In Danticat’s The Farming of Bones, many of the Freudian mechanisms such as displacement, reversal and intellectualization show themselves in the character of Amabelle through the way she acts around others and though her narratives. However, the most visible Freudian mechanism in Amabelle is isolation. It can be seen through the way that she interacts with others, especially Yves.
The most predominant example of isolation in Amabelle’s character is on page 269. Amabelle explains how she would shut herself in her room and go to bed for months at a time. When she did not sleep, she sewed. She only broke routine when she dreamt of Generalissimo’s death. In this passage, she physically isolates herself by going to bed for long periods. She also mentally isolates herself because she cannot deal with the traumatic events that have happened to her like the death of Sebastien and Mimi. Instead of recognizing what happened, she resorts to work and sleep in order to avoid emotional involvement in life.
Her periods of emotional coherence are separated physically within the novel. Amabelle processes the most emotionally through her narratives, which exist separate from the main plot. The narratives describe memories that occurred either before or after the main plot. Through the memories, she encounters death and speaks about death unlike she does during the plot. The moments that she deals with death do not exist within the main story line; instead they exist in her past.
Instead of mourning the loss of Sebastien, Amabelle isolates herself from Yves. She explains, “He and I both had chosen a life of work to console us after the slaughter. We had too many phantoms to crowd those quiet moments when every ghost could appear in its true form and refuse to go away.” The both buried themselves in their work and separated themselves from each other in order to avoid dealing with the past. On page 274 she explains that she regretted that they had not found more comfort in each other. She tells how she wanted to find someone who would help her forget Sebastien and mourn him at the same time. Instead of forgetting and mourning the loss of Sebastien, she refuses to get close to Yves—she is not ready to deal with his loss.
Firstly, I have a question.
It concerns chapter 30, pages 208-213 when Amabelle is a the hospital and the victims around her are recounting their experiences,"As they ate, the people gathered in a group to talk. Taking turns, they exchanged tales quickly, the haste in their voices sometimes blurring the words, for greater than their desire to be heard was the hunger to tell." Where does this fit into the process? Is it intellectualization? Is it simply the need to connect with other that have been through similar experiences?
Secondly –
During the massacre, Dominican soldiers take Father Romain away to prison and torture him. He suffers major emotional and mental damage. One of the most obvious ways he displays his damage is through the suppression of these memories.
Suppression is the conscious forgetting troubled memories. His sister says, “Sometimes her remembers everything. Sometimes, he forgets all of it, everything, even me.” After this Father Romain’s mumbles the word ‘forget’ which hints that he has been actively trying to suppress these memories ever since he got out of prison. His inability to control when he remembers and when he forgets is also a sign of suppression for when a person is in repression, their subconscious forgets the troubling memories by no effort of the conscious mind.
Father Romain’s busing himself with his kite may be one way he tries to suppress his memories. Doing something with his hands is a way to take his mind off of the images and thoughts he can’t get out of his head.
By page 271 Father Romain appears to have healed, “…his eyes were suddenly attentive, the two most visible signs of the you man he had once been.” Does this mean that he has been able to suppress his memories? No, he has simply healed and has been able to accept what has happened. He speaks briefly to an audience of the horrors of the massacre and admits that he’s taken a wife and fathered three children in his healing process. He recognizes his pain, “I wept all the time I was in prison. I wept at the border. I wept for everyone who was touched, beaten or killed.” Through recognizing his pain and no longer trying to suppress the memories, Father Romain begins to function normally and no longer drools and repeats the phrases forced upon him but his captors.
Over the course of the whole book, I was very interested in how Danticat used water as a symbol in the lives of her characters. I thought it was very interesting that water is what separates Amabelle from her home (though Danticat didn't really make that part up) and both Amabelle and Sebastien lost people to water (the river overflowing and the aftermath of a hurricane). After Amabelle crosses back to the DR and cannot find Sebastien's waterfall (more water!) Amabelle lays down in the low flowing river. This is the moment that I focused on. While it could be said that Amabelle is in someway regressing to that moment of her parents' death (she describes herself as "cradles by the current, paddling like a newborn"), I feel like part of her actions can be explained if one imagines that water can be a symbol for water. While I know this is not something discussed in the Psychological Criticism powerpoint, many dream scientists see water as a symbol of emotion in dreams. Since fiction can be seen as a form of the author dreaming, it could be said that the water that is ever present in "The Farming of the Bones" symbolized some kind of emotion. So when Amabelle lies down in the shallow river and lets it rush over her body, it could be seen as Amabelle giving over to the rush of emotions she has been blocking out of her mind since the Parsley Massacre.
In the aftermath of the Parsley Massacre, Yves attempts to forget the trauma he experienced with the Freudian mechanism of suppression, which manifests in his actions and dialogue. For example, he refuses to answer his mother’s questions about Amabelle and whether or not her family died in the massacre, but he would talk about other topics with her (226-227). He also refuses to speak to Man Denise, Sebastien’s mother, when his own mother asks him to do so (228). Finally, he barely speaks to Amabelle at all about their situation since the event (230). This fits with the idea of suppression because he only ignores people or conversations that could remind him of the past: Amabelle was his companion during the entire trip, and Man Denise is the mother of the man he and Amabelle were trying to save. He distances himself from these in an act of repression because he either does not want to or cannot deal with the emotional trauma of the event; instead, he tries to forget about it. Indeed, he talks about why the justices of peace listen to people’s stories “as if he were no longer linked to the slaughter” (231). Yves instead chooses to focus his energy into planting green beans in his father’s fields, even though “it is not the season” (228), which “could make him believe that he had forgotten” (246).
However, later on in the story, Yves begins to talk about the event more with Amabelle, which shows that he is beginning to come to terms with his trauma and perhaps wants to process his previously suppressed emotions. He tells her about how he could have been with Sebastien and Mimi at the church when the soldiers came if he had not gone to sell the wood Sebastien gave him (248). He also says he wanted to save them like Joël had saved him from the car the day Joël got hit by the same car, but could not do it (248). Finally, he says that “I have not been able to do for anyone what Joël did for me…Because the more I see people die, the more I want to guard my own life” (249). Perhaps Yves believes that he could have sacrificed himself and saved Sebastien and Mimi, and therefore feels guilty that they died instead of him and ashamed of his cowardice. This would confirm Amabelle’s previous theory that Yves “thought I hated him and was tormenting him for being there instead of Sebastien,” (218) which would add another reason for his distance from her.
But he seems unable to deal with his emotions because his recounting of the past physically shakes him up (249). Amabelle’s attempts to calm him down, which led to their sleeping together, only seemed to aggravate his pain considering the “flash flood of tears” he let loose afterwards (250) and his resulting avoidance of Amabelle’s touch (256). He regresses back into a state of suppression; he chooses “a life of work” to avoid his pain (274). Yet he is still physically affected by the trauma he experienced, shown by his aversion to parsley, which his captors shoved into his mouth, and Spanish, which his captors spoke (273). Yves continues the rest of his life affected by the traumatic experience and unable to move on because of his inability to deal with his emotions.
Something I thought was very interesting in the novel, The Farming of Bones, by Edwidge Danticat, happened during Chapter 30. Amabelle and Yves have just arrived at the clinic, and other survivors are sharing their stories and talking about the horrifying things they witnessed during the Haitian Massacre. One man in this group of storytellers, in particular, caught my attention. The man is not even given a name; he is simply called “the man from the cadaver pit” (211). The cadaver man had been struck with a machete and left for dead. He tells the others that he awoke in the morning to find himself in a pit of corpses. The man says, “Waking up among the dead, I started screaming…and then I thought of my woman and our first night together, and in spite of all the corpses, I smiled.” (211). When the others ask where his woman is now, he simply shrugs his shoulders. Amabelle goes on to note later that she saw the cadaver man lay on his mat all morning, mumbling, “Nounoune, Nounoune” (217) (his woman’s name). In this short section of chapter 30, I noticed the Freudian Mechanism referred to as Isolation.
Earlier, we see the cadaver man blatantly telling his gruesome story of waking up in a pit of corpses. Danticat depicts the man as calmly telling his story. This is unusual, as one would think that waking up in a pit of dead bodies would cause an enormous amount of mental anguish and at least leave the sufferer visibly shaken. This leads me to conclude that this man consciously recognizes the event (waking up in a pit of corpses), but that his mind has failed to process it, choosing instead to isolate it from the man’s mind. This is why the cadaver man can speak so calmly and blatantly about such events. This conclusion fits with the definition of isolation, thus I can conclude that this example shows the isolation in the cadaver man’s character.
There is also another section in chapter 30 that shows the isolation present in the cadaver man’s character. This section is when the cadaver man calmly shrugs his shoulders, gesturing that he doesn’t know where his woman is. This response also seemed very odd to me. For one, when corpses surrounded him, thinking about his woman made in smile, so he must feel a great deal of attachment towards her. Secondly, later in the chapter Amabelle notices him repeatedly calling for his woman. By calling for her repeatedly, it is obvious that the cadaver man loves and is deeply attached to his woman. Thus, it is clear that his calm and somewhat uninterested response regarding the whereabouts of his woman stems from the isolation in him. Again, he consciously recognizes the separation from his woman, but he is not processing how he feels about that, and those unprocessed feelings come out in bouts like what Amabelle witnessed.
Something I thought was very interesting in the novel, The Farming of Bones, by Edwidge Danticat, happened during Chapter 30. Amabelle and Yves have just arrived at the clinic, and other survivors are sharing their stories and talking about the horrifying things they witnessed during the Haitian Massacre. One man in this group of storytellers, in particular, caught my attention. The man is not even given a name; he is simply called “the man from the cadaver pit” (211). The cadaver man had been struck with a machete and left for dead. He tells the others that he awoke in the morning to find himself in a pit of corpses. The man says, “Waking up among the dead, I started screaming…and then I thought of my woman and our first night together, and in spite of all the corpses, I smiled.” (211). When the others ask where his woman is now, he simply shrugs his shoulders. Amabelle goes on to note later that she saw the cadaver man lay on his mat all morning, mumbling, “Nounoune, Nounoune” (217) (his woman’s name). In this short section of chapter 30, I noticed the Freudian Mechanism referred to as Isolation.
Earlier, we see the cadaver man blatantly telling his gruesome story of waking up in a pit of corpses. Danticat depicts the man as calmly telling his story. This is unusual, as one would think that waking up in a pit of dead bodies would cause an enormous amount of mental anguish and at least leave the sufferer visibly shaken. This leads me to conclude that this man consciously recognizes the event (waking up in a pit of corpses), but that his mind has failed to process it, choosing instead to isolate it from the man’s mind. This is why the cadaver man can speak so calmly and blatantly about such events. This conclusion fits with the definition of isolation, thus I can conclude that this example shows the isolation in the cadaver man’s character.
There is also another section in chapter 30 that shows the isolation present in the cadaver man’s character. This section is when the cadaver man calmly shrugs his shoulders, gesturing that he doesn’t know where his woman is. This response also seemed very odd to me. For one, when corpses surrounded him, thinking about his woman made in smile, so he must feel a great deal of attachment towards her. Secondly, later in the chapter Amabelle notices him repeatedly calling for his woman. By calling for her repeatedly, it is obvious that the cadaver man loves and is deeply attached to his woman. Thus, it is clear that his calm and somewhat uninterested response regarding the whereabouts of his woman stems from the isolation in him. Again, he consciously recognizes the separation from his woman, but he is not processing how he feels about that, and those unprocessed feelings come out in bouts like what Amabelle witnessed.
In the latter parts of this novel The Farming of Bones, we see the main character, Amabelle, in a very disoriented and confused state. Regarding the Freudian Mechanisms, we see examples of suppression used to its fullest extent, however she attempts to reverse some horrid memories. While Amabelle woes over the death of Sebastien, it is Yves who she goes to live with almost in an attempt to move on from Sebastien. Although this may be considered repression, it is evident that Amabelle is almost using reversal to move on from the past. Amabelle returns to the cave in which she would meet Sebastien, and also goes to visit Sebastien's mother. Amabelle displays other signs of struggling to move on from her past when she attempts to reconnect with Valencia, who does not even recognize her. Amabelle's attempt to convince herself of what she knows to be false is saddening. She is burdened by the memories of the Parsley Massacre, and her visits to past locations is her attempt to right the wrongs.
Though Danticat provides little information about Sebastian's mother in The Farming of the bones, she gives enough description to hint at a variety of Freudian mechanisms at play, influencing the character's ego. In refusing to believe the many people who inform her of the death of her children, Man Denise exhibits classic signs of reversal. Although she realizes in a way that her son and daughter have been killed, nothing can bring her to submit to the truth, as it would result in more emotional processing than she is capable of handling. As a result, she attempts to convince herself and Amabelle of the exact opposite: that her son is alive and well somewhere, not lying, dead, near the border. More chronically, we can see her isolation as well. Like Amabelle, Man Denise has shut herself from the outside world. She finds herself unable to behave normally, as she can not move on from processing her great emotional torment. Because she has isolated the experience from her cognition, the problem never resolves itself, and as readers we witness the resulting degradation of her life. So extreme is this isolation that she forces Amabelle to leave prematurely, not wanting to touch this uncomfortable emotional territory.
While jubilantly skimming through the pages of Danticat searching for a character on which I could apply my inner psychologist, I happened to stumble across the character of Man Rapadou, Yves mother. Analyzing her psychological characteristics from pgs. 275-278, during her heartfelt conversation with Amabelle, two main Freudian mechanisms materialize, each having substantial influence on her ego. As Man Rapadou talks to Amabelle, she mentions her recurring dreams: “My head barely touches the pillow at night when I dream that I’m falling.” Man Rapadou recounts that in her dreams she falls off of progressively higher objects, but always awakens before hitting the ground. When Amabelle asks what she believes the dreams signify, Man Rapadou utters that they are because she was weak as a child and would slip and fall, letting the force of the earth pull her down. These night terrors are classic examples of projections by the subconscious. Man Rapadou has an innate fear of being vulnerable and weak, these unwanted emotional characteristics or anxieties are projected in the form of “falling” dreams. Falling signifies Man Rapadou’s feeling of lack of conscious control or self-possession over her ego. The faller is pulled helplessly towards the surface of the earth, unable to slow or stop the inevitable impact, which in her case signifies the confrontation of the truth.
The “truth” mentioned is Man Rapdou’s secret, which she admits to Amabelle for the very first time. Man Rapadou poisoned her husband because he was a Yanki spy. “So I cooked his favorite foods for him and filled them with flour-fine glass and rat poison. I poisoned him. Maybe this is why I am falling in all my dreams. I’m going to him soon and I’m afraid.” This second Freudian mechanism is suppression. Man Rapadou, for all those long years has been consciously trying to forget her painful memories and feelings of sorrow and regret. When she was young she told herself that what she was doing was out of “love for her country”(hint of reversal), but now as an old, lonely widow those feeling have finally emerged from the dark troves of her consciousness and manifested themselves in the form of the projections mentioned above. Man Rapadou is not afraid of the mere act of dying, but of the consequences it brings; facing her husband, the truth, and the almighty judgment in the heavens above.
Throughout the novel I was most interested in the dream-like memory chapters (in bold). I think that they reveal quite a bit of insight about Amabelle's psychological states and memories. In particular, they illustrate how she remembers her parents, especially her mother. They showcase Amabelle's preconscious (can be recalled by not always presently conscious in the mind), memories, and awareness of her. I was re-reading a little and came across page 208, which portrays her mother coming to her in the hospital and saying, "Your mother was never as far from you as you supposed. You were like my shadow." I think that there is a link here - similar to the way that Amabelle was once her mother's shadow, her mother now shadows Amabelle's conscious and awareness (through the bold chapters). Again and again she returns to Amabelle to send her messages, remind her of things, or simply to just be present. In a way she is still very much alive because she exists in Amabelle's awareness: "I see my mother rising." I don't think that Amabelle is necessarily repressing or suppressing these memories of her mother because they seem to come up quite often.
In Edwidge Danticat's The Farming of Bones, Amabelle is clearly the most highly traumatized and emotionally stunted character. Her experiences with her parents' deaths and the slaughter of her friends and loved ones left an obvious mark on her person. However, on the flip side of Amabelle's experiences, we have Señora Valencia. The two grew up together like sisters, but they belonged to two very different classes of people and led very opposite lives. In Amabelle and Señora Valencia's reunion, we see the mental state the Señora is in, and her stories and actions illustrate what she has gone through in the past few decades. The Señora has clearly struggled with the loss of her loved ones over the years. When Amabelle arrives, she finds Valencia staring at a large portrait of Rafael that she had painted. (294) Initially, Valencia does not recognize Amabelle and angrily denies that it is her, stating that she has heard that Amabelle was killed. (294-295) However, Amabelle convinces her of her identity, and Valencia feels "shame and regret" for not having recognized her. She goes on to tell Amabelle that during the slaughter she hid many Haitians in an attempt to feel like she was helping Amabelle, saying, "I hid them because I couldn't hid you, Amabelle. I thought you'd been killed, so everything I did I did in your name." (299) Valenica seems to have been affected by the loss of her son, her family, the help who were like family, and the perceived loss of Amabelle. She mentions later to Amabelle that she had often looked for her at many bodies of water, hoping to find her. (303) The particular Freudian mechanism that applies to Señora Valencia is reversal. In one part of their conversation, Valencia says to Amabelle that her husband was only following orders during the slaughter. (300) This is something she has probably been trying to convince herself of for decades, though subconsciously she probably knows the opposite is true. All of her experiences and her guilt over the role of her husband in the slaughter and not being able to do enough to stop it have brought her to a state of disillusionment, and as she says to Amabelle, "It is a marvel that some of us are still here, to wait and hope to die a natural death."
After the Parsley Massacre, many of the Hatians were deeply psychologically disturbed by what had happened and many developed psychological methods to cope with their psychological wounds. But some Dominicans were also psychologically scarred by the massacre, such as Señora Valencia who use displacement and reversal to cope with he lose of her "sister", Amabelle and the crimes she could not stop.
When Amabelle returned to Alegría and finds Señora Valencia, the Señora reacts with denial and says "You are wicked to come here and use Amabelle's name." (294) Señora Valencia's inability to recognize Amabelle seems unlikely because Amabelle recognizes Señora Valencia immediately once she appears but Valencia doesn't recognize Amabelle leading one to think that Señora Valencia rejects Amabelle existence on a psychological level; because it causes her too much guilt, because she was married to the man, who captured and killed many of the Haitians near the plantation and was unable to save many of them, and Amabelle in praticular. Therefore it appears easier for Señora Valencia to not face Amabelle, as to face Amabelle would admit Señora Valencia's guilt in the Massacre. The Señora tries to back up her denial of Amabelle by using facts to try and prove that the person in front of her doesn't share a relation with Amabelle, by saying "I spoke to many people who said they watched when she was killed in La Romana, with some others who were hiding in a house by the sea" (294). Yet while this quotes primary use appears to be for getting Amabelle to leave the house, the actual goal seems to be to convince Valencia herself that Amabelle died.
Eventually, Amabelle recites enough details of Señora Valencia's life, so that Valencia has to respond to what has been said and switches to a psychological defense of denial to try and convince Amabelle but more importantly herself that she did the right thing this can be seen in how the first words out of the Señora's mouth are "Amabelle, I beg your forgiveness for not recognizing you (297)." The first thing that comes out is forgiveness representing what is filling her subconscious mind. Valencia's conversation continues to be very self centered as she talks about how she still paints and is unable to have children once she has asked Amabelle where she is living. Finally Valencia starts to try and prove to Amabelle that despite what her husband did she actually did the best thing possible saying " Do you truly understand?... During El Corte, though I was bleeding and nearly died, I hid many of your people... I hid a baby who is now a student at the medical school with Rosalinda and her husband. I hid Sylvie and two families in your old room. I hid some of Doña Sabine's people before she and her husband escaped to Haiti. I did what I could in my situation" (299). The first thing that the Señora says in the quote above shows how pitiful she has become in wanting understanding and forgiveness. She goes on to say she deserves this forgiveness for how many people she did save, not how many she left behind which mentally provides a barrier against the guilt she feels. Señora Valencia's final statement in her explanation of what happened during the massacre, "I did what I could in my situation." (299), is used as a pitiful excuse for why she didn't do more to help and save the Hatians. Señora Valencia tries to relate her experience to Amabelle by saying "I hid them because I couldn't hide you, Amabelle. I thought you'd be killed, so everything I did in your name" (299) this quote shows a reversal in the Señora's subconscious as she tries to shift the goodness that she has done to a Haitian who has been abused making her efforts in saving the Haitian refugees seem more powerful than her guilt.
Overall Vancia tries to tone down what damage has happened due to the Massacre by saying that "None of the people in Don Carlos' mill were touched" (300) this form of denial helps seperate Valencia from the true magnitude of the Massacre as does the term "el corte" which Amabelle states "El corte - the cutting - was an easy word to say" (299), it is necessary for Valencia to use El Corte because its meaning can be cutting of a cane stalk as it can be the cutting of a Haitian, it therefore separates her from the Massacre psychologically by using deconstructionism. Eventually Señora Valencia goes as far to deny her associated guilt and tries to make her husband seem innocent, when she says "Amabelle, Pico merely followed the orders he was given" (300). This psychological denial and separation from guilty ultimately allow Valencia to function and go on with life.
n Edwidge Danticat's The Farming of Bones, Amabelle showed clear signs of Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome and as a result, showing clear signs of isolation. She clearly remembers what happens to her parents, and later in the story what happened to her, and those around her during the massacre, yet her descriptions are mostly detached, although she emotionally connects to the pain, at least in the beginning of the story, what starts to happen after the massacre (emotional stress part 2) it seems that the compounding stress on her system forced her to isolate herself. We know that she isn't suppressing or regressing per se, what happened during the massacre, she clearly remembers what happens, yet she does alienate herself from the community, possibly because after she lost her parents, she had Valencia, after she grew up, Sebastien was her support, after the massacre, the most important people to her in this new life was taken from her. It would take her 20 years to look back for her old life, to find Valencia and from what I saw start the "healing" process.
Though there are periods of time where Yves tries to process his emotion, he ultimately pushes them away and tries to ignore the entire thing. He is in total isolation mentally and though there are people around him he seems to completely ignore all the people that have connections to his isolated emotions. Yves gets up early in the morning and comes back home late. Also apparently over the twenty some year period that Amabelle and he lived in the same house and slept in the same bed, almost no conversations went on between the two, especially after their failed attempt at sex. Yves' isolation gets worse and worse the more time that passes. In the beginning he expresses some contemplation on his emotions when he talks about his feelings about the time Joel saved him and how painful it is for him for him to believe that he cannot save anyone and he keeps seeing all the people he loves die in front of him. Not much is seen into Yves' life after his and Amabelle's botched sex, there are theories that he may have found another woman and have another life, but that seems unlikely. All that seems to be left of his life is hard labor (his attempt to reach back to his former life, or just something to keep him distracted) and sitting in a chair with a bottle of rum.
In Edwidge Danticat’s The Farming of Bones, many psychological criticism traits are found in characters throughout the entire novel. Although there are many characters to analyze, Father Romain exemplifies many characteristics of psychological criticism, which makes him an interesting character to analyze. As discussed in class, one of the main aspects of psychological criticism is the Freudian Theory. Along with Freudian Theory is the idea of suppression: consciously trying to forget troubling memories in the past. Father Romain shows the idea of suppression when trying to forget the memories of when he was in prison. According to Father Romain’s sister, Father Romain was tortured daily while in prison and was only given his own urine to drink. As a result of this horrific time in prison, Father Romain does all he can to forget about it. As the reader can see in chapter 36, Father Romain is described as sitting in a chair and playing with kite. Although this may seem like an unimportant object in the chapter, it is actually a way that Father Romain keeps himself occupied and his mind off his terrible time in prison. The sister goes on to tell Amabelle “Sometimes he remembers everything. Sometimes, he forgets all of it, everything, even me.” From this line, the reader is able to conclude that Father Romain is trying to forget his past, but sometimes is not able to. Through this character, the idea of suppression is shown very clearly and allows readers to get a better understanding of psychological criticism.
In Edwidge Danticat’s “The Farming of Bones,” analyzing with psychological criticism Father Romain shows the difficulty in discerning the difference between suppression and repression. Father Romain had a traumatic experience while being tortured in a Domincan prison. With such painful memories, Father Romain regressed to a simpler state of mind to be able to cope with these emotions. To be able to do this, he either has to forgot his memories consciously, suppression, or subconsciously, repression. In either case, the result would have been difficult to explain without knowing what Father Romain thought. The only other information we are given about Father Romain’s situation is that he would occasionally remember everything, which could occur if he was either suppressing or repressing the information. Either he chose to begin remember it, or the information came to his conscious because of some sort of mental connection that he made. At the second encounter between amabelle and the Father, he seems to have come to grips with what had happened at the border and in prison. Either he is now no longer choosing to suppress the memories, or since he able to cope with them his subconscious no longer has to repress them. Though it would seem more logical to be the former, the latter can’t be completely ruled out. I would say this because of how his view point of the incidents have changed, “perhaps I have lost, but I have also gained an even greater understanding of things both godly and earthly.” (272) Father romain does not even acknowledge that something was lost during the slaughter, which may be how he views it in his mind. This mind set would not require suppression because is an optimistic.
In Edwidge Danticat's The Farming of Bones, we see a depth of psychological detail in not only the major characters, but also in the more minor, incidental characters. We see evidence of what is very likely displacement from the young men in the crowd who attack Amabelle and her friends (191). Their aggression is so entirely lacking in factual basis that it can only stem from some other psychological position, likely their frustration at their circumstances in life as uneducated, likely manual laborers. Likewise we see evidence of systematic isolation from the Haitian nuns (205). They see incredible pain and deformity every day and still remain calm and collected. Clearly they are no longer able to process each individual casualty with the empathy normal to human interaction. They have become numb to the pain in their surroundings and likely have difficulties in forming empathic connections in their everyday lives.
Interestingly even the reaction of the reader can be attributed to a Freudian Mechanism. As we read through the extensive descriptions of murder, death and general atrocity, we cannot help but intelectualize the struggle of Amabelle and her Haitian comrades. As readers we are sufficiently distant from the events and their emotional contents for us to be unable to process them in a significant way without considerable effort and narrative ability on the part of the author.
Throughout this book Amabelle experiences a lot of loss. I think the biggest loss that she had was the loss of her mother. Throughout this book Amabelle has dreams and memories of her mother, both of which I believe help her to deal with the loss of her mother.
On page 265, Amabelle explains how dreams work, “you may be surprised what we use our dreams to do, how we drape them over our sight and carry them like amulets to protect us from evil spells.” I think this quote well describes what dreams have done for Amabelle. They “drape” and help cover up the “evil spells” of the pain she feels from the loss of her mother.
Whenever Amabelle talks about her mother she only has nice things to say about her. Amabelle remembers liking her gentleness and her tranquility. Amabelle also remembers her mother making her a doll out of her favorite things when she was sick. Amabelle remembers that doll as being the thing that made her better. Remembering the doll makes Amabelle what to be a little girl again and to be able to touch the doll again. Whenever she touches the doll, she feels closer to her mother.
Latter in the book, Amabelle has a dream about her mother. In the dream her mother is a spirit and she is talking to Amabelle; Amabelle says that, “I will never be a whole women in the absence of you face.” Amabelle then goes on her say that, “You were like my shadow. Always fled when I came to you and only followed when I left you alone.” When Amabelle says these things I think it is her going through the grief process. I think the things that her mother says to her are maybe things that her mother never said to her or maybe the things that Amabelle always wanted to hear from her. The things Amabelle says to her mother could also be things that she never had a chance to tell her and had always wanted to. I think this dream was maybe some type of closure for Amabelle. Maybe it was a subconscious way of letting go and dealing with the loss of her mother.
Towards the end of this book, “The Farming of Bones”, by Edwidge Danticat we learn a lot about this man Yves, who he is, what does he do, ect. Yves is a very important person towards the end of this book. The Freudian Theory that Yves possesses is Repression. Repression is “subconsciously forgetting troubling memories.” The massacre has started and ended during this entire book, and Yves really show his “repression side”. One example is on page 228, “Yves stayed in the fields until nightfall.” Why does he stay until the night has come to go home? Yves response in the book is that he “planted a field of green beans”. Is that the real reason he has stayed out in the field till nightfall? He could be out there thinking and trying to forget his troubled memories in the past or even what is happening now during the massacre. Yves and Amabelle have a close relationship, id Yves knows about the Amabelle and Sebastian, then why is Yves having a relationship with Amabelle. Is this because he was hurt when he was young, his memories are coming back, and he wants to hurt someone, or something? There are lots of questions about Yves, and his memories, that he perhaps wants to forget. He tries to forget them by maybe making other people feel worse, so he does not feel bad. Everyone would feel bad and it wouldn’t be just him that feels bad. The Freudian Theory that Yves represents is Repression.
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This page contains a single entry by Beth Slocum published on February 25, 2011 12:33 PM.
Psychological Criticism
Laurel Schwartz
In Danticat’s The Farming of Bones, many of the Freudian mechanisms such as displacement, reversal and intellectualization show themselves in the character of Amabelle through the way she acts around others and though her narratives. However, the most visible Freudian mechanism in Amabelle is isolation. It can be seen through the way that she interacts with others, especially Yves.
The most predominant example of isolation in Amabelle’s character is on page 269. Amabelle explains how she would shut herself in her room and go to bed for months at a time. When she did not sleep, she sewed. She only broke routine when she dreamt of Generalissimo’s death. In this passage, she physically isolates herself by going to bed for long periods. She also mentally isolates herself because she cannot deal with the traumatic events that have happened to her like the death of Sebastien and Mimi. Instead of recognizing what happened, she resorts to work and sleep in order to avoid emotional involvement in life.
Her periods of emotional coherence are separated physically within the novel. Amabelle processes the most emotionally through her narratives, which exist separate from the main plot. The narratives describe memories that occurred either before or after the main plot. Through the memories, she encounters death and speaks about death unlike she does during the plot. The moments that she deals with death do not exist within the main story line; instead they exist in her past.
Instead of mourning the loss of Sebastien, Amabelle isolates herself from Yves. She explains, “He and I both had chosen a life of work to console us after the slaughter. We had too many phantoms to crowd those quiet moments when every ghost could appear in its true form and refuse to go away.” The both buried themselves in their work and separated themselves from each other in order to avoid dealing with the past. On page 274 she explains that she regretted that they had not found more comfort in each other. She tells how she wanted to find someone who would help her forget Sebastien and mourn him at the same time. Instead of forgetting and mourning the loss of Sebastien, she refuses to get close to Yves—she is not ready to deal with his loss.
Firstly, I have a question.
It concerns chapter 30, pages 208-213 when Amabelle is a the hospital and the victims around her are recounting their experiences,"As they ate, the people gathered in a group to talk. Taking turns, they exchanged tales quickly, the haste in their voices sometimes blurring the words, for greater than their desire to be heard was the hunger to tell." Where does this fit into the process? Is it intellectualization? Is it simply the need to connect with other that have been through similar experiences?
Secondly –
During the massacre, Dominican soldiers take Father Romain away to prison and torture him. He suffers major emotional and mental damage. One of the most obvious ways he displays his damage is through the suppression of these memories.
Suppression is the conscious forgetting troubled memories. His sister says, “Sometimes her remembers everything. Sometimes, he forgets all of it, everything, even me.” After this Father Romain’s mumbles the word ‘forget’ which hints that he has been actively trying to suppress these memories ever since he got out of prison. His inability to control when he remembers and when he forgets is also a sign of suppression for when a person is in repression, their subconscious forgets the troubling memories by no effort of the conscious mind.
Father Romain’s busing himself with his kite may be one way he tries to suppress his memories. Doing something with his hands is a way to take his mind off of the images and thoughts he can’t get out of his head.
By page 271 Father Romain appears to have healed, “…his eyes were suddenly attentive, the two most visible signs of the you man he had once been.” Does this mean that he has been able to suppress his memories? No, he has simply healed and has been able to accept what has happened. He speaks briefly to an audience of the horrors of the massacre and admits that he’s taken a wife and fathered three children in his healing process. He recognizes his pain, “I wept all the time I was in prison. I wept at the border. I wept for everyone who was touched, beaten or killed.” Through recognizing his pain and no longer trying to suppress the memories, Father Romain begins to function normally and no longer drools and repeats the phrases forced upon him but his captors.
Over the course of the whole book, I was very interested in how Danticat used water as a symbol in the lives of her characters. I thought it was very interesting that water is what separates Amabelle from her home (though Danticat didn't really make that part up) and both Amabelle and Sebastien lost people to water (the river overflowing and the aftermath of a hurricane). After Amabelle crosses back to the DR and cannot find Sebastien's waterfall (more water!) Amabelle lays down in the low flowing river. This is the moment that I focused on. While it could be said that Amabelle is in someway regressing to that moment of her parents' death (she describes herself as "cradles by the current, paddling like a newborn"), I feel like part of her actions can be explained if one imagines that water can be a symbol for water. While I know this is not something discussed in the Psychological Criticism powerpoint, many dream scientists see water as a symbol of emotion in dreams. Since fiction can be seen as a form of the author dreaming, it could be said that the water that is ever present in "The Farming of the Bones" symbolized some kind of emotion. So when Amabelle lies down in the shallow river and lets it rush over her body, it could be seen as Amabelle giving over to the rush of emotions she has been blocking out of her mind since the Parsley Massacre.
Garseng Wong - Yves and Suppression
In the aftermath of the Parsley Massacre, Yves attempts to forget the trauma he experienced with the Freudian mechanism of suppression, which manifests in his actions and dialogue. For example, he refuses to answer his mother’s questions about Amabelle and whether or not her family died in the massacre, but he would talk about other topics with her (226-227). He also refuses to speak to Man Denise, Sebastien’s mother, when his own mother asks him to do so (228). Finally, he barely speaks to Amabelle at all about their situation since the event (230). This fits with the idea of suppression because he only ignores people or conversations that could remind him of the past: Amabelle was his companion during the entire trip, and Man Denise is the mother of the man he and Amabelle were trying to save. He distances himself from these in an act of repression because he either does not want to or cannot deal with the emotional trauma of the event; instead, he tries to forget about it. Indeed, he talks about why the justices of peace listen to people’s stories “as if he were no longer linked to the slaughter” (231). Yves instead chooses to focus his energy into planting green beans in his father’s fields, even though “it is not the season” (228), which “could make him believe that he had forgotten” (246).
However, later on in the story, Yves begins to talk about the event more with Amabelle, which shows that he is beginning to come to terms with his trauma and perhaps wants to process his previously suppressed emotions. He tells her about how he could have been with Sebastien and Mimi at the church when the soldiers came if he had not gone to sell the wood Sebastien gave him (248). He also says he wanted to save them like Joël had saved him from the car the day Joël got hit by the same car, but could not do it (248). Finally, he says that “I have not been able to do for anyone what Joël did for me…Because the more I see people die, the more I want to guard my own life” (249). Perhaps Yves believes that he could have sacrificed himself and saved Sebastien and Mimi, and therefore feels guilty that they died instead of him and ashamed of his cowardice. This would confirm Amabelle’s previous theory that Yves “thought I hated him and was tormenting him for being there instead of Sebastien,” (218) which would add another reason for his distance from her.
But he seems unable to deal with his emotions because his recounting of the past physically shakes him up (249). Amabelle’s attempts to calm him down, which led to their sleeping together, only seemed to aggravate his pain considering the “flash flood of tears” he let loose afterwards (250) and his resulting avoidance of Amabelle’s touch (256). He regresses back into a state of suppression; he chooses “a life of work” to avoid his pain (274). Yet he is still physically affected by the trauma he experienced, shown by his aversion to parsley, which his captors shoved into his mouth, and Spanish, which his captors spoke (273). Yves continues the rest of his life affected by the traumatic experience and unable to move on because of his inability to deal with his emotions.
Something I thought was very interesting in the novel, The Farming of Bones, by Edwidge Danticat, happened during Chapter 30. Amabelle and Yves have just arrived at the clinic, and other survivors are sharing their stories and talking about the horrifying things they witnessed during the Haitian Massacre. One man in this group of storytellers, in particular, caught my attention. The man is not even given a name; he is simply called “the man from the cadaver pit” (211). The cadaver man had been struck with a machete and left for dead. He tells the others that he awoke in the morning to find himself in a pit of corpses. The man says, “Waking up among the dead, I started screaming…and then I thought of my woman and our first night together, and in spite of all the corpses, I smiled.” (211). When the others ask where his woman is now, he simply shrugs his shoulders. Amabelle goes on to note later that she saw the cadaver man lay on his mat all morning, mumbling, “Nounoune, Nounoune” (217) (his woman’s name). In this short section of chapter 30, I noticed the Freudian Mechanism referred to as Isolation.
Earlier, we see the cadaver man blatantly telling his gruesome story of waking up in a pit of corpses. Danticat depicts the man as calmly telling his story. This is unusual, as one would think that waking up in a pit of dead bodies would cause an enormous amount of mental anguish and at least leave the sufferer visibly shaken. This leads me to conclude that this man consciously recognizes the event (waking up in a pit of corpses), but that his mind has failed to process it, choosing instead to isolate it from the man’s mind. This is why the cadaver man can speak so calmly and blatantly about such events. This conclusion fits with the definition of isolation, thus I can conclude that this example shows the isolation in the cadaver man’s character.
There is also another section in chapter 30 that shows the isolation present in the cadaver man’s character. This section is when the cadaver man calmly shrugs his shoulders, gesturing that he doesn’t know where his woman is. This response also seemed very odd to me. For one, when corpses surrounded him, thinking about his woman made in smile, so he must feel a great deal of attachment towards her. Secondly, later in the chapter Amabelle notices him repeatedly calling for his woman. By calling for her repeatedly, it is obvious that the cadaver man loves and is deeply attached to his woman. Thus, it is clear that his calm and somewhat uninterested response regarding the whereabouts of his woman stems from the isolation in him. Again, he consciously recognizes the separation from his woman, but he is not processing how he feels about that, and those unprocessed feelings come out in bouts like what Amabelle witnessed.
Something I thought was very interesting in the novel, The Farming of Bones, by Edwidge Danticat, happened during Chapter 30. Amabelle and Yves have just arrived at the clinic, and other survivors are sharing their stories and talking about the horrifying things they witnessed during the Haitian Massacre. One man in this group of storytellers, in particular, caught my attention. The man is not even given a name; he is simply called “the man from the cadaver pit” (211). The cadaver man had been struck with a machete and left for dead. He tells the others that he awoke in the morning to find himself in a pit of corpses. The man says, “Waking up among the dead, I started screaming…and then I thought of my woman and our first night together, and in spite of all the corpses, I smiled.” (211). When the others ask where his woman is now, he simply shrugs his shoulders. Amabelle goes on to note later that she saw the cadaver man lay on his mat all morning, mumbling, “Nounoune, Nounoune” (217) (his woman’s name). In this short section of chapter 30, I noticed the Freudian Mechanism referred to as Isolation.
Earlier, we see the cadaver man blatantly telling his gruesome story of waking up in a pit of corpses. Danticat depicts the man as calmly telling his story. This is unusual, as one would think that waking up in a pit of dead bodies would cause an enormous amount of mental anguish and at least leave the sufferer visibly shaken. This leads me to conclude that this man consciously recognizes the event (waking up in a pit of corpses), but that his mind has failed to process it, choosing instead to isolate it from the man’s mind. This is why the cadaver man can speak so calmly and blatantly about such events. This conclusion fits with the definition of isolation, thus I can conclude that this example shows the isolation in the cadaver man’s character.
There is also another section in chapter 30 that shows the isolation present in the cadaver man’s character. This section is when the cadaver man calmly shrugs his shoulders, gesturing that he doesn’t know where his woman is. This response also seemed very odd to me. For one, when corpses surrounded him, thinking about his woman made in smile, so he must feel a great deal of attachment towards her. Secondly, later in the chapter Amabelle notices him repeatedly calling for his woman. By calling for her repeatedly, it is obvious that the cadaver man loves and is deeply attached to his woman. Thus, it is clear that his calm and somewhat uninterested response regarding the whereabouts of his woman stems from the isolation in him. Again, he consciously recognizes the separation from his woman, but he is not processing how he feels about that, and those unprocessed feelings come out in bouts like what Amabelle witnessed.
Psychological Criticism
In the latter parts of this novel The Farming of Bones, we see the main character, Amabelle, in a very disoriented and confused state. Regarding the Freudian Mechanisms, we see examples of suppression used to its fullest extent, however she attempts to reverse some horrid memories. While Amabelle woes over the death of Sebastien, it is Yves who she goes to live with almost in an attempt to move on from Sebastien. Although this may be considered repression, it is evident that Amabelle is almost using reversal to move on from the past. Amabelle returns to the cave in which she would meet Sebastien, and also goes to visit Sebastien's mother. Amabelle displays other signs of struggling to move on from her past when she attempts to reconnect with Valencia, who does not even recognize her. Amabelle's attempt to convince herself of what she knows to be false is saddening. She is burdened by the memories of the Parsley Massacre, and her visits to past locations is her attempt to right the wrongs.
Though Danticat provides little information about Sebastian's mother in The Farming of the bones, she gives enough description to hint at a variety of Freudian mechanisms at play, influencing the character's ego. In refusing to believe the many people who inform her of the death of her children, Man Denise exhibits classic signs of reversal. Although she realizes in a way that her son and daughter have been killed, nothing can bring her to submit to the truth, as it would result in more emotional processing than she is capable of handling. As a result, she attempts to convince herself and Amabelle of the exact opposite: that her son is alive and well somewhere, not lying, dead, near the border. More chronically, we can see her isolation as well. Like Amabelle, Man Denise has shut herself from the outside world. She finds herself unable to behave normally, as she can not move on from processing her great emotional torment. Because she has isolated the experience from her cognition, the problem never resolves itself, and as readers we witness the resulting degradation of her life. So extreme is this isolation that she forces Amabelle to leave prematurely, not wanting to touch this uncomfortable emotional territory.
While jubilantly skimming through the pages of Danticat searching for a character on which I could apply my inner psychologist, I happened to stumble across the character of Man Rapadou, Yves mother. Analyzing her psychological characteristics from pgs. 275-278, during her heartfelt conversation with Amabelle, two main Freudian mechanisms materialize, each having substantial influence on her ego. As Man Rapadou talks to Amabelle, she mentions her recurring dreams: “My head barely touches the pillow at night when I dream that I’m falling.” Man Rapadou recounts that in her dreams she falls off of progressively higher objects, but always awakens before hitting the ground. When Amabelle asks what she believes the dreams signify, Man Rapadou utters that they are because she was weak as a child and would slip and fall, letting the force of the earth pull her down. These night terrors are classic examples of projections by the subconscious. Man Rapadou has an innate fear of being vulnerable and weak, these unwanted emotional characteristics or anxieties are projected in the form of “falling” dreams. Falling signifies Man Rapadou’s feeling of lack of conscious control or self-possession over her ego. The faller is pulled helplessly towards the surface of the earth, unable to slow or stop the inevitable impact, which in her case signifies the confrontation of the truth.
The “truth” mentioned is Man Rapdou’s secret, which she admits to Amabelle for the very first time. Man Rapadou poisoned her husband because he was a Yanki spy. “So I cooked his favorite foods for him and filled them with flour-fine glass and rat poison. I poisoned him. Maybe this is why I am falling in all my dreams. I’m going to him soon and I’m afraid.” This second Freudian mechanism is suppression. Man Rapadou, for all those long years has been consciously trying to forget her painful memories and feelings of sorrow and regret. When she was young she told herself that what she was doing was out of “love for her country”(hint of reversal), but now as an old, lonely widow those feeling have finally emerged from the dark troves of her consciousness and manifested themselves in the form of the projections mentioned above. Man Rapadou is not afraid of the mere act of dying, but of the consequences it brings; facing her husband, the truth, and the almighty judgment in the heavens above.
Throughout the novel I was most interested in the dream-like memory chapters (in bold). I think that they reveal quite a bit of insight about Amabelle's psychological states and memories. In particular, they illustrate how she remembers her parents, especially her mother. They showcase Amabelle's preconscious (can be recalled by not always presently conscious in the mind), memories, and awareness of her. I was re-reading a little and came across page 208, which portrays her mother coming to her in the hospital and saying, "Your mother was never as far from you as you supposed. You were like my shadow." I think that there is a link here - similar to the way that Amabelle was once her mother's shadow, her mother now shadows Amabelle's conscious and awareness (through the bold chapters). Again and again she returns to Amabelle to send her messages, remind her of things, or simply to just be present. In a way she is still very much alive because she exists in Amabelle's awareness: "I see my mother rising." I don't think that Amabelle is necessarily repressing or suppressing these memories of her mother because they seem to come up quite often.
-sarah purgett
In Edwidge Danticat's The Farming of Bones, Amabelle is clearly the most highly traumatized and emotionally stunted character. Her experiences with her parents' deaths and the slaughter of her friends and loved ones left an obvious mark on her person. However, on the flip side of Amabelle's experiences, we have Señora Valencia. The two grew up together like sisters, but they belonged to two very different classes of people and led very opposite lives. In Amabelle and Señora Valencia's reunion, we see the mental state the Señora is in, and her stories and actions illustrate what she has gone through in the past few decades. The Señora has clearly struggled with the loss of her loved ones over the years. When Amabelle arrives, she finds Valencia staring at a large portrait of Rafael that she had painted. (294) Initially, Valencia does not recognize Amabelle and angrily denies that it is her, stating that she has heard that Amabelle was killed. (294-295) However, Amabelle convinces her of her identity, and Valencia feels "shame and regret" for not having recognized her. She goes on to tell Amabelle that during the slaughter she hid many Haitians in an attempt to feel like she was helping Amabelle, saying, "I hid them because I couldn't hid you, Amabelle. I thought you'd been killed, so everything I did I did in your name." (299) Valenica seems to have been affected by the loss of her son, her family, the help who were like family, and the perceived loss of Amabelle. She mentions later to Amabelle that she had often looked for her at many bodies of water, hoping to find her. (303) The particular Freudian mechanism that applies to Señora Valencia is reversal. In one part of their conversation, Valencia says to Amabelle that her husband was only following orders during the slaughter. (300) This is something she has probably been trying to convince herself of for decades, though subconsciously she probably knows the opposite is true. All of her experiences and her guilt over the role of her husband in the slaughter and not being able to do enough to stop it have brought her to a state of disillusionment, and as she says to Amabelle, "It is a marvel that some of us are still here, to wait and hope to die a natural death."
After the Parsley Massacre, many of the Hatians were deeply psychologically disturbed by what had happened and many developed psychological methods to cope with their psychological wounds. But some Dominicans were also psychologically scarred by the massacre, such as Señora Valencia who use displacement and reversal to cope with he lose of her "sister", Amabelle and the crimes she could not stop.
When Amabelle returned to Alegría and finds Señora Valencia, the Señora reacts with denial and says "You are wicked to come here and use Amabelle's name." (294) Señora Valencia's inability to recognize Amabelle seems unlikely because Amabelle recognizes Señora Valencia immediately once she appears but Valencia doesn't recognize Amabelle leading one to think that Señora Valencia rejects Amabelle existence on a psychological level; because it causes her too much guilt, because she was married to the man, who captured and killed many of the Haitians near the plantation and was unable to save many of them, and Amabelle in praticular. Therefore it appears easier for Señora Valencia to not face Amabelle, as to face Amabelle would admit Señora Valencia's guilt in the Massacre. The Señora tries to back up her denial of Amabelle by using facts to try and prove that the person in front of her doesn't share a relation with Amabelle, by saying "I spoke to many people who said they watched when she was killed in La Romana, with some others who were hiding in a house by the sea" (294). Yet while this quotes primary use appears to be for getting Amabelle to leave the house, the actual goal seems to be to convince Valencia herself that Amabelle died.
Eventually, Amabelle recites enough details of Señora Valencia's life, so that Valencia has to respond to what has been said and switches to a psychological defense of denial to try and convince Amabelle but more importantly herself that she did the right thing this can be seen in how the first words out of the Señora's mouth are "Amabelle, I beg your forgiveness for not recognizing you (297)." The first thing that comes out is forgiveness representing what is filling her subconscious mind. Valencia's conversation continues to be very self centered as she talks about how she still paints and is unable to have children once she has asked Amabelle where she is living. Finally Valencia starts to try and prove to Amabelle that despite what her husband did she actually did the best thing possible saying " Do you truly understand?... During El Corte, though I was bleeding and nearly died, I hid many of your people... I hid a baby who is now a student at the medical school with Rosalinda and her husband. I hid Sylvie and two families in your old room. I hid some of Doña Sabine's people before she and her husband escaped to Haiti. I did what I could in my situation" (299). The first thing that the Señora says in the quote above shows how pitiful she has become in wanting understanding and forgiveness. She goes on to say she deserves this forgiveness for how many people she did save, not how many she left behind which mentally provides a barrier against the guilt she feels. Señora Valencia's final statement in her explanation of what happened during the massacre, "I did what I could in my situation." (299), is used as a pitiful excuse for why she didn't do more to help and save the Hatians. Señora Valencia tries to relate her experience to Amabelle by saying "I hid them because I couldn't hide you, Amabelle. I thought you'd be killed, so everything I did in your name" (299) this quote shows a reversal in the Señora's subconscious as she tries to shift the goodness that she has done to a Haitian who has been abused making her efforts in saving the Haitian refugees seem more powerful than her guilt.
Overall Vancia tries to tone down what damage has happened due to the Massacre by saying that "None of the people in Don Carlos' mill were touched" (300) this form of denial helps seperate Valencia from the true magnitude of the Massacre as does the term "el corte" which Amabelle states "El corte - the cutting - was an easy word to say" (299), it is necessary for Valencia to use El Corte because its meaning can be cutting of a cane stalk as it can be the cutting of a Haitian, it therefore separates her from the Massacre psychologically by using deconstructionism. Eventually Señora Valencia goes as far to deny her associated guilt and tries to make her husband seem innocent, when she says "Amabelle, Pico merely followed the orders he was given" (300). This psychological denial and separation from guilty ultimately allow Valencia to function and go on with life.
n Edwidge Danticat's The Farming of Bones, Amabelle showed clear signs of Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome and as a result, showing clear signs of isolation. She clearly remembers what happens to her parents, and later in the story what happened to her, and those around her during the massacre, yet her descriptions are mostly detached, although she emotionally connects to the pain, at least in the beginning of the story, what starts to happen after the massacre (emotional stress part 2) it seems that the compounding stress on her system forced her to isolate herself. We know that she isn't suppressing or regressing per se, what happened during the massacre, she clearly remembers what happens, yet she does alienate herself from the community, possibly because after she lost her parents, she had Valencia, after she grew up, Sebastien was her support, after the massacre, the most important people to her in this new life was taken from her. It would take her 20 years to look back for her old life, to find Valencia and from what I saw start the "healing" process.
Yves and Isolation
Though there are periods of time where Yves tries to process his emotion, he ultimately pushes them away and tries to ignore the entire thing. He is in total isolation mentally and though there are people around him he seems to completely ignore all the people that have connections to his isolated emotions. Yves gets up early in the morning and comes back home late. Also apparently over the twenty some year period that Amabelle and he lived in the same house and slept in the same bed, almost no conversations went on between the two, especially after their failed attempt at sex. Yves' isolation gets worse and worse the more time that passes. In the beginning he expresses some contemplation on his emotions when he talks about his feelings about the time Joel saved him and how painful it is for him for him to believe that he cannot save anyone and he keeps seeing all the people he loves die in front of him. Not much is seen into Yves' life after his and Amabelle's botched sex, there are theories that he may have found another woman and have another life, but that seems unlikely. All that seems to be left of his life is hard labor (his attempt to reach back to his former life, or just something to keep him distracted) and sitting in a chair with a bottle of rum.
Psychological Criticism
In Edwidge Danticat’s The Farming of Bones, many psychological criticism traits are found in characters throughout the entire novel. Although there are many characters to analyze, Father Romain exemplifies many characteristics of psychological criticism, which makes him an interesting character to analyze. As discussed in class, one of the main aspects of psychological criticism is the Freudian Theory. Along with Freudian Theory is the idea of suppression: consciously trying to forget troubling memories in the past. Father Romain shows the idea of suppression when trying to forget the memories of when he was in prison. According to Father Romain’s sister, Father Romain was tortured daily while in prison and was only given his own urine to drink. As a result of this horrific time in prison, Father Romain does all he can to forget about it. As the reader can see in chapter 36, Father Romain is described as sitting in a chair and playing with kite. Although this may seem like an unimportant object in the chapter, it is actually a way that Father Romain keeps himself occupied and his mind off his terrible time in prison. The sister goes on to tell Amabelle “Sometimes he remembers everything. Sometimes, he forgets all of it, everything, even me.” From this line, the reader is able to conclude that Father Romain is trying to forget his past, but sometimes is not able to. Through this character, the idea of suppression is shown very clearly and allows readers to get a better understanding of psychological criticism.
In Edwidge Danticat’s “The Farming of Bones,” analyzing with psychological criticism Father Romain shows the difficulty in discerning the difference between suppression and repression. Father Romain had a traumatic experience while being tortured in a Domincan prison. With such painful memories, Father Romain regressed to a simpler state of mind to be able to cope with these emotions. To be able to do this, he either has to forgot his memories consciously, suppression, or subconsciously, repression. In either case, the result would have been difficult to explain without knowing what Father Romain thought. The only other information we are given about Father Romain’s situation is that he would occasionally remember everything, which could occur if he was either suppressing or repressing the information. Either he chose to begin remember it, or the information came to his conscious because of some sort of mental connection that he made. At the second encounter between amabelle and the Father, he seems to have come to grips with what had happened at the border and in prison. Either he is now no longer choosing to suppress the memories, or since he able to cope with them his subconscious no longer has to repress them. Though it would seem more logical to be the former, the latter can’t be completely ruled out. I would say this because of how his view point of the incidents have changed, “perhaps I have lost, but I have also gained an even greater understanding of things both godly and earthly.” (272) Father romain does not even acknowledge that something was lost during the slaughter, which may be how he views it in his mind. This mind set would not require suppression because is an optimistic.
In Edwidge Danticat's The Farming of Bones, we see a depth of psychological detail in not only the major characters, but also in the more minor, incidental characters. We see evidence of what is very likely displacement from the young men in the crowd who attack Amabelle and her friends (191). Their aggression is so entirely lacking in factual basis that it can only stem from some other psychological position, likely their frustration at their circumstances in life as uneducated, likely manual laborers. Likewise we see evidence of systematic isolation from the Haitian nuns (205). They see incredible pain and deformity every day and still remain calm and collected. Clearly they are no longer able to process each individual casualty with the empathy normal to human interaction. They have become numb to the pain in their surroundings and likely have difficulties in forming empathic connections in their everyday lives.
Interestingly even the reaction of the reader can be attributed to a Freudian Mechanism. As we read through the extensive descriptions of murder, death and general atrocity, we cannot help but intelectualize the struggle of Amabelle and her Haitian comrades. As readers we are sufficiently distant from the events and their emotional contents for us to be unable to process them in a significant way without considerable effort and narrative ability on the part of the author.
Throughout this book Amabelle experiences a lot of loss. I think the biggest loss that she had was the loss of her mother. Throughout this book Amabelle has dreams and memories of her mother, both of which I believe help her to deal with the loss of her mother.
On page 265, Amabelle explains how dreams work, “you may be surprised what we use our dreams to do, how we drape them over our sight and carry them like amulets to protect us from evil spells.” I think this quote well describes what dreams have done for Amabelle. They “drape” and help cover up the “evil spells” of the pain she feels from the loss of her mother.
Whenever Amabelle talks about her mother she only has nice things to say about her. Amabelle remembers liking her gentleness and her tranquility. Amabelle also remembers her mother making her a doll out of her favorite things when she was sick. Amabelle remembers that doll as being the thing that made her better. Remembering the doll makes Amabelle what to be a little girl again and to be able to touch the doll again. Whenever she touches the doll, she feels closer to her mother.
Latter in the book, Amabelle has a dream about her mother. In the dream her mother is a spirit and she is talking to Amabelle; Amabelle says that, “I will never be a whole women in the absence of you face.” Amabelle then goes on her say that, “You were like my shadow. Always fled when I came to you and only followed when I left you alone.” When Amabelle says these things I think it is her going through the grief process. I think the things that her mother says to her are maybe things that her mother never said to her or maybe the things that Amabelle always wanted to hear from her. The things Amabelle says to her mother could also be things that she never had a chance to tell her and had always wanted to. I think this dream was maybe some type of closure for Amabelle. Maybe it was a subconscious way of letting go and dealing with the loss of her mother.
Towards the end of this book, “The Farming of Bones”, by Edwidge Danticat we learn a lot about this man Yves, who he is, what does he do, ect. Yves is a very important person towards the end of this book. The Freudian Theory that Yves possesses is Repression. Repression is “subconsciously forgetting troubling memories.” The massacre has started and ended during this entire book, and Yves really show his “repression side”. One example is on page 228, “Yves stayed in the fields until nightfall.” Why does he stay until the night has come to go home? Yves response in the book is that he “planted a field of green beans”. Is that the real reason he has stayed out in the field till nightfall? He could be out there thinking and trying to forget his troubled memories in the past or even what is happening now during the massacre. Yves and Amabelle have a close relationship, id Yves knows about the Amabelle and Sebastian, then why is Yves having a relationship with Amabelle. Is this because he was hurt when he was young, his memories are coming back, and he wants to hurt someone, or something? There are lots of questions about Yves, and his memories, that he perhaps wants to forget. He tries to forget them by maybe making other people feel worse, so he does not feel bad. Everyone would feel bad and it wouldn’t be just him that feels bad. The Freudian Theory that Yves represents is Repression.