Agency of Silence: An Intertextual Study of Identity Construction in Jean Rhys’s Wide Sargasso Sea and Michelle Cliff’s No Telephone to Heaven

Research Article

Abstract

A major theme in Caribbean literature is the search for an identity and a place of belonging in the face of a colonial past and its damaging consequences. This essay takes a unique stance on identity formation and discusses the role of silence as agency in the construction and expression of female creole identity in Wide Sargasso Sea (1966) by Jean Rhys and No Telephone to Heaven (1987) by Michelle Cliff. It argues that for the female creole characters in these novels, agency is expressed through silence, which forms their identities as fragmented and conflicted. In discussing agency as an integral part of identity construction and expression, this essay further argues that historical factors such as colonialism and imperialism do not passively define colonial subjects; rather, the agency of these characters also plays an essential role in moulding their identities. The essay employs an intertextual approach to create a historical trajectory and trace these character’s agency of silence in a post-emancipation and postindependence Jamaica, linking their experiences across space and time. In doing so, it demonstrates the manner in which external silencing forces such as patriarchy are turned by these women into deliberate silence as agency. This silence is reiterated in their characters, the narration, and the structure of these texts, and further shows a lack of significant change in the condition of these creole women across time.