says, was abandoned to vulnerability that he possesses,
He tells her coldly to leave, right of his position of privilege the care of a man who "take and respects her for it.
that all that has happened is with white law enforcement. her whenever he want, that
her fault. She tells him that he man, and others." She says that 1 2 3 4
has no power to tell her to do 1 2 3 4 if he is willing to do this for
anything. In response, he reads money, then he is “wicked like
aloud to her the part of the Satan self!” He shouts back
magistrate’s letter that tells that he did not choose any of
the husband to report this, that he would give his life
Christophine to the police, to undo it. She says this is the
that she won’t get off lightly first word of truth he’s spoken
this time. He says that he so far. When the husband next
knows that she gave looks at her, it looks as if there
Antoinette the “poison” that is a mask on her face, “and her
she put in his wine, that he’s eyes were undaunted.” The
saved the wine glass and will husband feels respect for her
use it against her. strength.
He asks Christophine if she Remorse seems to creep back
wants to say goodbye to into the husband’s demeanor, as
Antoinette, and she tells him he offers to allow Christophine to
that she has given her speak to, and then write to,
something to sleep, and she Antoinette. Christophine’s
will not wake her up to misery, refusal is her final assertion of
that that is for him to do. He power in the novel.
tells her stiffly that in that case
she can write to Antoinette, 1 3
and Christophine replies,
“Read and write I don’t know.
Other things I know.” She
leaves the house without
looking back.

Agitated after his For the second time, the husband While he is writing, a cock The cock, symbolizing betrayal,
confrontation with mentally writes a letter to his outside crows persistently. the returns here louder than before.
Christophine, the husband father before physically writing it. husband throws a book at it, Unlike Antoinette, the husband
paces his room and speaks As is the case with the first but it merely walks further does not mention the symbolism
aloud to himself a letter he example of this, the husband’s away and keeps crowing. attached. His annoyance,
wants to write to his father. In thought or spoken letter contains Baptiste comes into the room, however, his desire to silence the
it, he accuses his father of his true emotions, which are then and the husband requests creature, suggest that he
setting up this marriage in concealed in the written version. more rum-- he is drunk. He understands its import and
order to get rid of him, that his These letters provide yet another asks Baptiste what the cock is desires not to acknowledge it.
father and his brother had no example of the possibility for crowing about, and Baptiste When he realizes that he will not
love at all for him. He says that multiple versions of each reality, replies indifferently that it is be able to control the stories that
their plan succeeded because each utterance within the novel. for a change in the weather. will be told about himself and
he, the husband, was young, The husband sees Baptiste Antoinette in Jamaica, he begins
conceited, and foolish. the 1 4 looking toward Antoinette’s planning their return to England.
husband thinks to himself that room, and shouts at him that Even now, he envisions
he is no longer young, and sits she is asleep. Baptiste scowls Antoinette in the attic of their
down to write a real letter to and walks away. The husband future home.
his father. In this letter, he realizes that he will never be
merely informs his father that able to buy discretion from 1 2 4
“unforeseen circumstances” Jamaican servants, that as long
have dictated that he and as he and Antoinette are in
Antoinette return to Jamaica Jamaica they will be gossiped
very soon, that his father can about constantly. He draws a
likely guess what has picture of an English house
happened, and that the less he surrounded by English trees,
speaks of it to anyone else, the with a woman on the third
better. He then writes a letter floor.
to his lawyers in Spanish Town,
requesting that they set up a
house with two separate wings
and discreet servants.

The next day is cool and misty. The husband’s prideful cruelty, as On the morning of their The lack of emotion displayed by
He watches the royal palm well as his passion and longing departure, the husband and Antoinette upon their departure
trees with respect, imagining for Antoinette, are locked in Antoinette are dressed and from Granbois unsettles the
that they will stand tall and conflict here, as two equal and packed for the journey, and husband. Rather than seeming
defy the hurricanes that are opposing forces. On the one Baptiste, along with some an indication of strength in
coming soon, while the hand, he desperately wants a remaining servants, are concealing emotional
bamboo will merely lie on the reason to feel tenderly toward waiting by the horses to see vulnerability, he fears that her
ground and let them rage past. Antoinette and treat her gently, them off. Antoinette’s face is outer blankness reflects an inner
He thinks of his own revenge but on the other, he is consumed blank, and the husband blankness. As he looks at the
as a hurricane, and wonders by his own jealousy, rage, and wonders if she remembers or house at Granbois for the last
why there is no pity for him, need for control. He equates his feels anything. He remembers time, feelings of sadness take him
who is “tied to a lunatic for life.” own desire for revenge with a her telling him the names of by surprise and cause him to
He remembers Christophine coming hurricane, and his the mountains, and that a reflect. In his mind, he pities the
telling him that Antoinette respect for the royal palm trees green sunset is called an crumbling house, and blames the
loves him, thirsts for him, and that will defy the hurricane Emerald Drop, and it brings forest for its destruction. This
thinks to himself that suggest that he longs for good fortune. He is caught by pitting of the natural world
Antoinette thirsts for anyone, Antoinette to defy his rage, in surprise by the sadness he against the domestic realm, or
that she makes love like only a this case by displaying an feels looking at the house for the realm of people, is consistent
mad girl can, not caring who emotion that will soften it. the last time. He feels its with the husband’s viewpoint
she’s loving. He thinks about shabbiness, feels that it is throughout the novel.
locking her away, to prevent 1 2 3 crying to be saved from
her from seeing anyone again. desolation. He blames the 1 4
He then thinks that if he forest for the house’s
watches and sees Antoinette inevitable destruction,
display any real emotion, “one addresses the house in his
human tear” when they leave mind, “Don’t you know this is a
Granbois for good, then he’ll dangerous place? And that the
drop all of this and take her in dark forest always wins?”
his arms gently, because “she’s Though Baptiste addresses
mad but she’s mine, mine.” him politely, the husband feels
his contempt and dislike
strongly.

The husband is filled with a The nostalgia of leaving affects A servant boy begins to cry In the face of Antoinette’s silence,
bewildering and sudden the husband deeply, and he is “loud, heartbreaking sobs,” and the boy’s display of bald emotion
certainty that everything he’d filled with the desire for things to the husband thinks that he at first gives the husband intense
imagined to be true about be as they were when he and could have “strangled him with pleasure. The weeping boy is a
Antoinette these last few days Antoinette were in sync. Once pleasure.” The husband asks feebler, defeated echo of the
was false, that “only the magic again, the his remorse weakens Baptiste why the boy is crying, Young Bull, the porter who
and the dream are true-- all and quiets him, but gives way but Baptiste ignores him. appears at the start of the
the rest’s a lie.” He looks at quickly to the solidity of his Antoinette tells him, in a honeymoon. The Young Bull was
Antoinette staring blankly out vengeful anger. Where his detached voice that the a black man who vied confidently
to the sea, and wishes that she tenderness and remorse are husband hardly recognizes, for the attention and approval of
would sing to him as she once accompanied by sad wishes and that upon their arrival the boy the husband. But now, after the
did. He imagines what he a tentative apology, his anger asked to be taken with them emotional destruction that has
should say to her-- to not be comes with hatred and an when they left Granbois. She taken place at Granbois, the
sad, to chatter and laugh as absolute vow. explains that the boy wants no novel is left with only a desolate
she used to, to tell him stories. money, merely to be with the young black boy, who sobs
He remembers their nights 1 4 husband, because he loves him powerlessly at his rejection.
together tenderly, and wishes very much. Baptiste has told
for them both to give the boy that the husband won’t 1 2 3
everything they have to each take him, and this is why he
other. He says to her, “I have sobs. Antoinette says the boy
made a terrible mistake. has tried very hard to learn
Forgive me.” When he sees English. The husband becomes
that she looks at him with angry at her for speaking for
hatred, he feels in himself “a him, and making promises to
sickening swing back to hate”. the boy, and says he will
He vows to himself that his certainly not bring the boy
hatred will be stronger than with them.
hers, that she will be left with
They leave, and the husband The husband’s feelings of
nothing.
notices that when Antoinette alienation and exhaustion are
says goodbye to Baptiste she directed at everyone and
very nearly cries, but recovers everything in his sight. After a
her cold composure at once. sizable struggle between the
He feels exhausted and empty, forces of compassion and
but sane. He feels tired of the bitterness within him, bitterness
place and its people. He feels finally takes the upper hand.
hate for the mountains, the
hills, the rivers, and the 1
sunsets “whatever colour.”
Above all, he feels hate for
Antoinette, for “she left me
thirsty and all my life would be
thirst and longing for what I
had lost before I found it.” The
boy follows them some
distance as they leave, crying
still. The husband marvels that
a boy would cry like that, “for
nothing.”

PART 3 Mrs. Eff tells Grace that she Grace Poole’s decision to stay at
will double her pay, but that the house, and to not add to or
Part Three opens in the point Grace Poole’s narration takes the
she will be replaced if there is contradict the talk that she hears
of view of Grace Poole, form of gossip about gossip.
any more gossip. Grace tells about the husband and
Antoinette’s caretaker in These layers of remove open the
Leah that after this Antoinette, is rooted in a realistic
England. She is speaking to final part of the novel on a note
conversation, all of the understanding of the options
Leah, another servant in the of mystery and hearsay, and
servants but herself were sent available to her as a woman in
husband’s house. Grace highlight the deeply biased and
away, and Leah and one cook this world. She is acutely aware
recounts a conversation she’s unreliable nature of all
were hired. She says that there of the vastly fewer options
had with Mrs. Eff, the utterances, including and
is no way to stop those people available to Antoinette, who is
housekeeper, where Mrs. Eff especially supposed ‘truth’
from talking, though, and the imprisoned in the house.
reprimands Grace for telling, in the novel. Grace Poole’s
rumors she’s heard are very far
gossiping. Grace replies that narrative implies that Antoinette 4
from the truth. Nevertheless,
servants always gossip, that it is being held against her will, in
she says, she does not
can’t be stopped, and questionable conditions. Mrs. Eff
contradict them, because she
furthermore she is not sure provides a perspective on the
does not want to be fired--the
the job suits her. She does not husband that has not appeared
“thick walls” of the house
know what to think of yet in the novel-- a tender,
protect her from a world that
Antoinette and the condition compassionate, generous one.
“can be a black and cruel world
she is being kept in. Mrs. Eff
1 2 3 4 to a woman.” Grace thinks to
offers to double her salary,
herself that this is the reason
under orders from the
she, Mrs. Eff, and Leah stay at
husband, who is apparently
the house. She reflects that
away. Grace replies that she
Antoinette, “that girl who lives
will not serve the devil for
in her own darkness,” does not
money, and Mrs. Eff bristles.
have the luxury that she does,
She tells Grace that to call the
of choosing to stay or go.
husband the devil is a mistake,
that she knew him as a boy and The narration switches to Antoinette’s narration is now
a young man, that he was Antoinette’s consciousness. quite hazy. She does not reflect
generous and brave, and that She is watching Grace Poole at length on things as she’s done
his stay in the West Indies light the fire in her attic room. before. She simply observes
destroyed him. She gets up and puts her face things that happen around her,
very close to the fire, admiring and cannot always connect these
its beauty. As she watches the observations into lucid trains of
fire, she wonders why it is she thought or conclusions. Her
was brought to this place, feels fascination with the fire recalls
that there is something she the flames at Coulibri and
must do. She remembers that foreshadows her final act of
when she was first brought arson and suicide. It is unclear
here and locked in the attic, how long she has been
she planned to plead with the imprisoned.
husband to let her go, but she
never saw him again and never 4
got the chance. She watches
Grace Poole count money, and
drinks Grace’s liquor after she
falls asleep.

Antoinette looks at a tapestry Antoinette hallucinates, and One morning, Antoinette The girl in the white dress that
hanging on her wall and sees does not quite know where she is. wakes up aching, with her Antoinette sees at night, who
her mother in it, looking away Her inability to look at her wrists red and swollen. Grace thinks she is a ghost, is probably
from her. She does not tell reflection or retain knowledge of Poole tells her that the day Jane Eyre. Antoinette is further
Grace about her vision, and her appearance makes her feel before, “a gentleman” had and further disconnected from
thinks to herself that the name completely disconnected from come to see her. Antoinette herself-- she cannot remember
“Grace” does not fit Grace her identity. Her distrust of Grace does not remember anything her violent actions from the
Poole, that “names matter,” Poole is shown to have some about this. She only previous night. She believes that
remembering when the connection to Antoinette’s remembers stealing the keys the core of the problem with
husband refused to call her feeling that “Grace” is not an apt and walking through the Richard Mason was her
Antoinette, that as a result of name for the woman, does not house, seeing a girl in a white recognizability, the unity of her
this she felt the sense of reflect her true qualities. Despite dress who runs away from her identity with her outward
herself as Antoinette, her her inability to reason about her and afterwards speaks of appearance, and thus fixates on
identity, float away. Antoinette circumstances, Antoinette does seeing a ghost. Grace tells her her red dress.
does not have a looking-glass still act on her impulse to escape that her brother, Richard,
here, and no longer knows the attic, even for a short time, came to see her and didn’t 1 2 3 4
what she looks like. She feels when she wanders through the recognize her. Grace says that
that this means everything has rest of the house at night. Antoinette ran at him with a
been taken from her. At night, knife, and when the knife was
after Grace Poole has had a 1 2 3 4 taken from her she bit him.
few drinks and fallen asleep, “You won’t be seeing him
Antoinette steals her keys and again,” Grace tells her.
walks through the rest of the Antoinette is convinced that if
house. She knows that people she were wearing a red dress,
tell her that she is in England, her brother would have
but she does not believe them: recognized her. She demands
“The cardboard house where I to know where her red dress
walk at night is not England.” is, and Grace shows her.

As Antoinette looks at and The red dress triggers a memory That night, Antoinette has her Antoinette is simultaneously
smells her red dress, she is that was left out of Antoinette’s dream for the last time. It is connected to her identity and her
reminded of the colors and earlier narration. We see now clear to her that the stairs in past by this recurring dream, and
smells of her home, “the smell that the rumors about her the dream lead here, to her completely separated from an
of the sun and the smell of relationship with Sandi were attic room. In her dream, she understanding of who she’s
rain.” She recalls that she was true, that her loyal servants knew takes Grace Poole’s keys and become. When she mentions “the
wearing a red dress that last about it but didn’t tell. We, as descends into the house. She is woman they say haunts this
time that Sandi came to see readers, were left out of this inner quiet, for she doesn’t want to place,” she does not realize that
her, before her passage to circle of trust until now, disturb the “woman they say she is referring to herself.
England. At this time, Sandi weakened with madness and haunts this place.” She goes Likewise, when she sees herself in
asked her to leave with him, grief, Antoinette finally narrates into a sitting room and lights her dream in what is obviously a
but she declined. She recalls it. Her red dress is in contrast every candle she can find. She mirror, she does not register it as
that Sandi often came to see with the virginal white dress that hears a clock ticking that is her own reflection and is
her when the husband was the Jane Eyre figure was wearing made of gold, and thinks, “Gold frightened by what she believes
away, that the servants all in the previous scene. It is the idol they worship.” She to be this other being, this ghost.
knew about it but didn’t tell. symbolizes passion, and the becomes angry, and knocks
She recalls that she and Sandi image of it spreading across the over all of the candles. This 1 2 3 4
often “kissed,” but that this last floor like flames brings sets the curtains aflame. She
time their embrace was “the Antoinette one step closer to goes into the hallway and sees
life and death kiss.” She does realizing what she is about to do. what she thinks is a ghost, a
not share any of this with woman with streaming hair,
Grace Poole. She drops her 1 2 3 4 surrounded by a gilt frame. She
dress on the floor and thinks drops her candle, and it
that it looks like the fire has catches the end of a tablecloth,
spread across the room, and it which goes up in flames.
reminds her of something she
In her dream, Antoinette runs As has been true throughout the
has to do, but can’t think of
back up to the attic and climbs novel, Antoinette’s dream shows
what.
out onto the roof, all the while her what is going to happen
calling out to Christophine. before it does. When she wakes
Sitting out on the roof and and descends the stairs with her
watching the flames, she candle lit, having finally realized
remembers Aunt Cora and Tia what she needs to do, it is clear
and Coco the parrot calling that she is going to set the house
“Qui est la?” She hears her aflame. Her emancipation is
husband, “the man who hated shown to require the end of her
me,” calling to her in a panic, life, and the complete
but calling her Bertha. She destruction of the place in which
hears someone scream, then she is imprisoned.
knows that it is she who is
screaming. In the dream she 1 2 3 4
jumps, and then wakes up.
Grace Poole wakes up at the
sound of Antoinette’s scream
and comes over to check on
her. Antoinette waits for Grace
to go back to sleep, and then
steals her keys. She lights a
candle and descends into the
house with a sense of purpose,
thinking, “Now at last I know
why I was brought here and
what I have to do.”

HOW T
TO
O CITE
It's easy to cite LitCharts for use in academic papers and reports.
MLA CIT
CITA
ATION
McLaughlin, Kiley. "Wide Sargasso Sea." LitCharts. LitCharts LLC, 30
Apr 2014. Web. 26 Oct 2016.
CHICA
CHICAGO
GO MANU
MANUAL
AL CIT
CITA
ATION
McLaughlin, Kiley. "Wide Sargasso Sea." LitCharts LLC, April 30,
2014. Retrieved October 26, 2016. http://www.litcharts.com/lit/
wide-sargasso-sea.

Wide Sargasso Sea LitChart

Uploaded by

Document Information

Original Description:

Copyright

Available Formats

Share this document

Share or Embed Document

Sharing Options

Did you find this document useful?

Is this content inappropriate?

Copyright:

Available Formats

Wide Sargasso Sea LitChart

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

LitCharts The best way to study, teach, and learn about books.

Wide Sargasso Sea

©2016 LitCharts LLC www.LitCharts.com | Follow us: @litcharts | v.005 Page 1

©2016 LitCharts LLC www.LitCharts.com | Follow us: @litcharts | v.005 Page 2

©2016 LitCharts LLC www.LitCharts.com | Follow us: @litcharts | v.005 Page 3

Richard Mason – The son of Mr. Mason and stepbrother of The Y

©2016 LitCharts LLC www.LitCharts.com | Follow us: @litcharts | v.005 Page 4

©2016 LitCharts LLC www.LitCharts.com | Follow us: @litcharts | v.005 Page 5

©2016 LitCharts LLC www.LitCharts.com | Follow us: @litcharts | v.005 Page 6

©2016 LitCharts LLC www.LitCharts.com | Follow us: @litcharts | v.005 Page 7

©2016 LitCharts LLC www.LitCharts.com | Follow us: @litcharts | v.005 Page 8

©2016 LitCharts LLC www.LitCharts.com | Follow us: @litcharts | v.005 Page 9

©2016 LitCharts LLC www.LitCharts.com | Follow us: @litcharts | v.005 Page 10

©2016 LitCharts LLC www.LitCharts.com | Follow us: @litcharts | v.005 Page 11

©2016 LitCharts LLC www.LitCharts.com | Follow us: @litcharts | v.005 Page 12

©2016 LitCharts LLC www.LitCharts.com | Follow us: @litcharts | v.005 Page 13

©2016 LitCharts LLC www.LitCharts.com | Follow us: @litcharts | v.005 Page 14

©2016 LitCharts LLC www.LitCharts.com | Follow us: @litcharts | v.005 Page 15

©2016 LitCharts LLC www.LitCharts.com | Follow us: @litcharts | v.005 Page 16

©2016 LitCharts LLC www.LitCharts.com | Follow us: @litcharts | v.005 Page 17

©2016 LitCharts LLC www.LitCharts.com | Follow us: @litcharts | v.005 Page 18

©2016 LitCharts LLC www.LitCharts.com | Follow us: @litcharts | v.005 Page 19

©2016 LitCharts LLC www.LitCharts.com | Follow us: @litcharts | v.005 Page 20

©2016 LitCharts LLC www.LitCharts.com | Follow us: @litcharts | v.005 Page 21

©2016 LitCharts LLC www.LitCharts.com | Follow us: @litcharts | v.005 Page 22

©2016 LitCharts LLC www.LitCharts.com | Follow us: @litcharts | v.005 Page 23

©2016 LitCharts LLC www.LitCharts.com | Follow us: @litcharts | v.005 Page 24

©2016 LitCharts LLC www.LitCharts.com | Follow us: @litcharts | v.005 Page 25

©2016 LitCharts LLC www.LitCharts.com | Follow us: @litcharts | v.005 Page 26

©2016 LitCharts LLC www.LitCharts.com | Follow us: @litcharts | v.005 Page 27

©2016 LitCharts LLC www.LitCharts.com | Follow us: @litcharts | v.005 Page 28

©2016 LitCharts LLC www.LitCharts.com | Follow us: @litcharts | v.005 Page 29

©2016 LitCharts LLC www.LitCharts.com | Follow us: @litcharts | v.005 Page 30

©2016 LitCharts LLC www.LitCharts.com | Follow us: @litcharts | v.005 Page 31

©2016 LitCharts LLC www.LitCharts.com | Follow us: @litcharts | v.005 Page 32

©2016 LitCharts LLC www.LitCharts.com | Follow us: @litcharts | v.005 Page 33

©2016 LitCharts LLC www.LitCharts.com | Follow us: @litcharts | v.005 Page 34

©2016 LitCharts LLC www.LitCharts.com | Follow us: @litcharts | v.005 Page 35

©2016 LitCharts LLC www.LitCharts.com | Follow us: @litcharts | v.005 Page 36

©2016 LitCharts LLC www.LitCharts.com | Follow us: @litcharts | v.005 Page 37

©2016 LitCharts LLC www.LitCharts.com | Follow us: @litcharts | v.005 Page 38

©2016 LitCharts LLC www.LitCharts.com | Follow us: @litcharts | v.005 Page 39

©2016 LitCharts LLC www.LitCharts.com | Follow us: @litcharts | v.005 Page 40

©2016 LitCharts LLC www.LitCharts.com | Follow us: @litcharts | v.005 Page 41

©2016 LitCharts LLC www.LitCharts.com | Follow us: @litcharts | v.005 Page 42

©2016 LitCharts LLC www.LitCharts.com | Follow us: @litcharts | v.005 Page 43

©2016 LitCharts LLC www.LitCharts.com | Follow us: @litcharts | v.005 Page 44

©2016 LitCharts LLC www.LitCharts.com | Follow us: @litcharts | v.005 Page 45

©2016 LitCharts LLC www.LitCharts.com | Follow us: @litcharts | v.005 Page 46

©2016 LitCharts LLC www.LitCharts.com | Follow us: @litcharts | v.005 Page 47

©2016 LitCharts LLC www.LitCharts.com | Follow us: @litcharts | v.005 Page 48

©2016 LitCharts LLC www.LitCharts.com | Follow us: @litcharts | v.005 Page 49

©2016 LitCharts LLC www.LitCharts.com | Follow us: @litcharts | v.005 Page 50

©2016 LitCharts LLC www.LitCharts.com | Follow us: @litcharts | v.005 Page 51

You might also like