Daddy Issues

In class the other day, we spent some time discussing whether Rochester or Antionette deserve more sympathy in Wide Sargasso Sea. We came to the conclusion that Rochester tricks Antoinette into marrying him for financial gains and that Antoinette’s actions are justified for the most part, given that we know she has had a rough past and that she seems to genuinely want love from Rochester.

Although I won’t argue that Antoinette isn’t a victim of Rochester’s mistreatment, I think there is something to be said about Rochester’s relationship with his father and how it could have influenced his decisions. To start, although we haven’t heard directly from his father, it is clear from his letters to him that Rochester has some deeply rooted resentment and anxiety about their relationship. In particular, in one of his letters to his father, Rochester writes “I will never be a disgrace to you or to my dear brother, the son you love.” Taken out of context, it sounds satirical for Rochester to explicitly mention in a letter to his father that his father loves his brother but not him, since it seems unlikely that they would be writing letters to each other if this were the case. But since the rest of the letter is completely serious and he is consistent in groveling at his father throughout, it is clear that Rochester has serious issues with his father, although we don’t know the cause. Rochester is the least favorite son, and his father has seemingly made a clear point of it. Because of unknown circumstances, Rochester seems to really want attention and affection from his father. To this effect, in a letter, he highlights to his father the 30,000 pounds he has gotten from marrying Antoinette in hopes of earning some pride from his father. Assuming this premise that there are deeply-rooted reasons for this, it’s understandable that Rochester would have gone to the Caribbean and rushed into a marriage to his impress his family, and it’s understandable that he wouldn’t want to lose a penny of Antoinette’s money by taking Christophine’s offer. As for the hatred he feels for Antoinette at the end of the novel, one could read this as pent-up anger at his father that he hasn’t been able to release for years.


All in all, it is harder to sympathize with Rochester, since we don’t know the details of his past and having daddy issues doesn’t seem on par with the struggles we know Antoinette went through. We can more or less excuse Antoinette’s treatment of Rochester and her secretly drugging him because we know the circumstances that led to her decision to do so. So, in analyzing Rochester, we should not assume he is just an evil money-hungry guy and doesn’t have sympathetic motives for his actions since we really don’t know the causes of his issues with his father or much else about his past. 

Comments

  1. AdamNovember 17, 2018 at 12:17 PM

    Although we don't necessarily know Rochester's 'daddy issues' because he never explicitly tells us the situation and his emotions, we get a sense that it is complicated and one that is somewhat related to Antoinette and Annette. But, since we are more engrossed into Antoinette's story, we thus feel more sympathy for her. I do wonder what would be the effect of switching the genders of Antoinette and Rochester and how that would affect the level of our sympathies towards them.

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  2. AnonymousNovember 17, 2018 at 5:10 PM

    I think you make important points. Nothing excuses Rochester's abuse( or Antoinette drugging him) but it could explain the behavior. This doesn't mean Rochester isn't guilty but instead that his terrible actions could be related to broader problems of colonialism and gender roles....

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  3. AlexNovember 17, 2018 at 5:36 PM

    I think it is clear that Rochester's genetic make up is not what led him to mistreat Antoinette so horribly. His complex and painful relationship with his father along with the prevailing attitudes about gender, inheritance, and colonialism transformed him into a person capable of doing such horrible things.

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  4. AnnaNovember 17, 2018 at 6:01 PM

    I definitely think Rochester has a strained relationship with his father and family. However I would like to know more about how Rochester feels about his mother or the rest of family. He never mentions them. There are also very few times when he mentions his brother and father (but when he does it's negative). With Antionette we know what parts of her childhood shaped her but we never know about Rochester. Although it is mentioned at the end that he "was a good boy".

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  5. UnknownDecember 9, 2018 at 3:33 PM

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  6. UnknownDecember 9, 2018 at 3:33 PM

    You made some very valuable points in this post. While it's hard to justify the actions of someone who has cheated on and imprisoned a women against her will, we can't completely disregard the person's past too. If I were a lawyer for Rochester, I may even say that he is mentally unstable and his actions are a result of his mental instability. I would say that his mental problems were formed by his childhood experience with his dad and, like you said, his mistreatment of Antoinette is a result of anger towards daddy. Still, even while I'm typing this out, it's hard to defend someone who's done such terrible things, regardless of his history. Good post. It definitely made me think!

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  7. Alex HiggsDecember 15, 2018 at 7:15 AM

    It's clear in the book that Rochester has issues with his family and seeks the love and affection any child wants from their family. And he wants to feel love and so he thinks if he gets it from Antoinette it'll make his family want and praise him. Alas it does not work that way and in a way backfires because he forces and abuses her just to feel loved and that's not right.

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  8. FaizahDecember 18, 2018 at 1:34 AM

    I think you make a good point. There are definitely deeper reasons behind why Rochester rushed into his marriage with Antoinette and we should consider the full picture. However, I would argue that while the issues he has with his father might explain his motivation for marrying Antoinette in the first place, they do not justify the way he treats her. Perhaps if we got more of his backstory, he would be easier to sympathize with, but I don't see many scarring life events that could justify locking your wife in an attic for the rest of her life.

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