Breathe, Eyes, Memory
ABOUT EDWIDGE DANTICAT
- Edwidge Danticat was born in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, in 1969.adolescence
- She lived in Haiti up to the age of 12, then she migrated to New York, to be with her parents.
- She began working on what would become Breath, Eyes, Memory during her adolescents, as a way of dealing with her feelings of isolation that she endured while trying to fit into the American culture.
- She is an author, educator, and lecturer.
- more ...
SETTING
- The initial chapters of the novel, which chronicles Sophie's childhood, is set in Croix de Rosets, in Haiti.
- The setting then shifts to New York, which highliglights her adolescent years.
- Haiti, in particular Dame Marie, then highlights parts of her life as a young wife and mother.
- The novel begins around the end of the reign of Francois Duvalier (Papa Doc), in 1971.
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THEMES
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EDWIDGE DANTICAT'S NOVELS
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SUMMARY
This is the story of a young girl, Sophie Caco, who leaves the comfort of Haiti, and her Tantie Atie, to live with her mother, Martine. While she lives with her mother in New York, she is privy to Martine's psychological issues, due to the rape that she endured as a young girl in Haiti, and is steeped in her mother's expectations for her only child, who is a product of that rape. Sophie endures testing by her mother, a tradition passed down among mothers in Haiti, and (www.bulbsoup.com) is so traumatized by this invasion of her privacy, that she takes her own virginity, with a pestle, to bring the testing to an end. The result of failing the 'test' is that she was kicked out of her mother's home, and marries Joseph. This is not the perfect solution for her because she enters the union with sexual issues, due to the trauma of her mother's tests, that lead to doubling and bulimia, in order to gain some control of her life. Sophie then travels to Haiti with her infant daughter, who was conceived on her wedding night and reunites with the women in her family, including her mother Martine, to initiate a healing process. The healing process continues in the United States for Sophie. She rejoins her support group for women who have sexual phobias due to traumatic sexualized abuse and resumes her meetings with her therapist where she discusses both her issues, as well as her mother's. However, there is no healing for a pregnant Martine who kills herself by stabbing her belly seventeen times. The story ends in Haiti, at Martine's funeral, with the question of whether or not Sophie has achieved freedom.
This is the story of a young girl, Sophie Caco, who leaves the comfort of Haiti, and her Tantie Atie, to live with her mother, Martine. While she lives with her mother in New York, she is privy to Martine's psychological issues, due to the rape that she endured as a young girl in Haiti, and is steeped in her mother's expectations for her only child, who is a product of that rape. Sophie endures testing by her mother, a tradition passed down among mothers in Haiti, and (www.bulbsoup.com) is so traumatized by this invasion of her privacy, that she takes her own virginity, with a pestle, to bring the testing to an end. The result of failing the 'test' is that she was kicked out of her mother's home, and marries Joseph. This is not the perfect solution for her because she enters the union with sexual issues, due to the trauma of her mother's tests, that lead to doubling and bulimia, in order to gain some control of her life. Sophie then travels to Haiti with her infant daughter, who was conceived on her wedding night and reunites with the women in her family, including her mother Martine, to initiate a healing process. The healing process continues in the United States for Sophie. She rejoins her support group for women who have sexual phobias due to traumatic sexualized abuse and resumes her meetings with her therapist where she discusses both her issues, as well as her mother's. However, there is no healing for a pregnant Martine who kills herself by stabbing her belly seventeen times. The story ends in Haiti, at Martine's funeral, with the question of whether or not Sophie has achieved freedom.
CHARACTERS
Sophie Caco
Sophie Caco
- The reader experiences Sophie's growth from a young Haitian girl, to an adolescent, then her transformation to a wife and mother.
- The story revolves around her experiences in Haiti and the United States of America.
- She is emotionally traumatized by her mother's 'testing', but takes responsibility for her emotional well-being by seeing a therapist and joining a support group to help her navigate her emotional and sexual challenges.
- Sophie is also forgiving and loyal, as seen in her attempts to not only help her mother but also by trying to be her mother's friend, despite what her mother did to her.
- Sophie's aunt.
- She loves Sophie very much and views her, and treats her, like a daughter.
- She is a caregiver by nature because she planned to take care of her mother after Sophie's migration.
- She was never married but appeared to have had an interest in Monsieur Augustin, at the beginning of the novel.
- When the reader encounters Tantie in the later chapters, she appears to be sad and bitter about her life.
- Sophie's mother.
- She loved Sophie very much, but her traumatic past prevented her from being the best mother to Sophie.
- She left Sophie with Tantie Atie, when (www.bulbsoup.com) she was a baby, in order to make a life for her child, as well as to escape the ramifications of a violent rape.
- Sophie was conceived through this rape.
- Martine was the best mother that she could be, despite the unhappy circumstances that made her a mother, and she worked very hard, for herself and Sophie, in order to ensure that Sophie got a good education.
- Martine's boyfriend.
- He is a Haitian lawyer.
- He helped Martine to get a green card to go to America, and then to get Sophie to America as well.
- He loved Haitian food.
- He did not understand the extent to which Martine was emotionally compromised.
- He found Martine's body.
- His love for Martine is evident by the fact that he made all the arrangements for her burial in Haiti; he did not abandon her in life or death.
- Sophie's husband and the father of her child, Brigitte.
- He was originally Sophie's neighbour and a musician who was constantly traveling.
- He was a caring father and husband.
- He too, like Marc, did not understand the complexity of his wife's intimacy issues.
- Sophie's grandmother, and Martine and Tantie Atie's mother.
- Tantie Atie lives with her, in Dame Marie, when Sophie and Brigitte visit.
- She looks out for her family, as is seen in her businesslike approach to sorting out the family's land when all her relatives were present in Haiti.
- She loves and wants the best for her children, as seen in her desire for Tantie Atie to leave Haiti.
- She tried to be the mother that she could be, despite the fact that Martine's knowledge of 'testing' had its genesis with Grandme Ife.
- Monsieur Donald Augustin - Atie's love interest. According to Martine, Atie and Donald were supposed to get married, but he fell in love with Lotus and married her instead.
- Lotus Augustin - Donald Augustin's wife. She and Donald live in Haiti.
- Chabin - The lottery agent for the village of Croix - des - Rosets, in Haiti.
- Brigitte Louise - Sophie and Joseph's infant daughter.
- Man Grace - Grandme Ife's neighbour. Martine sent money for the reconstruction of her home. She dies by the time Sophie returns to Haiti as an adult.
- Louise - Tantie Atie's friend and Man Grace's daughter. She goes to live in America at the end of part three, which devastates Tantie Atie.
- Dessalines - The coal seller who is killed by the Macoutes.
PLOT
PART 1
Chapter 1
Sophie and Tantie Atie go about their daily lives; meeting Chabin and preparing for the potluck. They sit among the women at the potluck and discuss the package that Tantie Atie has received. They speculate about its content until they form the conclusion that it contains a plane ticket for Sophie. Later, at home, Sophie is upset with Tantie Atie. Atie explains to Sophie that she needed time to accept Sophie's impending departure and that she had even formulated a way to tell her. They then both go to bed.
Chapter 2
The next morning Tantie Atie and Sophie eat cinnamon rice pudding for breakfast. Tantie Atite, during this interlude, attempts to explain to Sophie why her mother, Martine, had to leave her. Atie also asks Martine not to fight with her mother because they have a lot in common. Martine only wanted the best for Sophie.
Chapter 3
Tantie Atie and Sophie visit Grandme Ife. They go to visit because Sophie could not leave the island without her blessing, and this could be Sophie's last chance to see her grandmother because she was advanced in years. They stay for the night.
Chapter 4
Tantie Attie is late for work for the whole week. The reader learns that she has been working extra hours to get gifts for Sophie, one of which is a dress. As Tantie Atie pours hot milk from a kettle, a lost love is hinted at by a note at the bottom of the kettle. Sophie has a nightmare about her mother that night, but, in the morning, Tantie Attie puts out her best dishes for the departure breakfast. They also use the good towels, but an air of sadness pervades breakfast. They receive good news from Chabin; Tantie Atie's number came out, and she is a winner. The taxi then arrives and they leave for the airport.
Chapter 5
Tantie Atie and Sophie go to the airport and Tantie Atie remembers her Christmas trips with Martine to Port-au-Prince. They are late because there is an incident at the airport, student professors are attempting to rename the airport, from Francois Duvalier to Mais Gate. They finally arrive and a flight attendant escorts Sophie onto the plane. The flight attendant then escorts another child onto the plane, but he is very disruptive. He falls asleep after he is restrained, and Sophie falls asleep too.
Chapter 6
Sophie arrives in New York. Her mother meets her, but she does not look like the lady in the picture with Tantie Atie. They drive home in a beat-up old car, to a beat-up neighborhood. Martine gives Sophie the bedroom and she realizes that she has to share the room with a doll. The doll seems to be a representation of, before this point, the absent Sophie. Sophie goes to bed but is awakened by a scream. Her mother has had a nightmare, so she goes to sleep with her on the sofa bed in the living room. She awakens to a new day and accepts that New York is her new home.
Chapter 7
Martine and Sophie walk along Flatbush Avenue. Martine greets fellow Haitians as they walk along and purchase a few items. Martine stresses the importance of learning to speak English. They then visit Marc, who is a lawyer. He takes them to dinner at a Haitian restaurant, where Martine reveals her plans for Sophie. She is to wait until she is eighteen years old before she has a boyfriend and she is to become a doctor.
Chapter 8
It was summertime, so Martine took Sophie to both her day and night jobs with her. Martine assisted bedridden senior citizens in the day, as well as an old lady in the night. It is during the night job that Martine reveals that Sophie was a child of rape. This revelation was prompted by Martine's revelation of the 'testing' that Martine and Tantie Atie endured in their youth.
PART 2
Chapter 9
Sophie was eighteen and going to college in the fall. They had moved to a neighbourhood near Marc, and Sophie had successfully completed her education at a Haitian Adventist school. Sophie speaks about the discrimination that she faced due to her Haitian identity, as well as her journey to become an English speaker by reading aloud to her mother. Her life, for six years, was school, home, and prayer. Then she met Joseph, an older neighbour who was her mother's age and a man that Martine did not trust. They got to know each other, secretly went on dates, and Sophie fell in love. Joseph was a musician and he knew that Martine would not approve of him befriending Sophie, but he was a gentleman and courted Sophie like a lady. He told her that he would marry her one day and that all he wanted from her was the pursuit of happiness.
Chapter 10
Martine takes Sophie out. While they are on the train, Sophie tells Martine that she likes someone. She gives her mother the name Henry Napoleon. Martine researches the family and is pleased. Henry Napoleon is a success story because his mother had sold coal in Haiti and he was going to become a doctor. Meanwhile, Joseph was on the road for a month and Sophie eagerly collected postcards and letters from the mailbox, before Martine got home. Sophie describes her mother's nightly nightmares, the screaming and shouting for someone to leave her alone.
Chapter 11
Joseph and Martine go out on his first night back from his music tour and she wears a tight yellow dress that she hid under her mattress. Joseph relayed his guilt about his thoughts of taking Sophie away from her mother. He then gives Sophie a small ring from his pinky and her first kiss. She did not see him for a while after this (www.bulbsoup.com) encounter, but he returned for a small window of time. They went to the Note, a restaurant, where he asked her to marry him. Sophie then tells Martine that Henry is never coming back and Martine reveals that she thought the letters that Sophie was receiving were coming from Henry. Sophie came home at 3 a.m. the next morning to find her mom with a belt. Martine used it on her own palms and ended up 'testing' Sophie for the first time that night.
Chapter 12
Sophie does her best to ignore Joseph when he returns and becomes depressed. Sophie then told the tale of the bleeding woman who decided to change into a butterfly to stop the bleeding. She endured weekly 'testings' to ensure that she was still a virgin until she took her own virginity with a pestle in order to fail the test and be rid of the 'testing' process. Martine reacts in a resigned manner to Sophie's failure of the test and tells her to go to the man who has done this to her and see what he can do for her. She then went to Joseph and told him that she was ready to be married.
PART 3
Chapter 13
Sophie returned to Haiti with her infant daughter, Brigitte Louise. She takes a bus from the airport and then gets off. She waits on the side of the road for Tantie Atie, and Man Grace's daughter keeps her company. Tantie Atie is elated to see Sophie and the baby when she arrives.
Chapter 14
Tantie Atie takes Sophie to Grandme Ife, who shows her love through tears and acceptance of her child. While on the way there, Tantie Atie discovered that Sophie and Martine had not spoken since Sophie left Martine's house, despite Sophie's attempts at communication. Sophie also learns that Tantie Atie is now literate and writes poetry.
Chapter 15
Conflict exists between Tantie Atie and Grandme Ife over the lateness of her reading class. Tantie Atie reads Sophie's poem, the one that Sophie wrote when she was a child in Tantie's care, and Sophie and Brigitte are placed in Martine's room to sleep. Sophie wakes up to feed Brigitte and notices, upon opening a window, that Tantie Atie has returned home in an inebriated state. She and Grandme Ife have a tense conversation in the yard.
Chapter 16
Sophie got up at sunrise and bathed in leaves and rainwater. She then took Brigitte from Tantie Atie and gave her a sponge bath. Shortly after Grandme Ife took a bath as well.
Chapter 17
Tantie Atie, Grandme Ife, and Sophie eat cassava sandwiches and drink coffee for breakfast, but the tension between Grandme Ife and Tantie Atie is strong around the table. Sophie goes to the market with Grandme Ife and they shop and witness the savage behaviour of some of the soldiers. On their walk home, Grandme Ife acknowledges the tension between herself and Tantie Atie and suggests that Tantie Atie should go and see New York, but thinks that she is too old to do so. She acknowledges that Tantie Atie's only freedom is through books.
Chapter 18
Tantie Atie leaves when she hears of the violence in the market, and that Dessalines was hurt. Grandme Ife cooks and feeds the kite boy, and two other boys, before she ushered them home with a story of the bird that tried to take a pretty little girl's heart. Sophie shares, with Grandme Ife, that she has issues with having intimate relations with her husband. Grandme Ife then asks her to read, but she says she has nothing inside.
Chapter 19
Tantie Atie goes into the city with Louis to have her name put in the archives. Grandme Ife does not see the sense in it because if a woman is worth remembering, then her name does not have to be recorded. She takes pictures of Grandme Ife with Brigitte, and when she places her daughter down for a nap, she remembers the result of the night she took her virginity with the pestle. She also recalls her wedding night, which was very painful, and the fact that Brigitte was conceived that night.
Chapter 20
Louise brings Sophie a pig in the morning and they listen to Martine's tape. The tape reveals that Sophie has run away from home.
Chapter 21
Tantie Atie read poetry and Grandme Ife recorded a tape for Martine. Tantie Atie and Sophie talk, they discuss the painfulness of Croix-des-Rosets and the nothingness of Dame Marie. Night falls and the pig disrupts everyone's sleep. Louise tells them of the news of Dessaline's death. The reader then learns of the cruelty of the Macoutes, so much so that they are mythologized. Martine was raped by a Macoutes and went half insane. She was sent to live with a wealthy mulatto family in Croix-des-Rosets, then to the United States. Dessaline's death at the hands of the Macoute triggers harsh memories for Grandme Ife, so she wants everyone indoors. Tantie Atie would not comply, however, stating that she may need a good death to save her from her life. Grandme Ife continues her tape, highlighting Tantie Atie's sadness, as well as Sophie and Brigitte's presence in Haiti. Tantie Atie stays out all night.
Chapter 22
Grandme Ife went to pay her last respects to Dessalines. When she returned, Tantie Atie had gone to visit Louise. Grandme Ife and Sophie share coconuts and Tantie Atie did not come home for supper. They watched the lights and explained that someone was having a baby. If the baby is a boy, the lantern would be placed outside the shack and the father would stay with the child all night. If the baby is a girl, there will be no lights. The mother will be left alone, in the dark, to care for the child.
Chapter 23
Grandme Ife prepares for bad news about Tantie Atie because she did not come home the night before. Tantie Atie, however, returns home the following morning, with Louise, who takes her pig. Louise took the pig because Grandme Ife threatened to kill it. Sophie offers to buy the pig, but this idea is quickly rejected by Tantie Atie because she believes that Louise will use the money to procure a boat ride to Miami. Tantie puts leeches on her swollen calf and Sophie decides to cook dinner. As a result, she and Tantie Atie go to the market and she prepares a delicious meal, unlike those that she prepared at home. Tantie Atie leaves and Sophie and Grandme Ife discuss the reason behind testing and listen to the testing of Ti Alice. Sophie also explains the idea of doubling.
Chapter 24
Martine arrives in Haiti and Tantie Atie is nonchalant, while Grandme Ife quivers with shock and excitement. Sophie does not walk to greet her, as is tradition, but she goes to Sophie. The exchange is tense and Martine informed Sophie that she told Joseph that they, Sophie and Brigitte, would be back in three days.
Chapter 25
Grandme Ife makes plans to look at the papers for the family land and arrange her funeral since her family is whole. Martine and Tantie Atie talk under the stars and reminisce about unpleasant stories about the stars, and how Atie was their father's favourite.
Chapter 26
Eliab was sent to buy milk by Sophie, and Grandme Ife returned with documents reflecting that La Nouvelle Dame Marie belonged to Ife, Martine, Atie, and Brigitte. Grandme Ife believed that Tantie Atie should go with Martine, but Tantie Atie wanted to stay and do her duty. Fear runs through Sophie as her mother stands over her bed. She asks Martine why she tested her and she replies that she did it because her mother did it, but that she wants them to reconcile. Louise then leaves the island without a word to Tantie Atie.
Chapter 27
Sophie and Brigitte slept with Tantie, while Martine paced in the next room. Tantie Atie and Grandme Ife then said their goodbyes, and Martine, Sophie, and Brigitte left.
Part 4
Chapter 28
Martine, Sophie, and Brigitte rode with the hunchback until she came off at the iron market in Port-au-Prince. They get through quickly, at the airport, due to their American passports. They spoke about Sophie's bulimia on the plane and spent the night at Martine's house in the Bronx. Joseph called from Providence, wanting to pick up his wife and daughter, but Sophie wanted to find her way back home.
Chapter 29
Martine speaks to Sophie and reveals that she is pregnant. She fears keeping the baby because of her nightmares, which are exacerbated by the baby's presence. She does not want to marry Marc because she does not want to use him as a crutch for her nightmares. She reveals that she tried to abort Sophie, with Grandme Ife's help, but it didn't work because Sophie was strong. She said, at the end of their conversation, that she would have the baby at the expense of her sanity. Martine then loaned Sophie her car to drive to Providence. She did this in order to ensure that she would visit again, and Sophie revealed that she had suicidal thoughts in her first year of marriage.
Chapter 30
Joseph greets his family, with Brigitte getting most of the attention. The house is a mess, but Sophie, while sitting on her couch, is glad to be home. The couple spend their first night together watching a movie. Sophie takes Brigitte to the doctor the following day and she gets a clean bill of health. While Sophie speaks to her mother on the phone that night, however, Joseph makes sexual advances to Sophie. She practices doubling during the sexual encounter with her husband, then regurgitates her food (bulimia) afterward.
Chapter 31
Sophie's sexual phobia group, consisting of Buki, an Ethiopian college student who was a victim of female genital mutilation, Davina, a rape victim, and Sophie, a testing victim, meet to try to heal. Buki writes a healing letter to her grandmother, the one who mutilated her, and they each place their abuser's name on a piece of paper and burn it. Then Buki released a green balloon. Sophie returns home to find that Brigitte can now say 'dada', and, prompted by an urgent message from her husband, calls her mother. She finds out that Grandme Ife is happy because she is ready for her funeral and Tantie Atie is depressed about the loss of Louise. She writes Tantie Atie a letter so that she has something just for her.
Chapter 32
Sophie and her therapist take a walk and she states that she wants to accept her mother, who now wants to be good to her. It was hard to be angry at her mother and grandmother because they were trying to be good mothers. The therapist states that Martine never confronted, or gave her rapist a name, so he still haunts her as (www.bulbsoup.com) a shadow. Sophie, therefore, has to say goodbye to her father before she can connect with her husband. She admits that sex with her husband is an obligation so that he doesn't leave her. Sophie thinks that only her daughter will not leave her. The therapist enlightened Sophie to the fact that Martine thought so too. She suggested that Martine and Sophie go to the spot of the attack and confront what happened.
Chapter 33
Martine met her daughter and her family on her stoop, Sophie and Brigitte were in her car and Joseph was driving his family's car. They had a nice time discussing Negro Spirituals and finding out more about Joseph's career. They leave, and when they return home, Martine and Sophie speak on the phone. Martine says that she is planning to abort the baby, which is male because it mentally abuses her.
Chapter 34
Sophie, in her therapy session, reveals her concern for her mother. Sophie explains to the therapist that Martine feels that she must abort the baby or truly go mad. She feels that she is already crazy, but is fooling everybody. The therapist suggested an exorcism for Martine.
Chapter 35
Sophie returns home to her husband telling her to call Marc. Marc reports that Martine killed herself by stabbing her belly seventeen times. She died in the ambulance. Marc and Sophie went to Haiti with Martine's body, and the women in the family decided to bury her the next day. They had a private wake with themselves and the wondering boys. Martine was buried in red and, as they walked through the market, a procession formed. They bury Martine and Sophie runs away into the can fields where she beats the canes. She has an audience, one of which - the priest - tries to stop her, but Grandme Ife stops him and asks her if she is now free. The final paragraphs of this chapter end with Sophie telling the reader that there is a place where women live, near trees, that sounds like music. These women tell their children tales to frighten and delight them, but they also pass on nightmares (bad experiences) through generations like heirlooms. Sophie, through her experience in the canefield, should be able to tell if she is free.
PART 1
Chapter 1
Sophie and Tantie Atie go about their daily lives; meeting Chabin and preparing for the potluck. They sit among the women at the potluck and discuss the package that Tantie Atie has received. They speculate about its content until they form the conclusion that it contains a plane ticket for Sophie. Later, at home, Sophie is upset with Tantie Atie. Atie explains to Sophie that she needed time to accept Sophie's impending departure and that she had even formulated a way to tell her. They then both go to bed.
Chapter 2
The next morning Tantie Atie and Sophie eat cinnamon rice pudding for breakfast. Tantie Atite, during this interlude, attempts to explain to Sophie why her mother, Martine, had to leave her. Atie also asks Martine not to fight with her mother because they have a lot in common. Martine only wanted the best for Sophie.
Chapter 3
Tantie Atie and Sophie visit Grandme Ife. They go to visit because Sophie could not leave the island without her blessing, and this could be Sophie's last chance to see her grandmother because she was advanced in years. They stay for the night.
Chapter 4
Tantie Attie is late for work for the whole week. The reader learns that she has been working extra hours to get gifts for Sophie, one of which is a dress. As Tantie Atie pours hot milk from a kettle, a lost love is hinted at by a note at the bottom of the kettle. Sophie has a nightmare about her mother that night, but, in the morning, Tantie Attie puts out her best dishes for the departure breakfast. They also use the good towels, but an air of sadness pervades breakfast. They receive good news from Chabin; Tantie Atie's number came out, and she is a winner. The taxi then arrives and they leave for the airport.
Chapter 5
Tantie Atie and Sophie go to the airport and Tantie Atie remembers her Christmas trips with Martine to Port-au-Prince. They are late because there is an incident at the airport, student professors are attempting to rename the airport, from Francois Duvalier to Mais Gate. They finally arrive and a flight attendant escorts Sophie onto the plane. The flight attendant then escorts another child onto the plane, but he is very disruptive. He falls asleep after he is restrained, and Sophie falls asleep too.
Chapter 6
Sophie arrives in New York. Her mother meets her, but she does not look like the lady in the picture with Tantie Atie. They drive home in a beat-up old car, to a beat-up neighborhood. Martine gives Sophie the bedroom and she realizes that she has to share the room with a doll. The doll seems to be a representation of, before this point, the absent Sophie. Sophie goes to bed but is awakened by a scream. Her mother has had a nightmare, so she goes to sleep with her on the sofa bed in the living room. She awakens to a new day and accepts that New York is her new home.
Chapter 7
Martine and Sophie walk along Flatbush Avenue. Martine greets fellow Haitians as they walk along and purchase a few items. Martine stresses the importance of learning to speak English. They then visit Marc, who is a lawyer. He takes them to dinner at a Haitian restaurant, where Martine reveals her plans for Sophie. She is to wait until she is eighteen years old before she has a boyfriend and she is to become a doctor.
Chapter 8
It was summertime, so Martine took Sophie to both her day and night jobs with her. Martine assisted bedridden senior citizens in the day, as well as an old lady in the night. It is during the night job that Martine reveals that Sophie was a child of rape. This revelation was prompted by Martine's revelation of the 'testing' that Martine and Tantie Atie endured in their youth.
PART 2
Chapter 9
Sophie was eighteen and going to college in the fall. They had moved to a neighbourhood near Marc, and Sophie had successfully completed her education at a Haitian Adventist school. Sophie speaks about the discrimination that she faced due to her Haitian identity, as well as her journey to become an English speaker by reading aloud to her mother. Her life, for six years, was school, home, and prayer. Then she met Joseph, an older neighbour who was her mother's age and a man that Martine did not trust. They got to know each other, secretly went on dates, and Sophie fell in love. Joseph was a musician and he knew that Martine would not approve of him befriending Sophie, but he was a gentleman and courted Sophie like a lady. He told her that he would marry her one day and that all he wanted from her was the pursuit of happiness.
Chapter 10
Martine takes Sophie out. While they are on the train, Sophie tells Martine that she likes someone. She gives her mother the name Henry Napoleon. Martine researches the family and is pleased. Henry Napoleon is a success story because his mother had sold coal in Haiti and he was going to become a doctor. Meanwhile, Joseph was on the road for a month and Sophie eagerly collected postcards and letters from the mailbox, before Martine got home. Sophie describes her mother's nightly nightmares, the screaming and shouting for someone to leave her alone.
Chapter 11
Joseph and Martine go out on his first night back from his music tour and she wears a tight yellow dress that she hid under her mattress. Joseph relayed his guilt about his thoughts of taking Sophie away from her mother. He then gives Sophie a small ring from his pinky and her first kiss. She did not see him for a while after this (www.bulbsoup.com) encounter, but he returned for a small window of time. They went to the Note, a restaurant, where he asked her to marry him. Sophie then tells Martine that Henry is never coming back and Martine reveals that she thought the letters that Sophie was receiving were coming from Henry. Sophie came home at 3 a.m. the next morning to find her mom with a belt. Martine used it on her own palms and ended up 'testing' Sophie for the first time that night.
Chapter 12
Sophie does her best to ignore Joseph when he returns and becomes depressed. Sophie then told the tale of the bleeding woman who decided to change into a butterfly to stop the bleeding. She endured weekly 'testings' to ensure that she was still a virgin until she took her own virginity with a pestle in order to fail the test and be rid of the 'testing' process. Martine reacts in a resigned manner to Sophie's failure of the test and tells her to go to the man who has done this to her and see what he can do for her. She then went to Joseph and told him that she was ready to be married.
PART 3
Chapter 13
Sophie returned to Haiti with her infant daughter, Brigitte Louise. She takes a bus from the airport and then gets off. She waits on the side of the road for Tantie Atie, and Man Grace's daughter keeps her company. Tantie Atie is elated to see Sophie and the baby when she arrives.
Chapter 14
Tantie Atie takes Sophie to Grandme Ife, who shows her love through tears and acceptance of her child. While on the way there, Tantie Atie discovered that Sophie and Martine had not spoken since Sophie left Martine's house, despite Sophie's attempts at communication. Sophie also learns that Tantie Atie is now literate and writes poetry.
Chapter 15
Conflict exists between Tantie Atie and Grandme Ife over the lateness of her reading class. Tantie Atie reads Sophie's poem, the one that Sophie wrote when she was a child in Tantie's care, and Sophie and Brigitte are placed in Martine's room to sleep. Sophie wakes up to feed Brigitte and notices, upon opening a window, that Tantie Atie has returned home in an inebriated state. She and Grandme Ife have a tense conversation in the yard.
Chapter 16
Sophie got up at sunrise and bathed in leaves and rainwater. She then took Brigitte from Tantie Atie and gave her a sponge bath. Shortly after Grandme Ife took a bath as well.
Chapter 17
Tantie Atie, Grandme Ife, and Sophie eat cassava sandwiches and drink coffee for breakfast, but the tension between Grandme Ife and Tantie Atie is strong around the table. Sophie goes to the market with Grandme Ife and they shop and witness the savage behaviour of some of the soldiers. On their walk home, Grandme Ife acknowledges the tension between herself and Tantie Atie and suggests that Tantie Atie should go and see New York, but thinks that she is too old to do so. She acknowledges that Tantie Atie's only freedom is through books.
Chapter 18
Tantie Atie leaves when she hears of the violence in the market, and that Dessalines was hurt. Grandme Ife cooks and feeds the kite boy, and two other boys, before she ushered them home with a story of the bird that tried to take a pretty little girl's heart. Sophie shares, with Grandme Ife, that she has issues with having intimate relations with her husband. Grandme Ife then asks her to read, but she says she has nothing inside.
Chapter 19
Tantie Atie goes into the city with Louis to have her name put in the archives. Grandme Ife does not see the sense in it because if a woman is worth remembering, then her name does not have to be recorded. She takes pictures of Grandme Ife with Brigitte, and when she places her daughter down for a nap, she remembers the result of the night she took her virginity with the pestle. She also recalls her wedding night, which was very painful, and the fact that Brigitte was conceived that night.
Chapter 20
Louise brings Sophie a pig in the morning and they listen to Martine's tape. The tape reveals that Sophie has run away from home.
Chapter 21
Tantie Atie read poetry and Grandme Ife recorded a tape for Martine. Tantie Atie and Sophie talk, they discuss the painfulness of Croix-des-Rosets and the nothingness of Dame Marie. Night falls and the pig disrupts everyone's sleep. Louise tells them of the news of Dessaline's death. The reader then learns of the cruelty of the Macoutes, so much so that they are mythologized. Martine was raped by a Macoutes and went half insane. She was sent to live with a wealthy mulatto family in Croix-des-Rosets, then to the United States. Dessaline's death at the hands of the Macoute triggers harsh memories for Grandme Ife, so she wants everyone indoors. Tantie Atie would not comply, however, stating that she may need a good death to save her from her life. Grandme Ife continues her tape, highlighting Tantie Atie's sadness, as well as Sophie and Brigitte's presence in Haiti. Tantie Atie stays out all night.
Chapter 22
Grandme Ife went to pay her last respects to Dessalines. When she returned, Tantie Atie had gone to visit Louise. Grandme Ife and Sophie share coconuts and Tantie Atie did not come home for supper. They watched the lights and explained that someone was having a baby. If the baby is a boy, the lantern would be placed outside the shack and the father would stay with the child all night. If the baby is a girl, there will be no lights. The mother will be left alone, in the dark, to care for the child.
Chapter 23
Grandme Ife prepares for bad news about Tantie Atie because she did not come home the night before. Tantie Atie, however, returns home the following morning, with Louise, who takes her pig. Louise took the pig because Grandme Ife threatened to kill it. Sophie offers to buy the pig, but this idea is quickly rejected by Tantie Atie because she believes that Louise will use the money to procure a boat ride to Miami. Tantie puts leeches on her swollen calf and Sophie decides to cook dinner. As a result, she and Tantie Atie go to the market and she prepares a delicious meal, unlike those that she prepared at home. Tantie Atie leaves and Sophie and Grandme Ife discuss the reason behind testing and listen to the testing of Ti Alice. Sophie also explains the idea of doubling.
Chapter 24
Martine arrives in Haiti and Tantie Atie is nonchalant, while Grandme Ife quivers with shock and excitement. Sophie does not walk to greet her, as is tradition, but she goes to Sophie. The exchange is tense and Martine informed Sophie that she told Joseph that they, Sophie and Brigitte, would be back in three days.
Chapter 25
Grandme Ife makes plans to look at the papers for the family land and arrange her funeral since her family is whole. Martine and Tantie Atie talk under the stars and reminisce about unpleasant stories about the stars, and how Atie was their father's favourite.
Chapter 26
Eliab was sent to buy milk by Sophie, and Grandme Ife returned with documents reflecting that La Nouvelle Dame Marie belonged to Ife, Martine, Atie, and Brigitte. Grandme Ife believed that Tantie Atie should go with Martine, but Tantie Atie wanted to stay and do her duty. Fear runs through Sophie as her mother stands over her bed. She asks Martine why she tested her and she replies that she did it because her mother did it, but that she wants them to reconcile. Louise then leaves the island without a word to Tantie Atie.
Chapter 27
Sophie and Brigitte slept with Tantie, while Martine paced in the next room. Tantie Atie and Grandme Ife then said their goodbyes, and Martine, Sophie, and Brigitte left.
Part 4
Chapter 28
Martine, Sophie, and Brigitte rode with the hunchback until she came off at the iron market in Port-au-Prince. They get through quickly, at the airport, due to their American passports. They spoke about Sophie's bulimia on the plane and spent the night at Martine's house in the Bronx. Joseph called from Providence, wanting to pick up his wife and daughter, but Sophie wanted to find her way back home.
Chapter 29
Martine speaks to Sophie and reveals that she is pregnant. She fears keeping the baby because of her nightmares, which are exacerbated by the baby's presence. She does not want to marry Marc because she does not want to use him as a crutch for her nightmares. She reveals that she tried to abort Sophie, with Grandme Ife's help, but it didn't work because Sophie was strong. She said, at the end of their conversation, that she would have the baby at the expense of her sanity. Martine then loaned Sophie her car to drive to Providence. She did this in order to ensure that she would visit again, and Sophie revealed that she had suicidal thoughts in her first year of marriage.
Chapter 30
Joseph greets his family, with Brigitte getting most of the attention. The house is a mess, but Sophie, while sitting on her couch, is glad to be home. The couple spend their first night together watching a movie. Sophie takes Brigitte to the doctor the following day and she gets a clean bill of health. While Sophie speaks to her mother on the phone that night, however, Joseph makes sexual advances to Sophie. She practices doubling during the sexual encounter with her husband, then regurgitates her food (bulimia) afterward.
Chapter 31
Sophie's sexual phobia group, consisting of Buki, an Ethiopian college student who was a victim of female genital mutilation, Davina, a rape victim, and Sophie, a testing victim, meet to try to heal. Buki writes a healing letter to her grandmother, the one who mutilated her, and they each place their abuser's name on a piece of paper and burn it. Then Buki released a green balloon. Sophie returns home to find that Brigitte can now say 'dada', and, prompted by an urgent message from her husband, calls her mother. She finds out that Grandme Ife is happy because she is ready for her funeral and Tantie Atie is depressed about the loss of Louise. She writes Tantie Atie a letter so that she has something just for her.
Chapter 32
Sophie and her therapist take a walk and she states that she wants to accept her mother, who now wants to be good to her. It was hard to be angry at her mother and grandmother because they were trying to be good mothers. The therapist states that Martine never confronted, or gave her rapist a name, so he still haunts her as (www.bulbsoup.com) a shadow. Sophie, therefore, has to say goodbye to her father before she can connect with her husband. She admits that sex with her husband is an obligation so that he doesn't leave her. Sophie thinks that only her daughter will not leave her. The therapist enlightened Sophie to the fact that Martine thought so too. She suggested that Martine and Sophie go to the spot of the attack and confront what happened.
Chapter 33
Martine met her daughter and her family on her stoop, Sophie and Brigitte were in her car and Joseph was driving his family's car. They had a nice time discussing Negro Spirituals and finding out more about Joseph's career. They leave, and when they return home, Martine and Sophie speak on the phone. Martine says that she is planning to abort the baby, which is male because it mentally abuses her.
Chapter 34
Sophie, in her therapy session, reveals her concern for her mother. Sophie explains to the therapist that Martine feels that she must abort the baby or truly go mad. She feels that she is already crazy, but is fooling everybody. The therapist suggested an exorcism for Martine.
Chapter 35
Sophie returns home to her husband telling her to call Marc. Marc reports that Martine killed herself by stabbing her belly seventeen times. She died in the ambulance. Marc and Sophie went to Haiti with Martine's body, and the women in the family decided to bury her the next day. They had a private wake with themselves and the wondering boys. Martine was buried in red and, as they walked through the market, a procession formed. They bury Martine and Sophie runs away into the can fields where she beats the canes. She has an audience, one of which - the priest - tries to stop her, but Grandme Ife stops him and asks her if she is now free. The final paragraphs of this chapter end with Sophie telling the reader that there is a place where women live, near trees, that sounds like music. These women tell their children tales to frighten and delight them, but they also pass on nightmares (bad experiences) through generations like heirlooms. Sophie, through her experience in the canefield, should be able to tell if she is free.
Contributor: Leisa Samuels-Thomas
Danticat, E. B. United Kingdom: Longman Group Ltd, 1995.
http://www.who.int/mediacentre/factsheets/fs241/en/
http://responsesidetherapy.com/pdf/Doubling_and_Dissociation.pdf
http://immigrationtounitedstates.org/536-haitian-boat-people.html
https://www.britannica.com/biography/Francois-Duvalier
http://www.coha.org/tonton-macoutes/
http://faculty.webster.edu/woolflm/virginitytest.html
Danticat, E. B. United Kingdom: Longman Group Ltd, 1995.
http://www.who.int/mediacentre/factsheets/fs241/en/
http://responsesidetherapy.com/pdf/Doubling_and_Dissociation.pdf
http://immigrationtounitedstates.org/536-haitian-boat-people.html
https://www.britannica.com/biography/Francois-Duvalier
http://www.coha.org/tonton-macoutes/
http://faculty.webster.edu/woolflm/virginitytest.html
