I have just finished the Wide Sargasso Sea by Jean Rhys and I have been pondering over her prequel of the Charlotte Brontë classic Jane Eyre. In the forward written by Francis Wyndham she explains the construction of the novel as being constructed of three parts: each is narrated by the main characters of Berta Antoinette Cosway and Edward Rochester.

“The novel is divided into three parts. The first is told in the heroine’s own words. In the second the young Mr. Rochester describers his arrival in the West Indies, his marriage and its disastrous sequel. The last part is once more narrated by his wife: but the scene is now England, and she writes from the attic room in Thornfield Hall.”

I found the second section a struggle to read as the narrators change off between Rochester and Antoinette with no sign of the change. And this is where the character of Antoinette, the beauty changes to Bertha, the mentally ill wife that Rochester is now burdened with. Rhys handles the two characters embodied by the same woman as physically different as Henry Jekyll and Edward Hyde are in their personas. No longer is she Antoinette the beautiful and sensuous wife that Rochester delights in her physical body, instead he sees Bertha as a smaller, thinner and constructed of many different mannerisms that serve to irritate him. With this novel being a prequel to Jane Eyre I found it hard to like anything about Bertha Antoinette Cosway. Since I have read many times the Brontë novel and see it as a classic. Rhys seems to never try to get the reader to like Bertha. I can only assume that Jane is the true heroine of the novel and her goodness is always overshadowing the whole Bertha Antoinette character. Bertha is a predestined and doomed characterin which there is no use in trying to make her anything else.

The top ten reasons you should be suspect that the rehab center you have just checked into is not that good.

10. When you arrive they take you down a hallway that you were not shown during your tour of the facility.

9. When you get your meals all of your vegetables are the same shade of grey.

8. They refuse to empty your overflowing garbage can early. They only empty the garbage after four days and not before.

7. If you are in bed when the aides come around to change bed linens you have missed your chance! They don’t come back.

6. You and your roommate share one toilet with the male patients in the next room. Get used to no flushing and strange odors!

5. Get used to be being locked out of the one bathroom by the non-thinking male patients in the next room!

4. Pill time equals quiz time. You find it necessary to question the nurse as to what they are giving you and where are your other regular medications?

3. You are in charge of telling your nurse that they are to be decreasing the use of your oxygen intake and to lower the pressure.

2. They have “Personal Hygiene Police.” They tell you when they want you to shower! And it has to be at their scheduled times and days. They cannot cope with a daily shower-er! They only want you to shower every other day!

1. You are given the wrong medications! I was given high blood pressure pills but because of my medications quizzes I discovered this error. When my blood pressure is 110/68 and shows no need for it to be any lower!