WSS_Felicia Ng_32/10
Q: Compare and contrast the characters of Antoinette and Rochester.
à How are they different?
à In what ways are they similar?
à How do their different social and cultural backgrounds account for the failure of their relationship?
The characters of Antoinette and Rochester are largely shaped by their interactions with one another, as well as the social conditioning that they have endured during different phases of their lives. As a result of this, along with stark contrasts between their positions in the racial hierarchy as well as the constraints they face, they have vastly different characters.
A clear distinction between the characters lies in their vulnerability to their situations, which vary accordingly given Antoinette’s position as a woman, her status as a White Creole, and Rochester as an Englishman, which hence confers to them differing degrees of entitlement to power and control. Throughout the text, Antoinette is constantly being othered by Rochester, playing the role of the weaker party whose actions and cultural habits are seen to constantly diverge from the standards of Rochester. This is evident from the line, ‘Creole of pure English descent she may be, but she is not English or European either,’ in which the contrast word ‘but’ highlights on Antoinette’s ‘inadequacies’. It also seemingly serves to demote her social background whilst elevating that of Rochester’s. Later on, Antoinette’s weakness is further emphasized upon when Rhys slowly reveals the fragmentation of her identity by Rochester, whom calls her ‘Bertha’, and later ‘Marionette’. As quoted from the text – ‘Bertha is not my name. You are trying to make me someone else, calling me another name,’ reflects certain dominance by Rochester through his re-shaping of Antoinette and how she is eventually perceived by the readers. ‘Marionetta’ as a name further on in the text, also connotates the negative notion of Antoinette’s puppet-like pliability and sense of forced servitude to Rochester. It is hence, this different name-calling that gradually weakens Antoinette’s being and drives her to isolation – proving how powerless she is against a man. Reinforcement of Antoinette’s vulnerability is also present in the visual imagery of, ‘Coco made an effort to fly down but his clipped wings failed him and he fell screeching. He was all on fire’ – where it shows Antoinette’s pet parrot in a futile attempt to escape, seemingly suggestive and symbolic of Antoinette’s similar flightless situation through the negative dictions of ‘clipped’, ‘failed’, ‘fell screeching’ and the universal expression ‘all’ highlighting on her helpless plight and her inability to alter the worst for the better. Antoinette’s naïve dependency on Christophine’s obeah magic – to get back Rochester’s love – also reflects upon her lack of mental strength and determination to tackle the situation, emphasizing upon her internal vulnerabilities and reluctance to overcome her difficulties. The above hence also manages to highlight Rochester’s ease in controlling Antoinette, who remains weak. Yet however, his power remains questionable to a certain extent because of his anonymity throughout the text.
Another difference in the characters of Antoinette and Rochester is their commitment levels to their marriage and what they seek to get out of their relationship. In other words, they both differ in their feelings towards one another. Whilst Antoinette seems to have grown feelings of attachment for Rochester, Rochester only lusts for her and quickly gets bored with Antoinette. This is revealed in the line, ‘As for the happiness I gave her, that was worse than nothing. I did not love her. I was thirsty for her, but that is not love. I felt very little tenderness to her…’ where the frequent use of punctuations and confession-like lines starting with ‘I’ gives the line a relatively rough rhythm, mirroring Rochester’s reluctance in accepting his marriage wholeheartedly and intensifies upon his hesitations of even entering a relationship in the first place. On the other hand, Antoinette still displays a certain level of affection and yearning for Rochester despite Rochester’s ignorant attitude towards her. This can be seen from ‘…If he, my husband, could come to me one night. Once more. I would make him love me,’ in which her hopes and desires for Rochester’s love are encompassed in the words ‘could’ and ‘would’, also emphasizing on how much Rochester means to her. This point of difference however, also contains an overlap to a similarity in the characters of the two, who seem to both believe that sex can serve as a bond in marriage and have selfishly abused it to meet their personal interests.
One similarity in their characters would have to be their selfish dependencies on the other party. After witnessing the burning down of her own house, her brother Pierre’s death and her mother going insane, Antoinette’s decision to finally accept the arranged marriage with Rochester could perhaps be attributed to her search for security and want for someone to protect her from possible abuses as a single woman (like her mother) rather than feelings of love at the start. Where Rochester says, ‘You are safe, I’d say. She’d like that – to be told that you are safe’ to Antoinette, it can be inferred that Antoinette has a very childlike dependency on Rochester. Rochester himself too, marries Antoinette for reasons of wealth and to acquire her possessions. He is blinded by monetary gains rather than actual dedication and this is clear in, ‘I have not bought her. She has bought me…The thirty-thousand pounds have been paid to me without question or doubt,’ which has implications that Rochester sees his marriage as more of a business transaction. His selfishness is revealed where he seems to be pushing the blame to Antoinette by stating, ‘She has bought me,’ and denies his own actions with a declarative statement.
This selfishness could have been a result of the fact that both Antoinette and Rochester were in some way, an orphan from young and have been less favored by their families. This is evident from how Annette, Antoinette’s mother, would place more attention on Pierre instead of her. This is revealed in, ‘…pushed me away…without a word, as if she had decided once and for all that I was useless to her.’ Rochester likewise, being the second son in his family, does not even get to inherit the family fortune. Due to this lack of concern and love that has been shown to them, both struggle for a sense of place and identity. When Antoinette could no longer find comfort in Coulibri Estate, she expressed her wishes to escape to England, ‘…but why should I go to Martinique? I wish to see England,’ only to find out that the very place in which she hoped to be could also not contain her, nor give her the security that she yearns – for England turns out to be the place that she was held captive by Rochester, and eventually, no longer belonging to either Coulibri or the new English land. Similarly for Rochester, he shows a struggle to accept his new environment (during his honeymoon period in Massacre – which forebodes something morbid), and claims that, ‘Everything is too much, I felt as I rode wearily after her. Too much blue, too much purple, too much green. The flowers too red…hills too near.’ He seems to imply that the overwhelming excess of the West Indies is taking over his comfort zones, as shown by the anaphora of the intensifier ‘too’, which conveys his degrees of tiredness for the things and nature around him. The soothing colours of ‘purple’ and ‘blue’ also serve as a contradictory image of his low emotions and depression, whilst the scenic views of ‘flowers’ and ‘hills’ are unable to bring him comfort and belonging; almost as if no place can embrace his presence.
Hence, in conclusion, from the various experiences that Antoinette and Rochester have each gone through, their characters were shaped and constructed differently. They also seem to display their own moments of strengths and weaknesses, whilst at certain points in time, they also struggle to find that balance between expressing and suppressing their emotions and thoughts, thereby constructing the image that readers have of them.
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