Wide Sargasso Sea

Truth can lie between two different realities. In Charlotte Bronte’s Jane Eyre, Mr. Rochester’s plans to marry Jane are frustrated by the revelation that the long-suffering man is already married and in fact, his mad wife is locked in the attic. But what is her story? And if she is ‘mad’, how did she get that way? The wife is Antoinette Bertha Mason Rochester, nee Cosway; she prefers Antoinette. Rhys is masterful showing the descent of Antionette’s life and mind as well as the gradual rise of Rochester’s contempt and control of her. The evolution of Antoinette’s voice from clarity to ‘madness’ is exquisite and sad. Like Rhys herself, Antoinette is of Creole descent. We meet her growing up in Dominica with her widowed mother and disabled brother. From the beginning, Antoinette is unsure of who she is. As white Creoles, they are rejected by both the English and the Blacks, who call them “white cockroaches.” As women, they lack status or agency. After the Emancipation Act frees the slaves, Antoinette’s slaveholding family, once wealthy, becomes destitute. Antoinette’s mother pursues the only option she believes is open to her, and marries a rich white carpetbagger, Mr. Mason. Mason decides to replace the family’s remaining servants with Eastern coolie workers. The staff overhears, however, and they set fire to the home, Coulibri, resulting in the death of Antoinette’s brother and leading to her mother’s emotional devastation. Mr. Mason abandons his mad wife to abusive caretakers and sends Antoinette to convent school. It is his responsibility to identify a husband for her, howe ver, and he does. It’s an unnamed English gentleman, though readers of Jane Eyre will recognize him as Mr. Rochester. As a second son, Rochester needs the money bequeathed to Antoinette by her stepfather. They wed, and at first the match seems successful. Rochester breaks down Antoinette’s reserve through affection and physical passion. Antoinette responds, opening herself to experience a happiness her childhood had trained her to never expect. Yet Rochester has a nagging distrust of his exotic Creole wife, and antipathy for Dominica. Geography becomes a proxy for the perceptions and misperceptions of the spouses. Neither view the home of the other as “real.” Antoinette sees England as cold and dark; in her eyes Dominica is lush, beautiful and fragrant. Rochester views the technicolor Dominica as ominous and threatening, as if he were about to be devoured by a giant Venus flytrap. And then there is the Sargasso Sea, a dead-calm oceanic mire that Dominica borders upon. For Antoinette, it’s a metaphor for her deepest fears. For Rochester, it is a physical barrier between himself and his beloved England. Rochester receives a letter received from a man who may or may not be Antoinette’s brother by her father and one of his slaves. The letter warns Rochester he was tricked into marrying a degenerate girl with a family history of madness. These allegations prey on Rochester’s insecurities and cause him to abruptly reject Antoinette. Her fragile sense of identity shaken and desperate to win back her husband’s affection, Antoinette resorts to means which unintentionally goad Rochester into acting on his worst impulses. The rift between them devolves into a chasm leading to her own undoing. Rochester drags his broken wife to cold and dark England, where he confines her to the attic, under the care of servants paid for their discretion. The Wide Sargasso Sea is a stunning work of understanding and empathy for all characters in this book – and the next.

The expression 'Short and Sweet' sprang to mind immediately after I raced to the last sentence of the voluminous 120 page account of Bertha Mason, Mr Rochester's wife in the renowned "Jane Eyre". I found myself needing to re-read the last chapter furiously because I was, at that point, hungry for more. Before launching into it, I had misgivings about a very thin bit of literature that purported to illuminate the life of a tragic and obscure character, threatening the secure opinions of known figures in a widely enjoyed story. After all, this is a classic we're tampering with. With several false starts, a little research about the author and fanning through passionate love/hate reviews, I decided to abandon all my ideas about the preceding novel and not be an annoying purist. The author Jean Rhys, made a controversial move in shifting the Victorian timeline of the tale to that of the Emancipation period and in doing so, wove a complicated and poetic tapestry of a fractured Jamaican society fraught with themes of financial insecurity, elitism, imperialism, and existentialism; a showcase of human frailty with no one innocent, only varying degrees of vulnerability. As you might have gathered, it is not a light headed fable with hopping bunnies and tweeting birds that encircle a handsome prince and his radiant bride - the egg in this Easter hunt is rotten and the Mad Hatter is serving you arsenic. Do people actually lose their minds or do they simply create their own reality because the one they are presented with is unacceptable? Can external circumstances drive you to extreme decisions? Are you crazy for making them? I will admit to having been momentarily confused with several parts because the author allowed different characters to elaborate on their thoughts and events as opposed to a consistent point of view throughout. Consequently, I was invited to a more intimate seat with the personalities, some more repulsive than others. Having said that, I recognise the reason for the negativity towards the book. If you lionised the characters and their society in Jane Eyre, this poignant chronicle becomes a damning affront to your sacred cows. Reading it for what it is, I found myself hurled into a whirlwind of innocence, betrayal, abandonment, deceit, and cruelty, wrapped up in sad ribbons of dreams that reference lyrically across the tumultuous lives featured. If The Wide Sargasso Sea was a song, it would be a haunting elegy to real lives that have been and that are still trapped in dark webs of humanity.

I generally have an enormous problem with authors writing spin-offs on books just because they often fall far short of the original, but this was a definite exception. Jane Eyre is one of my favorite books and at first I was upset at this book. However, it's joined Jane Eyre as one of my favorite books. It is extremely well written, not to mention all the literary devices the author uses very effectively. I like her premise, that she felt it was unfair of Bronte not to give Antoinette Mason a story. In Jane Eyre she is simply depicted as an evil madwoman, whereas in Wide Sargasso Sea the author forces the reader to see her as a complete human being who has lived a complete life. By the end of it I had the greatest sympathy for her, though as a fan of Mr. Rochester I did feel she was a little hard on him, considering what he had to go through. All in all, though, this is a magnificent book.

Eufemia es de esos libros que empiezas “solo para ver de qué se trata” y terminas leyendo de corrido, aunque digas que no tienes tiempo. Su estilo irónico y directo te hace reír justo cuando pensabas que no se podía decir nada más absurdo… pero sí, se puede. Una historia que mezcla realidad y sarcasmo de manera brillante, ideal para quienes disfrutan reírse incluso de lo serio.

All time classic, arrived as promised

Me compré el libro porque tuve que leer para un trabajo Jane Eyre y supe que jane Rhys escribió esta novela contando la historia entre Rochester y Bertha Mason ( the mad women in the attic) desde otro punto de vista, el de el mismo Rochester y la misma Bertha. Recomiendo su lectura conjunta ya que Wide Sargasso adquiere un major significado y amplia nuestra comprensión del contexto histórico en el que se desarrolla la historia: el colonialismo europeo y principalmente el inglés. Es una lectura interesante que hace reflexionar sobre el papel que ha desempeñado la mujer en las distintas épocas y el que ocupa hoy.

As expected and arrived on time.

Ottimo

Livro sensacional.