CXC ENGLISH

Hello there! This week will be our last on Breath, Eyes, Memory by Edwidge Danticat. We are sure you enjoyed the novel, and we hope that our discussions were helpful to you. As always, we have several exercises to help you revise skills you will need for English A. Read on now, and enjoy your CXC page.

ENGLISH B: Style in

Breath, Eyes, Memory Last week we looked at some aspects of style in this novel.

We discussed the four-part structure straddling Haiti and the USA, and tracing Sophie’s maturing from twelve-year-old to a grown woman caring for her child, and burying her own mother. We looked at the characters, and noticed the four generations of women, the con trasting ‘good’ and ‘bad’ male characters, and we identified some of the novel’s symbolism

Today we continue to discuss Danticat’s stylistic use of narrative techniques.

Landscape: In addition to offering us contrasting male characters (so that we can think about what makes a man a ‘good’ person), she shows us contrasting landscapes. Be alert to the descriptions of Haiti’s beauty and, in contrast, the ugliness of Martine’s sur roundings in New York. Sadly, though, although Haiti’s landscape is alluring, the feared tonton macoutes create terror in the land, so that migration is another theme being dealt with.

Language: You will come across a number of expressions in patois (French Creole): ou libéré? Parol gin pié zè, Mwin pa kapab enkò, and so on. Like the descriptions of Haitian cooking and the Haitian landscape, these occasional examples of Haitian patois give local colour and make the novel more realistic. But they do much more. Language in the novel has a symbolic quality. Remember how Sophie strug gles to learn English? Remember how happy she is to discover that Joseph also speaks Creole? Symbolically the suggestion is that folk in New York do not ‘speak her language’—they do not see the world as she does. But she and Joseph ‘speak the same language’ and understand each other.

Food: Food and cooking, too, are used symbolically. We see that when the Haitians are together in New York, their familiar ‘home-cooking’ serves as a bond. But food has another connotation too. We recall that Sophie suffers from an eating disorder. The suggestion is that she cannot ‘stomach’ the traumatic experiences she is exposed to, so what should be a healthy pleasure becomes a source of dis tress.

Therapy groups: By introducing the group of sexually abused women from vari ous countries and cultures, Danticat widens her discussion of the cruelty that women are subjected to: FGM, incest, rape, ‘testing’ and rejection if they are found to be “damaged goods”—as if they are merchandise in the marriage market.

Story-telling: You will come across many folk tales in this novel. Women are often the ones telling the stories, so they are the bearers of culture. Danticat herself is joining this tradition by telling her story.

equipment that had become dislodged. 3. Sometimes when politicians are being interviewed, the points they

make can seem quite obscure. 4. Jumping into the river from the sinking boat seemed a very irrational

thing to do. 5. We were rather surprised at how generous the old woman was with

the mangoes that grew in her yard. 6. After watching Joe Fisticuff’s undisputed victory over Sam Blows

last night, we went out for some ice cream. 7. When he was brought before the headmaster to explain the incident,

the team captain was there to accuse him. 8. Certain stories over the television and in the newspaper may well

encourage our students. 9. We put the proposal to the club’s president, expecting that he would

acquiesce. 10. Observing how lethargic the young patient had become, the doctor

decided it was time to change the treatment.