Daniel Cosway


            In Wide Sargasso Sea, it’s easy to see Daniel Cosway as an antagonist who plants the seeds that ultimately destroy any possibility of a stable relationship between Antoinette and Rochester. Cosway’s letter is what confirms Rochester’s fears about some secret being kept from him and drives him to act coldly towards Antionette. The series of events that follows is what leads to Antionette getting taken to England and eventually taking her own life. In a sense, all of that might have been avoided if Daniel just hadn’t sent that letter.
            While Daniel claims in his letter that he is writing to Rochester out of a sense of duty as a Christian, it’s clear that his reasoning for writing has far more depth than this. He seems incredibly spiteful when writing to Rochester and when Rochester meets him in person, it’s pretty clear just how bitter of a person Daniel is. He seems to take out all his hate on Antionette
            Like Antionette, it seems like Daniel has a level of confusion surrounding his identity. Amelie clearly has some level of disdain for Daniel and tells Rochester that Daniel is a “bad man”. It’s worth noting that before this Amelie mentions that Daniel lives like the white people. Daniel wants to connect more with his white side and tries to reject his black side in order to do this. In his eyes, because the society that he lives in values whiteness and has disdain for blackness, he clings to any form of whiteness that he can. This puts him in a situation where he doesn’t want to be accepted by black people, but he isn’t accepted by white people. Similar to Antionette, he doesn’t really have a group of people that he identifies with. His hatred of Antionette can be seen as a result of this. He resents the fact that Antionette is white and got to be raised on Mr. Cosway’s estate by Mr. Cosway’s family. Because of this, he not only takes glee in seeing everything surrounding Antionette go poorly, he actively tries to make her life worse. While it doesn’t really justify his actions, it definitely puts them in a context that makes sense. It highlights the problems that come along with the colonial attitudes of the British. Both Daniel and Antionette’s identity crises are a result of colonialism and the heavy handed imposition of  English ideals on non-English places.



Comments

  1. GrantNovember 17, 2018 at 1:05 PM

    while i think that Rochester would have eventually found out all the things Daniel mentioned definitely the fact that it came from him and not from someone who knew or Antoinette really put a serious strain on an already seriously strained relationship

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  2. SashaNovember 17, 2018 at 7:50 PM

    I think this analysis of Daniel Cosway makes a lot of sense. The idea that Daniel is basically in the same boat as Antoinette, but even worse off, makes a lot of sense. The idea that he tries to cling to the dominant white culture is supported by things like his watch (or possibly clock) that he is so proud of, one of the few things that he has that tie him to his horrible, but powerful father.

    ReplyDelete
  3. AlexNovember 17, 2018 at 8:29 PM

    I'm really glad that you thought to explore Daniel Cosway's character more. To me he had come across as a one-dimensional plot point in Antoinette's and Rochester's story. Maybe somebody needs to write a novel investigation Daniel Cosway more and telling his story like Rhys did for Bertha Mason.

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