The Fragmentation and Alienation of Ethics: A Study on the Ethical Choices in Wide Sargasso Sea

Abstract

Wide Sargasso Sea, a novel written by the British female writer Jean Rhys, is known as the prequel to Jane Eyre. Since its publication, the novel has been analyzed and studied by a number of scholars from various perspectives of ecologism, postcolonialism, and feminism, etc. Employing Nie Zhenzhao’s ethical literary criticism, this study explores the ethical choices in the novel, analyzing how colonialism and patriarchy cause ethical fragmentation and alienation. Focusing on ethical environment, identity, predicament, and choice, it examines how systemic oppression distorts moral reasoning and limits individual agency. As a marginalized Creole woman Antoinette faces fractured ethical identities due to racial exclusion and familial estrangement in a colonial-patriarchal environment. Her choices from compliance to defiance reflect a tragic fight against dehumanization, ending in self-loss symbolized by being renamed “Bertha” and her final arson. Rochester, embodying colonial-patriarchal hegemony, treats relationships as power transactions; his choices of exploiting Antoinette’s dowry, erasing her identity, and fabricating “madness” expose colonial ethics’ hypocrisy. And the secondary characters such as Christophine and Daniel further illustrate colonial ethical corruption. The study reveals colonialism and patriarchy alienate both colonized and colonizer, offering insights into postcolonial critiques of systemic injustice.