{"id":2070,"date":"2022-10-27T13:54:22","date_gmt":"2022-10-27T17:54:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/everythinginbetween\/?p=2070"},"modified":"2022-10-27T13:54:22","modified_gmt":"2022-10-27T17:54:22","slug":"self-sacrifice-as-protection","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/everythinginbetween\/2022\/10\/27\/self-sacrifice-as-protection\/","title":{"rendered":"Self-Sacrifice as Protection"},"content":{"rendered":"

The protagonists in <\/span>Written on the Body<\/span><\/i> and <\/span>Cereus Blooms at Night<\/span><\/i> both create an extension of themself who they feel an obligation to protect, ultimately sacrificing their form to save \u201ctheir child.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The narrator in <\/span>Written on the Body<\/span><\/i> views Louise as a part of themself, a person who is very similar and part of an intertwined and complementary set of bodies. They are two halves of the same whole, made of similar parts with very minimal differences: \u201cYour body is twice. Once you once me. Can I be sure which is which?\u201d (Winterson 99). They clearly see Louise as an extension of themself, or themself as an extension of Louise. Either way, the narrator views this relationship as dependent, with one unable to exist fully without the other. The narrator also sees Louise as their creation, calling her \u201cMy child. My baby\u201d (Winterson 159). The narrator feels a parental obligation to Louise, to protect her from the world and take care of her. This parental lens taken by the narrator in viewing their relationship forces the narrator to take a position of authority, one where they feel entitled to making decisions on behalf of Louise, as a parent would their child. Therefore, the narrator makes the decision to leave Louise to \u2018save her from her cancer,\u2019 because \u201cOur love was not meant to cost you your life. I can\u2019t bear that. If it could be my life I would gladly give it\u201d (Winterson 105). The narrator takes on the role of the savior, sacrificing themself and this love to allow Louise to get care from Elgin. They emphasize that they would rather die than her, but because they cannot take her cancer away from her body, they do the next best thing \u2014 they cut themself out like a tumor, theoretically saving Louise. For the rest of the novel, the protagonist floats through life incomplete, unable to have what they truly want. For a majority of the novel the protagonist sees this action as a justifiable and courageous sacrifice they make for Louise to be free, to survive.<\/span><\/p>\n

Similarly, Mala creates Pohpoh as an extension of her childhood self to separate that trauma and period of her life from her current woes. Mala views herself as Pohpoh\u2019s mother, and intends to be \u201cthe mother of Pohpoh or at least her older sister\u201d who would have \u201chugged her and protected her as well as PohPoh had protected Asha\u201d (Mootoo 173). Mala, the grown up Pohpoh, separates a part of her identity, that childhood youthfulness, from the whole so she has someone to take care of after Asha leaves. The maternal role Mala\/Pohpoh has filled since her real mother abandoned her is deeply ingrained in her identity, and so when one \u2018child,\u2019 Asha, leaves, Mala must create another child to protect. This child just happens to be an extension of herself, a figment of her imagination that represents her childhood and innocence that needs to be shielded from the violence of the father. Mala also takes on the role of \u2018mother\u2019 for the entire family, acting as a mother for Asha or Pohpoh, a wife for Chandin, and the one who runs the household.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Just as the protagonist does, Mala \u2018sacrifices\u2019 herself to save Pohpoh from violence. In addition to taking the brunt of her father\u2019s sexual abuse, when the police investigate her house and find Chandin\u2019s body, Mala places herself as a barrier between them and Pohpoh: \u201c\u2018They coming after you, run, run!\u2019 Mala shouted to the child who, in her imagination, had already escaped the yard\u2019s confines. […] \u2018Yes, Pohpoh, you take off and fly, child, fly!\u2019\u201d (Mootoo 186). Mala is tackled by the police, but this self-sacrifice allows Pohpoh, or her childhood, to remain free and escape from reality. This metaphorical sacrifice of the narrator and Mala \u2018saves\u2019 the child they care for in an ultimate act of parental love. Just as the protagonist views Louise as \u201cthe tender thing I wanted to protect,\u201d Mala says her \u201cfirst duty was to save and care for Pohpoh\u201d (Winterson 159, Mootoo 172). Both characters view their relationship with this extension or creation of theirs through a parental lens, making their primary purpose to protect and care for that person, like a child.<\/span><\/p>\n

By framing both of these protagonists as parents who shield and defend aspects of themself, both authors comment on this phenomenon of hiding away aspects of one\u2019s identity to protect it from the harsh world. This component is usually manifested or thought of as a child, because they represent innocence and purity and must be protected from trauma. By separating this part of self and manifesting it as something physical, whether that is onto one\u2019s lover or as a figment of one\u2019s imagination, these characters use escapism to protect this aspect of self that may be threatened by external factors. For the narrator, Louise represents all of the good parts of a relationship before it meets that \u2018six month mark\u2019 where things usually go south. For Mala, separating her childhood innocence and wish to escape keeps it from being corrupted by her father\u2019s violence. However, this reaction is a bit paradoxical, since it puts one in harm\u2019s way to protect one from another form of harm. Does this approach imply that keeping one\u2019s childhood pure is essential?<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The protagonists in Written on the Body and Cereus Blooms at Night both create an extension of themself who they feel an obligation to protect, ultimately sacrificing their form to save \u201ctheir child.\u201d\u00a0 The narrator in Written on the Body views Louise as a part of themself, a person who is very similar and part … Continue reading Self-Sacrifice as Protection<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4989,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[169404],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2070","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-2022-blog-post"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/everythinginbetween\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2070","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/everythinginbetween\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/everythinginbetween\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/everythinginbetween\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4989"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/everythinginbetween\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2070"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/everythinginbetween\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2070\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/everythinginbetween\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2070"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/everythinginbetween\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2070"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/everythinginbetween\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2070"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}