Wide Sargasso Sea by Jean Rhys | Summary, Themes, & Characters

Part Two

Part two is narrated by Antoinette's new husband. It begins with their arrival at Granbois, a small estate on one of the Windward Islands owned by Antoinette's mother where they intend to spend a few weeks for their honeymoon. He admits to knowing very little about his wife, having agreed to marry her out of desperation when her stepbrother, Richard Mason, offered him 30,000 pounds to propose. He feels increasingly uncomfortable at the estate and begins to feel as though he was taken advantage of.

Soon after their arrival, the man receives a letter from Daniel Cosway, one of Antoinette's father's illegitimate children. Daniel warns the man of the insanity that runs in his wife's blood. Antoinette begins to sense that her husband hates her, so she begs Christophine for her help. Christophine tells Antoinette to leave the man, but she refuses. That night, Antoinette returns home and tells her husband about her past. They talk late into the night and when he wakes, he believes he was poisoned. Afraid Antoinette will wake up, he runs out of the house and into the woods. He sleeps in the woods for several hours and when he wakes again, he returns to Granbois where Amélie, one of the servants, brings him wine and food. He sleeps with Amélie while Antoinette sits in the next room, able to hear everything.

The next morning, Antoinette goes to Christophine's home. When she returns, she is drunk and goes straight to her bedroom. When Antoinette calls for more to drink, her husband keeps the servants from taking her more, forcing her to come out of her bedroom. Antoinette is drunk and mad and when her husband refuses to give her the bottle, she bites him. Christophine comforts her and takes her back to her room, then returns to yell at the man for his cruelty. It is that night that he decides to return to England and to take Antoinette with him.

Part Three

In the third and final part of the story, Antoinette is the narrator. Her husband has brought her back to England where she lives locked in the attic under the care of a servant named Grace Poole. Now violent and deranged, Antoinette has lost all sense of time and believes that they never made it to England. When her stepbrother, Richard, comes to see her, she attacks him with a knife, though she has no recollection of this incident when Grace tells her about it later. Antoinette has a recurring dream about stealing Grace's keys and exploring the house, but she never makes it to the end. The third time she has the dream it ends with her setting the house on fire. Believing that she has to fulfill her dream, she grabs a candle and exits the attic.

• Race - Race is something that Antoinette struggles with throughout the novel. A young Creole girl, she grows up surrounded by black servants on the Coulibri estate. Because her family previously owned slaves, the black population holds many animosities towards them, often referring to them as white cockroaches. She is also not refined enough for white English society, so she is stuck in the middle, struggling to fit in.
• Identity - Antoinette struggles throughout the novel to form an identity. She is caught between two races, two countries, and suffers isolation constantly throughout her life. Her husband takes it upon himself to make her struggles worse, calling her Bertha instead of Antoinette and eventually locking her away, where she loses all sense of self.
• Oppression - Oppression is the basis of many of the struggles that take place in the novel. The former slaves, while they were freed due to the Emancipation Act, have not received any compensation and still struggle to survive. Annette frequently uses the term "marooned" to describe her feeling of isolation and imprisonment on her own estate after their money is gone and the rest of the community openly hates their family. Antoinette also faces oppression in the form of dependency that is forced on her by her husband, who ultimately takes her life away from her.
• Postcolonialism - Postcolonialism is seen throughout the novel as the narrative details the concept of decolonization and how it affects the individuals within the story.

Symbolism in "Wide Sargasso Sea"

Below are a few of the most important symbols in "Wide Sargasso Sea" and explanations for each.

• Birds - Coco, Antoinette's mother's bird, represents Antoinette's own death. The bird is killed when Coulibri is set on fire. His wings had been clipped by Mr. Mason, an Englishman, so he is unable to fly to safety. The bird, on fire, falls to his death when he jumps out a window, just as Antoinette does at the end of her dream and presumably does when she awakens to enact her dream as well.
• Fire - Fire is symbolic of retribution and defiance in the novel, offering an escape from oppressive captors. Not long after the Emancipation Act freed the slaves, the black community burns down Coulibri. Coco, the bird, jumps out the window but is unable to fly because his wings have been clipped, so he falls to his death. Antoinette suffers the same captivity and lack of freedom and she too uses fire to escape, setting the house on fire jumping out of the window to her death.
• Isolation - Antoinette goes through her entire life in a state of isolation. The rest of the town shuns them so she grows up alone with a mother who shows very little affection towards her. When she moves into the convent, she keeps to herself and becomes even more withdrawn. She is married for a very brief time before she is locked in an attic where the isolation finally forces her to lose her mind.

When Antoinette says this, she is referring to her mother who, to her, had died after the fire at Coulibri. While her mother continued to live for several more years, her mental state was shattered and she was no longer the woman she once was. Antoinette experiences the same unfortunate fate at the hands of her husband.

• "Bertha is not my name. You are trying to make me into someone else, calling me by another name. I know, that's obeah too."

When Rochester begins calling Antoinette "Bertha" he is ultimately trying to force her to surrender to him and fit the image of what he believes a woman should be. This adds one more divide to her already suffering sense of identity.

• "Names matter, like when he wouldn't call me Antoinette, and I saw Antoinette drifting out of the window with her scents, her pretty clothes and her looking-glass."

This quote is further proof that Rochester's insistence on referring to Antoinette as "Bertha" further worsened her already struggling mental state when it came to her identity. By refusing to acknowledge her for who she was, he took away her sense of self.

A brief summary of "Wide Sargasso Sea" depicts the story of Antoinette Cosway, a young Creole girl who grew up poor in Jamaica in the early nineteenth century. Sold into a marriage by her stepbrother, she is forced to endure a coldhearted and prideful husband who calls her "Bertha." Already struggling with her identity, Antoinette begins to sink into a depression just as her mother had. Her husband takes her to England and locks her in the attic of his house where she becomes violent and delusional. The story includes themes of race, oppression, identity, and postcolonialism with quotes within the text giving the reader a look into the minds of both Antoinette and her husband.