His Favorites and Heart Berries: The Problem with Trauma and Identity
The two novels we read for this blog contained some heavy content and themes, but they are certainly not topics to be shied away from. Both books include a large focus on trauma and the way that those who experience it are forced to deal with it and its consequences on their mind and body as time goes on. In relation to identity, trauma is a tough factor to discuss. For those who experience trauma, getting to the other side, where one can process it enough to say, “It’s all just part of my past” is not easy. Traumatic experiences are not something anyone SHOULD have to accept as a factor that makes them who they are. Nonetheless, it happens. Physiologically some brains are better equipped to deal with trauma than others, but for many, trauma can act as a huge block; a freeze on the progress of our mind, sometimes stunting one’s physical health. Both Jo’s story in His Favorites by Kate Walbert and Terese’s story in Heart Berries by Terese Mailhot act sort of as a trauma narrative in the most formal sense of the term. They each show an important distinction between trauma and identity. Trauma is typically caused by something that happens to the person, unfortunately having to deal with it will influence the person- but the traumatic even itself maintains no bearing on their value or character even if it has shaped their struggles (It may seem silly to have to state, but there is sometimes a stigma on those who have suffered mentally from trauma, and a lack of understanding). To get a very brief and general overview of a trauma narrative, you can click here. In His Favorites, Jo has a few different things going on. The book begins with her being a factor in and witnessing her best friend’s death. This sets off a sequence of events that only add to her struggles. Her parents split, her mom moves, and she is shipped off to a boarding school where she is preyed on and sexually and verbally abused by Master. When she comes forward with her story, no one helps her or believes her. It is this moment that she tells of an anger that she has in her. Through this, Jo manages to maintain a strong clear, mind. That is not say that she didn’t carry the pain of what had happened in her life every day. She had to disassociate at times to protect her mind. It seems she didn’t get the chance to truly tell her story until her early 30s, and it comes to us through the narrative itself. We don’t know if she is talking to a therapist or a detective who is on Master’s trail. Either way it seems like until this moment she had to move ahead in life carrying the weight of what happened to her. It is hard to say how her trauma affected her until then. Though she does tell us “The shadow of the Master” was in her life from the moment he first approached her at the restaurant. What Jo’s trauma narrative does say about her is just how courageous and intelligent she was as a young girl in an impossible situation. She processed it the best she could, she used Master’s critiques of her writing against him in her own narrative. Jo’s story helped her to process her abuse while helping others to see that her identity is so much more than what happened TO her, and allows her trauma to show how strong she was in dealing with it and how little it should be tied to her. While it should be obvious that the identity of Master and the Principle should be tarnished, often when someone goes through trauma, they are left bearing the mark. I think Jo’s story sheds light on the reality of that. In Heart Berries, Terese’s narrative is less of a flashback and retelling of what happened during her childhood. Instead, she takes us with her on her journey of processing this trauma. It makes sense that Casey is the one she writes much of this narrative to, as many of her buried pieces of abuse from her parents likely came to surface in such an intense romantic relationship. While Jo’s story does a great job of laying out flat that this stuff (sexual abuse etc.) happens, and how it happens, Terese offers a view into what it can be like to live with it. She tells us about her “Indian sickness” she has from the culture she grew up in, her abusive tendencies with Casey, and the PTSD she suffers from being molested by her own father as well as the death of her father. Her first examples of love, her parents, were absent and abusive. It makes sense that she would have a confusing and distrustful relationship later on. However, she doesn’t accept it as her identity. With many fall backs along the way she makes things with Casey work and sees a counselor who helps her to cope with memories of her father. She is still working on it when the book ends. Neither Jo or Terese embrace a victim’s stance or focus on how unfair life has been. They turn it around and prove that we are strong beings who can survive a lot, though not necessarily resilient (nor should we be expecting to be under certain circumstances). When looking at both of these women we can see how trauma gets processed differently among all who suffer it. Even by the end of each book it doesn’t seem that the speakers have fully processed things, but they are moving further along. In telling their stories they provide a raw example of the reality of someone who has to spend their life fighting a battle that should never have been theirs to fight, while providing hope for in others in showing that it is possible. To say that these women are brave and strong in how they processed the pain and faced it is also not to discount those who could not do so as well. Terese says this of the women in her community: “Resilience is one’s ability to endure and recover, and I don’t place much value on the word resilience. So many people did not survive, and they’re no less extraordinary.” (see full article on why she didn’t use the word “resilient” in her memoir here) I guess the problem with trauma and identity is that we want to focus on the stories of those who overcame and label them as the strong women they are, but we forget to acknowledge that there are certain things in this world that no one is meant to deal with when we think of those who couldn’t overcome. Simultaneously, no one’s identity should have to be wrapped up in something that happened to them when they can be so much more and are so much more. Those who deal with it surely have a blurry identity of self. What do you guys think about how trauma can influence identity ?
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The Incendiaries and Home Fire: Identity and Belief
In this blog, while I will be discussing two women, I am taking a slight detour from the stronger focus of identities in direct relation to women and would like to broaden the discussion a bit, which is something I think both The Incendiaries by R.O. Kwon and Home Fire by Kamila Shamsie begs for. Both novels are written by women and give men and women roles of exemplifying some important points about identities through their relationships with religion. Much of these character’s experience is universally representative of a common human condition. Religion, what we sacrifice for it, and what we gain through it is something we can see protagonists in both books dealing with. Phoebe from The Incendiaries and Aneeka from Home Fire act as perfectly contrasting examples of ways in which identity and religion can collide within someone. I would like to highlight that my interest in these character’s lies less within their religious identitfication, and more within the wide spread and underlying issues with identity itself that affects how these individuals practice their religion. When we are first introduced to Phoebe we quickly learn about some significant struggles in her life. Her mother is the most important person to her and the one closest to her, before dying in a car wreck for which Phoebe is largely to blame. She used to revolve her time and energy around becoming a great pianist, a dream now lost to her. Before these events occurred she was “Phoebe the pianist” and “Phoebe the daughter”. She had believed in a certain future and who she could be. When she loses her most important relationship and most important passion, she seems to lose herself. She spends her college years dabbling in parties, drinking, sexual encounters in which she often disregards her own safety, and becoming a social butterfly who has few, if any true connections. All of this has failed her. She is not known by others, or more importantly, even by herself. This extreme lack in sense of identity sets her up to be useful to John Leal, who shows up offering Phoebe a way to deal with her past. More importantly, he offers her some purpose. She hands over her identity to the cult, in search of discipline and stability. It makes sense, that John Leal was so easily able to light a fire in Phoebe. She’d been waiting around for something or someone to come along and bring her to life again. We may not know for sure if it was her idea to commit the bombing at the end of the novel, but we know she played a large role in it and became one of the most useful tools John Leal had; a sort of empty, malleable shell that could be manipulated and filled in the way he wanted her to be. Phoebe’s strong ties to the cult come less from a true belief in it, but rather a misguided search for fulfillment. In contrast to Phoebe, Aneeka from Home Fire has a strong personal identity that is supplemented by her religion rather than consumed by it. She has strong family ties, a discipline that keeps her tied to her schooling and her prayers. She isn’t afraid to blaze her own path in regards to things like sex, which are usually religiously regulated. She is confident in what she believes and consistently fights for her family and rights of Muslim citizens in her country and against injustice toward them. She has a steady fire burning in her, unlike Phoebe who goes from darkness to ablaze for someone else’s beliefs in a matter of months. While Phoebe is responsible for a bombing and the death of five girls, Aneeka’s “act of extremism” is much different. When she brings her brothers body in to the public and waits by it she is not harming anyone or causing destruction. Her choices are driven by a well-established, personal sense of right and wrong, as well as for a deep love for her brother. Her approach, though maybe bold, isn’t extremist in the usual sense. It was is a wonderful example of how the beliefs shaped by her identity allow for her to rise above injustice and destruction. The difference between an “extremist” with a strong sense of identity and one with a faltering sense of identity is exemplified between these two characters from different stories. Obviously, I cannot speak truth on everyone in this world who engages in religious extremism or religion in general and their reasons for doing so. It is a complex, and personal factor of life. However, I think the contrast in these women’s identities are most certainly linked to the differing ways in which they engage with a world where different beliefs, religions, branches of these religions, as well as their oppositions are shouting their truths around every corner. Further, it seems we can dissect this issue of their identities down to either having a solid understanding in who they are and why they believe what they do, or not. Religion in these instances points to the universal importance of identity and purpose that many people feel longing for: religious or secular, male or female, rich or poor. Religion is one of the ways in which people find some sense of identity and therefore, the state of our identity can manifest itself in how we engage with it. A quote whose origin we seem to be unsure of comes to mind when discussing this issue and summarizes it pretty well for me when consider Aneeka and Phoebe, who both represent the truth in it (as Aneeka stands for a lot, and Phoebe falls for a lot): “If we don’t stand for something, we’ll fall for anything.” Don’t Look Back...Or do.
I decided to cover both House on Mango Street by Sandra Cisneros and Another Brooklyn by Jacqueline Woodson in the same blog because they both possess a theme that is near and dear to me. The main characters in each novel, Esperanza and August, remind me that where we come from will always be important, however we should never give up on being an active part of shaping our own identity and future in any way possible. What is so great about these characters breaking out of their towns to move on to something bigger, is that they pay tribute to the childhood, which leads to their turning points that help develop their identities as adults. Their origins and coming of age stories likely have components that readers can relate to, and act as a reminder to consider the ways in which we are able to go forward. I think it is important for most people to get away from where they grew up, whether they consider their childhood good or bad. Some of us should come back, and maybe some of us shouldn’t. Esperanza and August each break out from where they grew up. They have different attitudes and ways of doing so, that are related to their upbringing and experiences. There is something for everyone outside of where they came from. In House on Mango Street we get a retelling of a year of Esperanza’s life where her childhood, as well as her coming into womanhood is described. Esperanza’s childhood is full of innocence. She deals with poverty in a less than ideal neighborhood, however she definitely gets to be a kid. She has a whole family unit and spends a lot of time roaming the neighborhood with her friends, and engaging in play. This is not to dismiss they ways in which men begin to come on to her in her early teen years. Pieces of her innocence are taken with time. She begins to take notice of her peers who are trapped with or abused by a man in their lives. However, despite becoming aware of these things, she doesn’t lose her childlike independence and hope as she becomes a woman. This one of the most beautiful things about Esperanza. Her strong family ties and encouragement from her mother and Grandmother are important influences on her escape from Mango Street. She certainly stands in contrast to girls like Sally who have lost their innocence so young, the idea of being truly free is never presented to them. This is extremely important when considering the manner in which Esperanza breaks away from Mango Street to become a writer. According to the last few sentences of the novel, she says of her friends and neighbors on Mango Street, “They will not know I have gone away to come back. For the ones I left behind. For the ones who cannot out” (Cisneros 175). While she doesn’t let Mango Street and all that comes with it determine her identity as a woman, in the sense that she defies the odds, she certainly won’t forget where she came from. This differs a bit from August’s attitude. August, like Esperanza, is all too familiar with poverty. She dreams of getting out of Brooklyn. Her childhood, however, has not been quite as innocently described as Esperanza’s. She goes through the trauma of losing her mother at a young age, after suffering the results of her mother’s mental state. She remembers her mother warning her of friendship’s with women. Her father and brother aren’t very encouraging of her as she finds her own identity away from them and their religion. She has seen people in her city become enslaved to addiction and seen women who have had to turn to sex work for an income. She stood with Gigi through the time she dealt with being raped. She feels very betrayed by Sylvia. In many ways, the city she grew up in was overwhelmingly toxic for her. Her friends were an important part of her childhood but eventually they outgrow each other or move on, and she turns all her energy to getting out of Brooklyn. After leaving for Brown University, she doesn’t look back. When she sees Sylvia years later, she pays her no mind. After time, her city is another Brooklyn entirely and she can’t return. In fact, for August, it was better to press forward and not spend too much time looking back on her city. She used her struggled to catapult her forward. Through this, she still acts as an example for those who need to let go of their past to find a better future. I don’t mean to bore with summaries of these girl’s time coming of age, but to highlight the important aspects of their different experiences and struggles that helped to shape their identities, and encourage them to go forward and develop these identities further. Our childhood will play a role in shaping us of course, but it doesn’t need to define us. That is what coming of age is about. This why I believe it is important to get out if we can. Right after high school I moved out of state for a year. It was a time to focus on where I wanted to go next, without the distractions of home. I feel very connected to August’s story because while I have not gone through a lot of her struggles, I have my own that have taught me sometimes our past is toxic. While we can learn from it, we don’t have to embrace it. By those like Esperanza, who return with hope, I am just as inspired. Where we came from is not up to us, but if we are lucky, where we are going is. The direction we go when we get to choose, as well as how we advocate for those who have no choice, say something important about who we are. Not Snow, Not Ever As anyone who has read it knows, Helen Oyeyemi’s Boy, Snow, Bird acts as a tentative retelling of the old fairy tale, snow white. While there were many important themes of identity present in this novel, I chose to dig into the allusion of the fairy tales because it isn’t something I had paid much mind to in the past, likely due to it being such a strong convention. When looking more closely at this convention, I noticed just how solidly the female tropes from these fairy tales have become embedded in art, society, and literature. The “evil stepmother” is an all to well known title, and the princess, is who we all wanted to be. In this novel Oyeyemi breaks their traditional dynamic. The evil stepmother and the innocent daughter/princess perpetuate a sort of rivalry between women whether it be over looks, power, or winning the affections of a prince or king. It is evil versus the innocent. Only one of the two will make it to “happily ever after”, and according to the fairy tales the someone is the young, beautiful, innocent, princess rather than the evil stepmother. Which of these would you want to be? Most of us would wish to be the latter, but neither of them is true. Therein lies an issue. The dynamic between Snow and Boy follows the Snow white formula in a number of obvious ways. Their relationship later takes a turn in one particularly important scene where they confront each other and Boy tells Snow to hit her (and she does) to fix the relationship- make them even. In this scene Boy recognizes that she abandoned bird and treated her poorly. Simultaneously, Boy stands by her choice to send Snow away- a decision made not solely of her own selfish motives, but rather in the interest of Bird. Was her choice and execution “right”? No. Was it purely evil? No. Was it a complex human choice derived from a mix of personal flaws, feelings, thoughtfulness, and a unique situation? Ding, ding! In regards to Snow, though it never becomes quite clear to Bird or Boy if she is a phony or not, the reader sees more than the perfect, beautiful girl on the surface. We know she hasn’t landed the job her family wanted her to. She admits to hating Agnes and Olivia. With enough prodding from Boy she hits her repeatedly. Snow has had the impossible expectation of the innocent daughter placed on her for her entire life and eventually it falls apart, even if in small pieces. She is more complex than she seems to those who idolize her. She is not purely good, just as Boy is not evil. Together, during a confrontation in the kitchen (void of any prince charming intervention, you’ll not), these flawed women work out their conflict- in a strange but effective way. No one loses, or wins big. The good woman and the bad woman in the fairy tale sense are accompanied by a whole set of characteristics that we are taught to aim for or to resist. At first glance Boy and Snow seem to fit these fairy tale molds pretty well, but as it turns out, they are actual humans, rather than these female manifestations of good and wicked. We don’t have to choose to be or not be in regards to the strange women of fairy tales (I think we can agree now, they are quite odd?). We are all a complex blend of good and bad and okay. That means if our “happily ever after” is out there, reaching it has everything to do with being our best and not much to do with competing against another. The ending might not be as perfect or obvious as it would be if we were perfect, but it will be real. The two novels we read for this blog contained some heavy content and themes, but they are certainly not topics to be shied away from. Both books include a large focus on trauma and the way that those who experience it are forced to deal with it and its consequences on their mind and body as time goes on. In relation to identity, trauma is tough factor to discuss. For those who experience trauma, getting to the other side, where one can process it enough to say, “It’ all just part of my past” is not easy. Traumatic experiences are not something anyone SHOULD have to accept as a factor that makes them who they. Nonetheless, it happens. Physiologically some brains are better equipped to deal with trauma than others, but for many, trauma can act as a huge block; a freeze on the progress of our mind, sometimes stunting one’s physical health. Both Jo’s story in “His Favorites” and Terese’s story in “Heart Berries” act sort of as a trauma narrative in the most formal sense of the term. They each show an important distinction between trauma and identity. Trauma is typically caused by something that happens to the person, unfortunately having to deal with it will influence the person- but the traumatic even itself maintains no bearing on their value or character even if it has shaped their struggles (It may seem silly to have to state, but there is sometimes a stigma on those who have suffered mentally from trauma, and a lack of understanding). To get a very brief and general overview of a trauma narrative, you can click here.
In His Favorites, Jo has a few different things going on. The book begins with her being a factor in, and witnessing her best friend’s death. This sets off a sequence of events that only add to her struggles. Her parents split, her mom moves, and she is shipped off to a boarding school where is she is preyed on and sexually and verbally abused by Master. When she comes forward with her story, no one helps her or believes her. It is this moment that she tells of an anger that she has in her. Through this, Jo manages to maintain a strong clear, mind. That is not say that she didn’t carry the pain of what had happened in her life every day. She had to disassociate at times to protect her mind. It seems she didn’t get the chance to truly tell her story until her early 30s, and it comes to us through the narrative itself. We don’t know if she is talking to a therapist or a detective who is on Master’s trail. Either way it seems like until this moment she had to move ahead in life carrying the weight of what happened to her. It is hard to say how her trauma affected her until then. Though she does tell us “The shadow of the Master” was in her life from the moment he first approached her at the restaurant. What Jo’s trauma narrative does say about her is just how courageous and intelligent she was as a young girl in an impossible situation. She processed it the best she could, she used Master’s critiques of her writing against him in her own narrative. Jo’s story helped her to process her abuse while helping others to see that her identity is so much more than what happened TO her, and allows her trauma to show how strong she was in dealing with it and how little it should be tied to her. While it should be obvious that the identity of Master and the Principle should be tarnished, often when someone goes through trauma, they are left bearing the mark. I think Jo’s story sheds light on the reality of that. In “Heart Berries” Terese’s narrative is less of a flashback and retelling of what happened during her childhood. Instead, she takes us with her on her journey of processing this trauma. It makes sense that Casey is the one she writes much of this narrative to, as many of her buried pieces of abuse from her parents likely came to surface in such an intense romantic relationship. While Jo’s story does a great job of laying out flat that this stuff (sexual abuse etc..) happens, how it happens, Terese offers a view into what it can be like to live with it. She tells us about her “Indian sickness” she has from the culture she grew up in, her abusive tendencies with Casey, and the PTSD she suffers from being molested by her own father as well as the death of her father. Her first examples of love, her parents, were absent and abusive. It makes sense that she would have a confusing and distrustful relationship later on. However, she doesn’t accept it as her identity. With many fall backs along the way she makes things with Casey work and sees a counselor who helps her to cope with memories of her father. She is still working on it when the book ends. Neither Jo or Terese embrace a victim’s stance or focus on how unfair life has been. They turn it around and prove that we are strong who beings who can survive a lot, though not necessarily resilient (nor should we be expecting to be under certain circumstances). When looking at both of these women we can see how trauma gets processed differently among all who suffer it. Even by the end of each book it doesn’t seem that the speakers have fully processed things, but they are moving further along. In telling their stories they provide a raw example of the reality of someone who has to spend their life fighting a battle that should never have been theirs to fight, while providing hope for in others in showing that it is possible. To say that these women are brave in strong in how the processed the pain and faced it is also not to discount those who could not do so as well. Terese says this of the women in her community: “Resilience is one’s ability to endure and recover, and I don’t place much value on the word resilience. So many people did not survive, and they’re no less extraordinary.” (see full articule on why she didn’t use the word “resilient” in her memoir here) I guess the problem with trauma and identity is that we want to focus on the stories of those who overcame and label them as the strong women they are, but we forget to acknowledge that there are certain things in this world that no one is meant to deal with when we think of those who couldn’t overcome. Simultaneously no one’s identity should have to be wrapped up in something that happened to them when they can be so much more and are so much more. What do you guys think about how trauma can influence identity? Red Clocks: The Timeless Identities of Women
An important issue Leni Zumas brings to life in her novel Red Clocks is the pieces of identity that women can share across time, and how women today can act as the voices for those who didn’t have one in previous years. Though I would argue that this novel does not have a main character, Zumas provides Ro with a significant role in establishing this timeless connection through the way she relates with Eivor. Through Eivor’s biography, Ro will bring life and recognition to someone who wasn’t even remembered for her own societal title of polar explorer or scientist, let alone her personal identity. A personal identity is harder to find and preserve than a “societal title”, so if some women of history have been forgotten even in regards to their societal contributions, how much can we assume has been lost when we consider their deeper identities? Luckily time has moved forward in a way that may allow for the uncovering of what was once lost. Eivor did not play the typical female role of her time and Ro, the biographer, does not play the typical role of her time either. Yet, even for these two individuals with unique occupations and personalities, a similar, though of course not identical, person can be found somewhere on the greater timeline of women in history. Someone like Eivor can be given a voice and have some of her truth revealed through a somewhat kindred identity even though it took years. If this can be true for the women living on the fringes of society, hopefully this is the same for women in more conventional, though just as influential roles; mothers, daughters, and menders. Through the mothers, daughters, and menders of today so much more can be revealed about women across time for all that they were despite the limits placed on them. Susan shows that there is more hiding under the surface of those who were restricted to the title of mother. She speaks for the women who have felt unnatural or caged in the confines of motherhood. In the same way Gin, the Mender, offers up deeper insight to the “crone” stereotype in her desires to be left alone with nature. Mattie, as a daughter, wrestles with the decision of whether or not to become a mother while she is still such a daughter and hoping for a bigger future in which to develop herself outside both of these categories. All of these women maintain a societal role common to women throughout history. However, that doesn’t mean their true identities are any less worthy of investigation or that those who were silenced in the past don’t matter now. While each individual is their own, the voices of today can speak to the lost complexities of women who came before us. If you read closely enough you can see through the mother, the mender, the daughter, and the biographer a light -similar to the steady glow of a certain lighthouse- shed on so much of the deeper issues women have faced throughout time. The reveal of these non-surface level identities remind us and others that we are not confined to one role. This is what contemporary literature by women can do. This is how women with a voice today can break through the silence of yesterday and say, “I am more.” I will continue to explore this issue as we journey through these novels together . |