Women are stereotyped for our emotional attachments, reactions, explanations, interactions, relations, (need I go on - you know what I mean). So, I personally find it delightful when literature not only highlights it, but leaves the door wide open, so that we can [emotionally] charge in, and make it like home. Make it like home? How? Well, let's follow stereotypical suit - by overanalyzing, judging, exploring, and conversing of course! Bertha...dear, sweet, Bertha. Are you crazy?
The Madwoman in the Attic. Hmm, Bertha..how does that make you feel? Pissed. She's angry! And who, honestly, in her position, wouldn't be? She's controlled by a man who waltzed in, claimed her money, her body, and home for his own, then ripped from the place she knows and is confined to a room - come on ladies, what woman wouldn't be angry? Personally, I get mad when someone takes something and doesn't put it back, I can't imagine the rage I'd have if I were Rys's Antoinette. She's held captive by vow, by law, and by physical force, by an emotionally stunted man. - yes, sad as I am to admit it, the gallant Rochester from Bronte's novel is no more, he's replaced by this obnoxiously privileged man, who is severly lacking interior depth. He refuses to claim emotional or ethical resposibility for the happiness of his wife, refusing to be anything but self-centric, as if they're all in The World According to Rochester. While Antoinette is ready and willing to abandon her self for the well being of the other, Rochester remains all-inclusive of everything Rockester, and anything else is simply rejected. But back to the woman (isn't that how it always goes?) - Dear Antoinette. Oh, the woman who's name means "beyond praise," how neglected you've become! They call her crazy, insane, mentally ill, but with what reasoning? Because she's angry? Because women aren't supposed to be angry? Rochester can't handle it when she shares the fears and pains of her heart, what makes us think he'd be any less forgiving in his description of her than his willingness to be a spouse? These dreams, the ghosts, the reflections she sees, are they not all simply the emotional ends of emotional means? Because while Rochester has the ability to un-act himself, to drop character, to claim his privilege to simply not deal with women, women cannot escape themselves! Or can they?
What Antoinette does to deal with all these emotions is create two realities, because one is no longer enough. The lines blur between her reality and her dreams, but in both she is tormented and controlled by the emotions for which she has no outlet...
I think you're correct in correlating Antoinette's anger with others' perception that she is insane. It's not a coincidence that the word "mad" can mean both angry and crazy. Even Freud relates emotionality strictly to women; the term hysteria means "wandering uterus", and was used to explain the irrational behavior of women. I find Audrey Lourde's work on poetry and anger to be a useful lens through which to view emotion as a meaningful and productive tool, and think it relates well to many of the points you bring up in this post.
ReplyDeleteI think you're correct in correlating Antoinette's anger with others' perception that she is insane. It's not a coincidence that the word "mad" can mean both angry and crazy. Even Freud relates emotionality strictly to women; the term hysteria means "wandering uterus", and was used to explain the irrational behavior of women. I find Audrey Lourde's work on poetry and anger to be a useful lens through which to view emotion as a meaningful and productive tool, and think it relates well to many of the points you bring up in this post.
ReplyDeleteI completely agree with your point on Antoinette's anger toward Rochester is entirely justified. Rochester, with his male-white European centrist attitude wholly admitted that he did not love Antoinette. Their marriage simply a political one where he desired her wealth and searched for a reason to justify his perceived inferiority of Antoinette. Thus, his opinion changed immediately upon being presented with the possibility of her madness. However, I still feel that Antoinette by Part 3 is mad due to her incredibly disjointed identity. I personally think that her fury is the trigger for her madness.
ReplyDeleteI also agree with your arguments of madness due to Antoinette's anger toward Rochester. In part 2 of Wide Sargasso Sea, Antoinette's behavior is 100% justified in my opinion. I also find myself confused when it comes to part 3, simply because Antoinette's thoughts, which were so easy to follow early in the text, suddenly become quite confusing. This is not to say that she is certainly "mad", however, I think it is worth exploring that she may be at this point. Though it is not a view that I particularly favor, I also think that Rochester's insistence that Bertha is mad may have created somewhat of a self-fulfilling prophecy. Bertha is told she is mad and treated as though she is mad. Therefore, she takes on the role of mad woman, allowing Rochester to believe that he, of course, was right all along.
ReplyDeleteAntoinette's condition does warrant some mad behavior, but what I like most about your argument is actually how you lead into it. Statistically speaking, women tend to preface their opinions in group discussion with "I feel" while men tend to preface their opinions with "I think." I feel (yes I use the feminine) that this tendency would apply to Rochester and Ant. Rochester seems cold to his emotions and rely only on what he knows of partiarchal society. Antoinette on the other hand is very in touch with her feelings, so much so that she intensely feels the betrayal of Rochester.
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