Although some articles on Rhys have appeared in popular magazines, she has received little critical attention, especially from women, despite her exceptional technical skill and the relevance of her subject matter to the women's movement. Is Rhys's relentless portrayal of passive, helpless heroines simply unpalatable to feminist critics? Or, perhaps more seriously, does Rhys's unremitting pessimism become an artistic failure that drives us to dismiss her vision despite her insight and control? Both questions, I believe, may be answered in the negative if we relinquish our expectation of a surface realism and adopt a psychological framework to explain the perversely self-destructive reactions of Rhys's heroines.

These reactions form the crux of Rhys's five novels, whose sparse and repetitive narratives are variations on the themes of failure and rejection. Although Rhys describes her heroines' progressive degeneration, often in excruciating detail, she fails to provide an adequate explanation for this...