“Why don't you spend the night Mr. Garner? You and Ma'am can talk about Sweet Home all night long""I can't live here. I don't know where to go or what to do, but I can't live here. Nobody speaks to us. Nobody comes by. Boys don't like me. Girls don't either."(17)
I believe this is an example of an "Oedipus Complex" situation where the child's need for their parents grows and as they mature they realize that they are not the center of attention of their parents. The child begins to realize that the attention they get from their mother is thwarted by the mother's attention for the father. This applies to the current situation Denver is having with Paul D moving in and taking the attention Denver gets from Sethe and giving it to Paul D. Denver was alone with no one but her mother because the people feared their home and avoided it like she said, “Nobody speaks to us. Nobody comes by.” but now that Paul D comes into their life Denver realizes she is not the center of attention. This feeling may have come on to her evens stronger because she has lived in that house with only Sethe for years and so Sethe had no one else to focus on but her, so now that another human hs entered the household she experiences these feelings which she has never felt before.
Another way this can be seen as is Denver’s frustration with the life they were given. She grew up in a home and with a family that was feared by almost everyone in the town and because of this she never had any friends or anyone to socialize with. This frustration could have made her angry with the fact that Paul D represented the Sweet Home history, and him coming back to it could be a symbol of the history haunting her family and making Denver hate him. On page 17 of the book Paul D asks Sethe why people don’t speak to them and when Sethe replies that its the house Denver gets angry and says, “It’s not! It’s not the house. it’s us! And it’s you!”. Denver knew that the fact that the house was haunted had nothing to do with why people didn’t visit but actually it was because of the history with slavery and all the gruesome things that went on with that family.
I really like how you explain the Oedipus Complex, and this also helped to dig deeper into the relationships of the character. The fact that you add the lifestyle of Denver really helps me understand why the Oedipus complex applies to Denver.
ReplyDeleteI really like how you explain the Oedipus Complex, and this also helped to dig deeper into the relationships of the character. The fact that you add the lifestyle of Denver really helps me understand why the Oedipus complex applies to Denver.
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