Wide Sargasso Sea ---

Imagery and Symbols

The images and symbols in Wide Sargasso Sea have a structural and thematic purpose. The patternsof imagery,
metaphor and symbolism used in Wide Sargasso Sea are fundamental to the way in which the novel handles its
subject matter. They are not easily separated out from other formal aspects of the writing. Throughout the
novel, the natural world reflects Antoinette’s and the husband’s respective feelings of comfort and/or alienation.

The ambiguity of the pastoral is strengthened by the symbolism and imagery used in the novel. When
Antoinette is rejected by her mother and ridiculed by her peers, she hides in the gardens at Coulibri
and feels that even biting ants and sharp, stinging foliage are “Better, better than people.”
Conversely, a major feature of her nightmares, which turn out to be of England, is the unfamiliarity
of the trees. The husband, on the other hand, who finds the people and customs of Jamaica
disorienting and even disturbing, is similarly disoriented and disturbed by the Jamaican landscape.
He becomes lost and delirious in the jungle, and says that the landscape is, “not only wild but
menacing. Those hills would close in on you.” disturbing, is similarly disoriented and disturbed by
the Jamaican landscape. He
becomes lost and delirious in the jungle, and says that the landscape is, “not
only wild but menacing. Those hills would close in on you.”

Huggan & Tiffin claim that the use of animal imagery in order to belittle other characters, is often used in
postcolonial literature . This usage of symbolism and imagery is evident in Wide Sargasso Sea. For example,when
Amélie calls Antoinette a white cockroach: ’The white cockroach she marry”, Rhys shows the complicated
relationship, not only between coloniser and colonised, but alsobetween native inhabitants, emphasising the
complex subjects of postcolonialism and emancipation.
Antoinette compares the garden at Coulibri Estate to the biblical Garden of Eden, with its luxurious excess and
lost innocence. In her own words, the garden has “gone wild,” assaulting the senses with its brilliant colours,
pungent odours, and tangling overgrowth. The flowers look vaguely sinister; Antoinette describes one orchid as
being “snaky looking,” recalling the biblical fall and man’s decline into greed and sensuality. The decadent Creole
lifestyle as portrayed in the novel—predicated upon exploitation, wealth, and ease—finds its natural counterpart
in the fallen garden.

The state of women’s dresses and hair represent their desirability as well as their agency in the novel. When Tia
and Antoinette fall out early on in the novel, Tia humiliates Antoinette by stealing her dress. Annette’s effort to
lift the family out of destitution begins with the making of new dresses for herself and Antoinette.
When Antoinette wakes from her fever, she knows that she has been ill and a great change has occurred because
she sees that her hair has been cut. Louise de Plana, the ultimate ideal female in the novel, is constantly dressed
in white, and has hair that Antoinette tries and fails to emulate. The husband’s physical attraction to both
Antoinette and Amélie is at various points directed towards their dresses, and in the case of Antoinette even her
dress on its own, without her in it, is enough to arouse the husband. Christophine’s intimidating presence is often
connected with the bold colours of her dress.

Fire is the ultimate destructive and redemptive force in the novel. The fire at Coulibri is an act of retribution and
defiance on the part of the nearby black community, but it destroys the life that Antoinette has known as a child.
Both Coco the parrot and the moths that fly into the flames of candles throughout Antoinette’s and the husband’s
honeymoon foreshadow Antoinette’s own fiery suicide, through which she finally gains freedom at the end of
the novel.

Coco, Annette’s pet parrot, enacts Antoinette’s own doom. With his wings clipped by Mr. Mason—notably, an
Englishman—the bird is shackled and maimed, mirroring Antoinette’s own flightless dependency. As Antoinette
recalls, “[Coco] made an effort to fly down but his clipped wings failed him and he fell screeching. He was all
on fire.” This passage presages the apocalyptic dream that ends the novel, including Antoinette’s fiery fall from
the attic. As omens and warnings, birds invite Antoinette to invest meaning and significance in the natural world.
When she sees a cock crowing alongside Christophine’s house, Antoinette thinks, “That is for betrayal, but who
is the traitor?” As with the parrot, the appearance of the cock portends danger.