SOURCE: "'And it Kept its Secret': Narration, Memory, and Madness in Jean Rhys' Wide Sargasso Sea," in Critique: Studies in Modern Fiction, Vol. XXVIII, No. 4, Summer, 1987, pp. 195-209.

In the following essay, Mezei examines the narrative structure and presentation of Antoinette's madness in Wide Sargasso Sea. According to Mezei, Antoinette's deteriorating mental state is linked to her inability to remember and recount her story.

Very soon she'll join all the others who know the secret and will not tell it. Or cannot. Or try and fail because they do not know enough…. She's one of them. I too can wait—for the day when she is only a memory to be avoided, looked away, and like all memories a legend. Or a lie…. (Wide Sargasso Sea)

With these vengeful words, Rochester closes his narration, the disturbing story of his marriage in Jamaica to Antoinette Cosway (Mason), the first...