The idea of masculinity and femininity in Jean Rhys novel Wide Sargasso Sea - Essay Example

A D Paul Page The Idea of Masculinity and Femininity in Jean Rhys'Novel Wide Sargasso Sea Jean Rhys is not a prolific After an initial writing spree, she went into seclusion. However in the evening of her life she came back to writing and produced, perhaps, her most widely studied novel, Wide Sargassso Sea. The divide between the autobiographical and fictional in all her works is indeed very thin. The fictional scaffolding is only to support her unconcealed life experience. Rhys once called herself, a doormat in a world of boots. The recurring theme of her writing is the helpless female and outsider in a patriarchal milieu. The feminist literature as a genre is relatively new. The autographic element in a post-colonial background lends it a special charm, while it offers a critique of the man-dominated colonial world. The novel explores the various contraries that are found in life. The oppositions are between self and the other, fiction and reality, black and white, master and slave and more particularly involving masculine and feminine. As a social criticism the novel is a documentation of the historic reality of the patterns of thinking and acting that has been perpetuated in the patriarchal society from time immemorial. Rhys insight into the role of gender in deciding the plight of the condition of women which she so beautifully and powerfully expressed in her early fiction, The perpetual hunger to be beautiful and Page 2 that thirst to be loved which is the real curse of Eve (from 'Illusion' in The Left Bank, 1927) continues in Wide Sargasso Sea. Since gender played an important role in the creation of this novel its full understanding requires a look from the gender point of view. The novel of Charlotte Bronte, The Jane Eyre, inspires the Rhys story. The mad woman in the attic in Rhys story is Antoinette Cosway. The marginalisation of Bronte's character makes the author to look for the other side of the mad woman. The patriarchal society traditionally took for granted the theory that women were essentially susceptible to unreason than men and female madness is associated often with deviations from the ideal of femininity. The popular belief supposes women to have a tendency for insanity. Western medicine has many theories to substantiate this view. Rhys critically responds to this by making Antoinette mad. While the cause of Berth's insanity is traced to familial tendency in Bronte's fiction, in Rhys' the critique is directed against the male and white dominated society and the demands of that society. The innocent and vivacious sensuous nature of the Creole was not the trigger for the young Englishman to like her. Instead of developing an engrossing relation based on love and sharing, soon the relation disintegrates in to that of master and slave. Page 3 The attempt to meet the demands of such relation makes her mad. She is in a way driven to madness. The basic aim of Bronte was to present the ideal in the character of Jane Eyre, who realized that her presence in the life of Rochester was an altruistic necessity for the well being of the man. Jane is the typical woman who accepts the society as it is. She knows the philandering of Rochester and gives some allowance to such behavior as an acceptable conduct in a patriarchal society. While the purpose of Rhys is not to idealize the society but to find out the factors that drove Bertha mad. Wide Sargasso Sea exposes the sinister side of marriage, which can jeopardize the psychological well being of a woman. Jane is a heroic woman who is idealized and functions in the world of men, because she has accepted the social norms of Victorian life. She is the typical European woman whom Ibsen portrays in the Doll's House. A person who accepts the social norm of a society, however corrupt that society may be, may not go to pieces, but the unwilling but apparently submissive attempt to live in the framework of a loveless relation can take a huge toll of a persons mind. A distance of hundred years separates the two novels from one another. Rhys is able to show how two different people react to a patriarchal society. Of the two women who are better equipped to survive in a patriarchal society Despite growing up as an orphan Jane climbs the social ladder. She becomes the governess in a rich man's house and eventually marries the man who is superior to her in social rank. She is able to establish a marital relation with him based on equality. At the same time, Antoinette gets entangled in a loveless relation and ends up as one of societies misfits. It is possible to assess Jane as a subtler Page 4 and cleverer woman, who knew the art of survival in the intricate world of male dominance. In a patriarchal set up the ultimate dream of a woman, is to get wedded to a wealthy man, superior in rank, who loves her and has a perception of her value as a woman often centered around her physical attributes. From this point of view Jane achieved what Antoinette could not do. In both novels, Rochester is the most central male character. While in Wide Sargasso Sea the Rochester's action is mostly pecuniary devoid of the warmth of masculinity, his action in Jane Eyre is deeply masculine with many of vignettes of chivalry. More than the innocent sensuality of the feminine in Antoinette what attracted Rochester was the reality that she is a prosperous Creole heiress. The prevailing English law, which would make him the possessor of her wealth seduced Rochester to marry more than the bewitching charm of the Creole. The Rochester-Antoinette imbroglio, in which they do not consummate their sexuality in an engrossing celebration of love, was somewhat common English family relations of the 19th century. Antoinette was "afraid of what may happen" (p. 48); nevertheless she marries him, as the necessity of securing a husband compels her as an institutional requirement. In spite of her foreboding of the outcome, she sacrifices her femininity and opts for an arrangement. In contrast Jane's relation with Rochester was a conscious choice to exercise her femininity. It is interesting to note that Jane was able to reject a prospective husband, St. John, by daringly telling him, "I scorn your idea of love". The fact that in spite of her lowly state as an orphan and her apparent plane looks, the feminine nature was visible to men. =============== Read More