Mrs. Mason.

There is no question mark at the end of this title because Annette is actually Mr. Mason's wife.

In this blogpost, I want to dive deeply into Annette's character and her unstable life. Mother of Antoinette, one of the narrators in the Wide Sargasso Sea, Annette seems to keep a lot to herself and restrains from developing a closer relationship with Antoinette. While the class have talked a lot about Antoinette receiving pity, Annette being looked upon with sympathy is often overlooked in my opinion. Clearly, Annette is, at times, mentally insane and has done some questionable things. However, when I think of Annette, rather than seeing her as an incomprehensible and abnormal character, I see her as unfortunate.

Being a Creole woman, Annette was wrongly discriminated. The people in the Spanish town have always been distant from her. At her wedding, she was rebuked behind her back: "'Then why should he marry a widow without a penny to her name and Coulibri a wreck of a place?'" She's always been at the receiving end of criticism and lacks any strength to fight back because her heart is anchored due to her unfortunate sequence of events.

Annette lost her first husband; she lost her horse from poisoning. And at the horrible fire, she lost her son Pierre. How sad is that? It's almost like she was destined to be in a tragedy. As I kept on reading these scenes and when I got to Pierre's death, I was shocked. Usually, if a character has conflicts, he/she has some kind of comeback: a positive outcome in his/her favor. However, Annette never has the clear cut comeback. In fact, she dies.

Does Annette deserve pity? I certainly believe so. But is it the same type of pity Marie deserved? Definitely not. Annette is a very unique character. How could someone's life be so tragic and unusual at the same time?

What do you guys think?

Mrs. Meursault?

There is actually a love story in The Stranger. While Meursault brushes off how intimate his relationship with Marie is, Marie acts like she really loves him. There were many moments in the book when I got frustrated at Meursault; I mean mostly for his lack of emotions but also for his inability to realize the only person in his life that cared for him after his mom died. If anything was going well in Meursault's life, it was Marie. His time in jail helped him to understand the blessings of having someone like Marie and, in general, all the little details that he stoically overlooked before.

Who is Marie? Marie Cardona was a former typist at Meursault's office, and she caught the eye of Meursault: the man who doesn't even express sorrow for his mother's death. The accounts dealing with him and Marie show rare occasions where Meursault seems capable of expressing emotion but not quite. How lucky is he though? You got a pretty girl who comes up to you first and asks you if you want to marry her (it's usually the other way around)! But how does Monsieur Meursault respond? He responds with pure indifference:

"That evening Marie came by to see me and asked me if I wanted to marry her. I said it didn't make any differences to me and that we could if she wanted to. Then she wanted to know if I loved her. I answered the same way I had the last time, that it didn't mean anything but that I probably didn't love her." (Camus 41)

Basically, he's saying "I mean if you want, but I don't really care." Who is this guy? Almost like if he's a stranger, he doesn't take Marie's marriage seriously. Poor Marie! His apathetic personality really pisses me off. Later on, he'll realize that he's made a mistake in dealing the situation in this manner.

Like it was all planned, Marie isn't allowed to go visit, after her first one, because she isn't his wife. Meursault is stuck; the once so impassive Meursault finally reflects how joyful his swimming with Marie was. Before his implied execution, he finally lets it out to the chaplain.

When reading the last chapter in the book, I felt pity for Meursault. I mean his only hope is to hear the cries of hate from the spectators. However, if we look at Marie's situation, I believe we should feel greater pity. She was a person that was with him until the end and had hope for him throughout his trial. The sad ending not only includes Meursault's execution but also the termination/"execution" of the hopes of the sweet Marie Cardona.