Wide Sargasso Sea And The Color Purple
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Problems, along with misery, become apart of life whether youre willing to accept it or not. For those who have accepted such troubles, have also learned to cope with it one way or another. Antoinettes character in “Wide Sargasso Sea” and Celies character in “The Color Purple” have both experienced problems with depression, loneliness, violence, inferiority, racism, and self-identity. It is important for such characters as Antoinette and Celie to express their emotions and have a method of working out there issues.
In the novel “Wide Sargasso Sea” by Jean Rhys, the character Antoinette is left mainly to her own free will as a child with no friends and relied on herself to find out that there is a world that can be both peaceful and horrifying. In the first part of the novel, we witness Antoinettes childhood memories. She remembers the racial tensions and disapproval of white Jamaican women because they were not like “real white people”, wearing French Caribbean fashions. The white people also feared revenge of the ex- black slaves who follow Antoinette and called her “white cockroach”. Accepted by neither white nor black society, Antoinette feels great shame and left out. Having witnessed her home burnt down by the ex-slaves, the death of her brother Pierre, and her mother falling ill and mad, Antoinette had to go through it alone and begins to talk to herself for comfort. Being rejected by her mother and everyone else around her, she begins to lose her identity but soon finds protection in the closed, isolated life of the convent. Without a mothers love Antoinette becomes increasingly lost in thought and isolated, showing the early signs of her inherited emotional fragility. As an adult, insulting refrains would resurface in her mind as she becomes increasingly paranoid.
Antoinettes arranged marriage begins to distresses her, as she is married to a controlling white Englishman who feels alienated were she feels at home. Indeed, their marriage is a mismatch of culture and custom. Anoinette and her husband, Mr. Rochester, fail to relate to one another or comfort each other when Antoinette needs it the most. His unsympathetic feelings intensify her condition and even push her to fits of violence. An exile within her own family, a “white cockroach” to her disdainful servants, and an oddity in the eyes of her own husband, Antoinette cannot find a peaceful place for herself. Now she seeks refuge of the cruel world by surrounding herself in natures fold. Antoinette is fascinated with nature, which becomes a central character, and perhaps her only friend.
Similarly, in the novel “The Color Purple” by Alice Walker, the character Celie also has a rough childhood. As a young girl, Celie is constantly subjected to abuse, rape, and told she is poor and ugly. Celie begins to write to God for guidance because she dose not understand whats happening to her. At only fourteen, Celie is already pregnant with her second child as a result of rape from her father. He threatens her to not speak of it because