1. What role, if any, do you think Mr. Rochester played in Antoinette’s descent into madness? Do you think she would have gone mad regardless, or did he have something to do with it?
In the novel, Wide Sargasso Sea by Jean Rhys, the plot is driven by the protagonist, Antoinette Cosway’s, descent into madness and her marriage with Mr. Rochester. As Antoinette descends into madness, Mr. Rochester is not the sole reason for her lunacy, yet he serves as the catalyst. A major reason for Antoinette to go mad was her influence form Christophine, an evil woman who practiced obeah. Antoinette’s life mirrors her mother’s, who also went mad, which causes her to follow that path.
Christophine was present throughout Antoinette’s life since she was a young girl. She believed in obeah, or black magic. To describe what Christophine believes in, Daniel says, “She is obeah woman…she believe in all that devil business.” (113). Christophine uses obeah like many other people of her kind, “they confuse matters by telling lies if pressed” (97) which greatly influences Antoinette. When Antoinette started believing that Mr. Rochester no longer loved her, she turned to Christophine’s use of obeah to make Mr. Rochester love her again. Therefore, Christophine gave Antoinette something to put in his wine and to place around the bed, a white powder. The spiked wine made him sick and he did not love her again. This caused Antoinette to leave the honeymoon house for some time because the spiked wine did not work. When Christophine convinced Antoinette to leave the island for some time, she greatly damages Antoinette though the use of obeah. Christophine makes Antoinette sleep because she believes it will make her better; she says “she must sleep while I work for her – to make her well again.” (140). It is clear that Christophine and her use of obeah is harming Antoinette because when she wakes up, she begs for Mr. Rochester after Christophine gives her too much rum. As Mr. Rochester told Christophine, “You seem to have made her dead drunk on bad rum and she’s a wreck!” (141). Antoinette’s descent into madness was sparked by Mr. Rochester’s withdrawal of attention for her; this, in turn, caused her to turn to Christophine, an evil woman whose influences were the twigs and logs, and Mr. Rochester is the spark who started the fire of Antoinette’s madness.
Antoinette’s mother, a lady who turned mad as she aged, had a life that mirrored her daughter’s. Their similarities in life were another factor towards the initiation of Antoinette’s madness. After the death of Antoinette’s father, they both become lonely, poor, and unhappy. The mother’s new marriage to Mr. Mason is not a healthy relationship; they do not love each other. Due to Mr. Mason, Antoinette marries Mr. Rochester, their marriage also becomes very unsuccessful and there is no true love for each other. In this mist of this, both of the women, mother and daughter, go completely mad. Ultimately, they both mimic each other by living a lonely, secluded life secluded from the majority of humanity. To add to the closeness of Antoinette and her mother, they are of the same ancestry so the madness is past through the blood line, especially because “the madness that is in her, and in all these white Creoles, come out” is highlighted (88). The similarity between mother and daughter as wells as their blood bond, causes Antoinette to go mad. Mr. Rochester was the spark that ignited her madness, but, ultimately, the parallels between their lives caused Antoinette’s lunacy. The dark an evil influences and the mirroring life between Antoinette and her mother, cause a substantial amount of build-up towards Antoinette’s initiation of madness which Mr. Rochester’s deprivation of love catalyzes.
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