THE VOICE OF SUBALTERNS—A STUDY OF WIDE SARGASSO SEA FROM THE PERSPECTIVE OF POSTCOLONIAL FEMINISM
ABSTRACT
Wide Sargasso Sea is a masterpiece of the mid twentieth-century English novelist Jean Rhys. It is regarded as a rewriting of Jane Eyre, a famous novel written by the nineteenth-century English writer Charlotte Bronte. Wide Sargasso Sea is mainly about the awkward situation and the identity crisis of the white Creole Antoinette (Bertha in Jane Eyre) in the British colony Jamaica after the slavery is abolished, which finally drive her mad. Meanwhile, it depicts the sufferings of the third world women as subalterns. As a writer born in Caribbean, Jean Rhys exposes to readers the real experience of the “mad woman” in Bronte’s novel by her own special identity of multiple cultures, her calm and objective judgment as well as her insightful and vivid art of narration. Based on Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak’s postcolonial feminist criticism and her analysis of whether “subalterns” can speak as its theoretical framework, this essay interprets the novel from the perspective of postcolonial feminism by studying the voice and revolt made by the two female subalterns--Antoinette and Christophine against the double oppression from both colonialism and the patriarchal society. The aim is to reveal the darkness and ugliness of colonialism and patriarchy as well as to tell people that only by persevering with the strategy of “violent revolt” with no slight compliance can we realize the real emancipation of the Third World women. What’s more, only by first eliminating colonialism and white women’s sense of superiority can the Third World women pursue gender equality bravely and completely in the world as a whole.
Keywords: Wide Sargasso Sea, postcolonial feminism, subaltern, Spivak, revolt
Contents
Chapter 1 Introduction    1
1.1 The Life and Work of Jean Rhys    1
1.2 Wide Sargasso Sea: A Literature Review    1
Chapter 2 Theoretical Framework    4
2.1 Postcolonial Feminism    4
2.2 Definition of Subaltern    5
Chapter 3 The Voice and Revolt of the Two Female Subalterns in Wide Sargasso Sea    7
3.1 Background Introduction of the Story    7
3.2 Subalterns as the Other    7
    3.2.1 Subalterns as the Sexual Other    7
    3.2.2 Subalterns as the Racial Other    8
3.3 Subalterns as Different Counter Powers    9
    3.3.1 Antoinette’s Voice    9
    3.3.2 Christophine’s Voice    11
    3.3.3 A Contrast Between Antoinette and Christophine    12
Chapter 4 Conclusion    14
Bibliography    15