widesargassosea读书报告.docx

Wide Sargasso Sea is a 1966 postcolonial parallel novel by Dominica-born author Jean Rhys. The novel acts as a prequel tochester is representative of the metropolitan state while Antoinette is the representative of the colony. For Antoinette, she has identity crisis, for as a white Creole, she is neither part of the black slave community nor accepted as part of European, a lack of belonging. And the problem of displacement and a shaky sense of one's own identity are already well established in the first part of the text, long before the marriage takes place: “... a white cockroach. That's me. That's what they call all of us who were here before their own people in Africa sold them to the slave traders. And I've heard English women call us white niggers. So between you I often wonder who I am and where is my country and where do I belong and why was I ever born at all.”(102) We can see that Antoinette was living in the crevice, which is one reason that she is inferior to Rochester in identity. Because to Rochester, he has the noble identity of being an English gentleman although he takes little possession of money. His noble status is a determining factor that he can play a leading role in marriage. Rochester regards the black people in the West Indies with great loathing. Antoinette's insanity, infidelity, and drunkenness are the result of his misguided belief that madness is i