Sargassam: The Wide Sargasso Sea by Jean Rhys

Rhys’ title references the Sargasso Sea, an oceanic black hole where vessels are supposedly ensnared by Sargassam; floating forests of seaweed. This could relate to the characters being trapped in their own Sargasso Sea, enmeshed in an array of conflicts. Known as the 'Woman in The Attic', Antoinette Mason is the novels protagonist. Antoinette's story is a scrutiny of racial supremacy coherent in colonial Dominica. 

“Justice. I've heard that word. I tried it out. I wrote it down. I wrote it down several times and always it looked like a damn cold lie to me. There is no justice.” 

As a white Creole woman living in the English colony of Jamaica, the protagonist is considered inferior to the dominant, English colonisers. As well as this, Antoinette's lineage is dismally linked to plantation ownership. This former affair means that Antoinette is repeatedly denied acceptance into any culture, especially the colonised black citizens. This constant rejection leaves the novel with an identify catastrophe.   

When & Where & How?

Rhys’ novel has a post-colonial setting where the Slavery Abolition Act has been passed and many of the formally profitable estates are in decline without the exploitation of forced labour. Though slaves are free, they are deeply unforgiving and with good reason not to. A trait that the writer creates within the protagonist is a sense of vulnerability within their surroundings. A troubled setting is thoughtfully created by Rhys from the beginning in Part 1, looking at Antoinette's complex childhood, then in Part 2 with Rochester's insight into Antoinette's early adulthood and then finally in Part 3 as Antoinette is taken to England against her will. The three-part structure which is implemented in the novel allows the reader to gain three different perspectives into Antoinette's life although, at the same time, detaching us from the protagonist. Especially, Rochester's view of Antoinette which is a battle between attraction but also fear. Upon arriving in Jamaica, Rochester finds the island to be “a beautiful place- wild, untouched, above all untouched, with an alien, disturbing secret loveliness”.  His description of Antoinette, whom he describes as stunningly attractive with “long, sad, dark alien eyes”, is similar to the island’s rich colours and entrancing scents that allure Rochester in their beauty; nevertheless, a sense of the unfamiliar proves to be quite disconcerting to Rochester.

Rhys depicts how troubled Antoinette appears from her surroundings in Part One where the setting is established. The narrative opens a few years after Britain passed the Emancipation Act of 1833. The former slaves continue to bear a major grudge against their former owners, and riots are common. “I went to parts of Coulibri that I had not seen, where there was no road, no path, no track. And if the razor grass cut my legs and arms I would think, 'It's better than people.' Black ants 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”. The wild beauty of the Coulibri estate provides the young Antoinette with an escape from her troubles. But this estate isn't a home, a safe and secure place that Antoinette can identify with and make her own. The razor grass's mutilation of Antoinette's body marks a wound far less painful than the pain caused by people around her. The character of Antoinette is troubled in the inhuman environment. In Part Two, the novel moves to Granbois, the Cosway estate outside Massacre, Dominica. Unlike Jamaica, Dominica has altered between British and French imperial control over the years. The name of the town "Massacre" refers to a particularly bloody massacre of the Dominicans called the Parsley Massacre[1]. It was a conflict between racially different communities, emphasising the segregated setting in Wide Sargasso Sea. Even the “natives” are not native to the place but are foreigners, the descendants of those who were forced to make terrifying voyages from Africa on slave ships, people to whom the Emancipation Act had not brought real liberation, for they were set adrift. Rhys requires the setting to be as equally divided as the separation between Antoinette’s racial identities to establish both an internal  and physical conflict.

---

[1] [Dominicans And Haitians Revisit Painful Memories Of Parsley Massacre: (2017) Marlon Bishop, Tatiana Fernandez]

Morality

In Rhys’ novel, morality crosses over into the madness endured by Antoinette. “When I asked Christophine what happened when you died, she said, ‘You want to know too much’”. In her childhood, Antoinette is obsessed with death, so much that her early troubled state is recognised by others. “I could hardly wait for all this ecstasy and once I prayed for a long time to be dead”. From the account of Antoinette, she highlights her obsession with heaven, referred to as euphoric. Her desires to die, in order to escape the abuse of her mother and the society that outcasts her, leave Antoinette’s character tragically lost and hopeless. Part 2 of the novel, offers Rochester’s perspective of Antoinette. “She was only a ghost. A ghost in the grey daylight. Nothing left but hopelessness. Say die and I will die. Say die and watch me die”. Here, Rochester refers to his wife as a ghostly figure although she is alive, telling us that she is closer to death than ever before. The ‘hopelessness’ and ‘grey daylight’ emanating from Antoinette reflects her dark and morbid view of the world, however this is only due to Rochester’s patronizing treatment of his wife and merciless desire for control over her. Society has negatively influenced the development of Antoinette’s identity, taking shape in Rochester’s superior attitudes which turn Antoinette into his subservient wife. Rhys portrays the character of Rochester as the one who lacks morality to suggest that he is the main contributor to Antoinette’s insanity. Rochester’s persona is comparable to the many enforcers of imperialism at the time, having a superior mentality that preys upon the weak in order to take advantage of them.

Rhys places Antoinette in such a position to show her readers several things: how Antoinette faced racism and prejudice, her misunderstanding of racism, and the violence towards the discriminated. [2]Ciolkowski argues ‘Wide Sargasso Sea also inquires into the production of knowledge about Englishness and, in the process, puts Englishness, itself into crisis’.  Here, Ciolkowski infers that the more the former slaves learn about Antoinette’s heritage, the harder it is for the protagonist to escape critical judgements made about her and her family but most importantly, what it means to be from a white European background living in the English colony. Rhys’ displays Antoinette’s mentality as being heavily affected by other people’s influences, especially those who resent her family’s past. The writer presents the instability in her protagonist as being the result of being affiliated with Europe’s slave trade.

---

[2] [Navigating the Wide Sargasso Sea: Colonial History, English Fiction, and British Empire, Laura E. Ciolkowski, Twentieth Century Literature, Vol. 43, No. 3 (autumn, 1997), pp. 339-359]

"The identification and naming of the Sargasso Sea are inextricably linked with the history of colonialism. The sea is a tract of the North Atlantic Ocean lying roughly between the West Indies and the Azores [...] The poem called 'Obeah Night', which Jean Rhys wrote when she was finishing Wide Sargasso Sea using the persona of Rochester, Antoinette's husband, touches on the novels title, though the novel itself does not do so:"

'Perhaps Love would have smiled then
Shown us the way
Across the sea. They say it's strewn with wrecks
And weed-infested'

- 'Obeah Night' by Jean Rhys