Lost In The Sea

Jean Rhys, an English woman writer born in Dominica, published in1966herlast novel Wide Sargasso Sea, her complex rewriting and recoding of Jane Eyre,exploring its “hidden” story, the life of the crazed Creole wife locked away in the atticof Thornfield Hall, providing her with a past, a history of dislocation and loneliness,an aberrant identity, missing from the original novel. Wide Sargasso Sea demonstratesRhys’s experimental and unique artistic writing style and her consummate skill inillustrating the themes.This thesis is intended, in terms of Rimmon-Kenan and Genette’s theories ofnarrative time, focalization and speech presentation, to present a detailed analysis ofthe narrative techniques employed in Wide Sargasso Sea and of how these techniquescontribute to its theme-construction.This thesis consists of five chapters. Chapter One gives a brief introduction toJean Rhys, Wide Sargasso Sea, previous criticisms on this novel, and the relevantnarratological theories which this thesis employs to analyze the novel. Chapter Two toChapter Four are the core parts of the thesis. Chapter Two discusses the timearrangement and its significance. Chapter Three studies and illustrates in details thefocalizations applied in Wide Sargasso Sea and their unique effects. Chapter Fouranalyses different narrative discourses in the novel and their functions. Chapter Fiveis the conclusion. Rhys’s consummate skills endow the novel complicated andversatile layout and demonstrate the theme and the inner activities of charactersproperly. The causes of Antoinette’s transformation to the lunatic Bertha come to light.The novel is both a celebration of restoring of humanity and a demonstration ofRhys’s superb narrative writing.