Lucy (novel)
Encyclopedia
Lucy is a short novel or novella by Jamaica Kincaid
. The story begins in medias res
: the eponymous Lucy has come from the West Indies to the United States to be an au pair
for a wealthy Caucasian family. The plot of the novel closely mirrors Kincaid's own experiences.
Lucy retains the critical tone of A Small Place
but simplifies the style of Kincaid’s earlier work by using less repetition and surrealism. The first of her books set completely outside the Caribbean, Lucy, like most of Kincaid’s writing, has a strong autobiographical basis. The novel’s protagonist, Lucy Josephine Potter, shares one of Kincaid’s given names and her birthday. Like Kincaid, Lucy leaves the Caribbean to become an au pair
in a large American city. At nineteen, Lucy is older than previous Kincaid protagonists, which lends the book a more mature and cynical perspective than in her previous fiction. Still, Lucy has pangs of homesickness and unresolved feelings about her mother, and she has never lived on her own or seen much of the world. With plenty of room for growth, Lucy’s journey takes the form of a bildungsroman
, a novel in which a young protagonist makes the transition to adulthood.
Lucy also joins the tradition of American immigration literature, tales that recount a newcomer’s experience in the United States, such as those seen in Anzia Yezierska
’s Bread Givers
, Willa Cather
’s My Antonia
, and Julia Alvarez
’s How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accents
. Along with exploring immigration, Lucy, as does much of Kincaid’s work, grapples with tensions between mother and daughter. Colonial themes of identity confusion and the connection between maternal and imperial rule stand out less clearly in Lucy than in Kincaid’s earlier books but have an underlying presence in Lucy’s relationship with her white, affluent employers, her homeland, and her new surroundings.
and family influences. This becomes evident when Lucy describes an event that happened in her former school. While attending Queen Victoria Girl's school, she was forced to memorize a poem about daffodils. (This poem, I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud
, was written by William Wordsworth
roughly two centuries ago.) The poem recalls the beauty of daffodils that the speaker has seen years ago. Lucy cannot appreciate this beauty, because daffodils do not grow on her island. After reciting the poem, Lucy is applauded and she explains that at this moment she feels fake. She feels like people see her as English on the outside but on the inside she hates the English. The daffodils represent Lucy's alienation from both her education, and from her new home.
Lucy also claims that she is trying to escape her mother. The relationship between Lucy and her mother is a central theme. Lucy thought that she has to leave behind her relationship with her mother in order to become an adult. Many things in the United States
remind Lucy of her mother. At one point in her relationship with Mariah, Lucy sees Mariah (her boss) and her mother as the same, because they both try to control Lucy. (At other times, Lucy feels like Mariah's friend.) Lucy also sees a resemblance when she sees Lewis cheating on Mariah. Lucy's own father cheated on her mother. Lucy though begins to love Mariah towards the end of the novel. As the novel draws near the end, one is able to discover how Lucy really feels about her mother.
The novel also encompasses Lucy actions in her new home. Lucy makes new friends. She meets a guy named Hugh with whom she has sex. In the park with the children one day, she meets a girl named Peggy. Mariah, the mother of the children, does not like Peggy because she smokes and curses but realizes that Lucy needs friends. Lucy also meets a guy named Paul with whom she becomes close. This novel explores Lucy's complicated sexuality, especially illustrated in Lucy's homoerotic relationship with Peggy. The novel ends with Lucy wishing she "could love someone so much that she would die from it." Lucy's dream of escaping her past leaves her feeling alone.
Annie Potter: Lucy's mother
Mariah: The wife that Lucy works for as an au pair
Lewis: The husband that Lucy works for as an au pair
Tanner: the boy with whom Lucy has her first sexual encounter
Miriam: the youngest daughter of Lewis and Mariah, with whom Lucy develops a special bond
Dinah: Mariah's best friend and the woman with whom Lewis has an affair
Peggy: Lucy's best friend that she meets while in the United States
Hugh: Lucy's first boyfriend in America; he is also the brother of Dinah
Paul: Lucy's lover who feels more for her than she does for him
At several points in the story, Lucy makes observations that may be unobvious to the reader. Lucy seems to see thing coming before they happen. Kincaid does this to give the impression that Lucy is notably intelligent, which turns out to be central to the novel. She spends a lot of time dwelling on her ability to understand things as if to point out she has a superior intellect. Readers discover later that the rift between Lucy and her mom was caused by Lucy’s mom having lower expectations for Lucy. In this manner, Lucy’s expression of her intelligence is directly linked to her rebellion from her mother, which happened in the past.
Another theme that works its way into the novel is the notion of reality. Lucy feels that the people she meets lead fake lives that could be improved if they focus on what matters. She is skeptical of the happiness because of her observations about Lewis and Mariah’s relationship. She is also skeptical because of the negative events that happened back home. She was unhappy enough to leave and it is fundamentally difficult for her to believe everyone is as happy as they seem. This has the effect of making Lucy seem pessimistic. From her perspective, however, she is simply realistic. This viewpoint originates from her past experiences.
and feminist
criticism. Gary E. Holcomb, for example, sees the novel as endorsing a black transnationalist view, as Lucy refuses to be constrained by "colonial, racist, and transnational values" of either Antigua or the US. Edyta Oczkowicz similarly describes Lucy's learning to tell her own story as an act of self-translation, in which she must create "a new personal 'space'" in which her identity "does not have to be defined by the roles of either colonized or colonzier."
Critics have also focused on the many intertexts
on which the novel draws. Diane Simmons details the way in which the novel draws on John Milton
's Paradise Lost
and Charlotte Brontë
's Jane Eyre
, noting that Brontë was Kincaid's favorite author. David Yost observes that Lucy contains many correspondences to another Brontë novel, Villette
--including the names of its primary couple (Lucy and Paul), its plot (an au pair adjusting to a foreign culture), its themes (sexual repression of women and self-recreation through art), and its setting (Villettes Paul dies returning from his Caribbean slave plantation)--arguing that Lucy acts a postcolonial reworking of this earlier text. Ian Smith focuses on the scene in which Lucy must memorize Wordsworth's "I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud" at her boarding school, despite having never seen a daffodil in Antigua. Noting that this episode recurs throughout Kincaid's work, Smith asserts that the act here of transcending an oppressive and often-nonsensical British
colonial education is emblematic of Kincaid's oeuvre as a whole.
Jamaica Kincaid
Jamaica Kincaid is a Caribbean novelist, gardener, and gardening writer. She was born in the city of St. John's on the island of Antigua in the nation of Antigua and Barbuda...
. The story begins in medias res
In medias res
In medias res or medias in res is a Latin phrase denoting the literary and artistic narrative technique wherein the relation of a story begins either at the mid-point or at the conclusion, rather than at the beginning In medias res or medias in res (into the middle of things) is a Latin phrase...
: the eponymous Lucy has come from the West Indies to the United States to be an au pair
Au pair
An au pair is a domestic assistant from a foreign country working for, and living as part of, a host family. Typically, au pairs take on a share of the family's responsibility for childcare as well as some housework, and receive a small monetary allowance for personal use...
for a wealthy Caucasian family. The plot of the novel closely mirrors Kincaid's own experiences.
Lucy retains the critical tone of A Small Place
A Small Place
A Small Place is a memoir published in 1988 by Jamaica Kincaid. The work is an indictment of the Antiguan government, the tourist industry and Antigua's British colonial legacy....
but simplifies the style of Kincaid’s earlier work by using less repetition and surrealism. The first of her books set completely outside the Caribbean, Lucy, like most of Kincaid’s writing, has a strong autobiographical basis. The novel’s protagonist, Lucy Josephine Potter, shares one of Kincaid’s given names and her birthday. Like Kincaid, Lucy leaves the Caribbean to become an au pair
Au pair
An au pair is a domestic assistant from a foreign country working for, and living as part of, a host family. Typically, au pairs take on a share of the family's responsibility for childcare as well as some housework, and receive a small monetary allowance for personal use...
in a large American city. At nineteen, Lucy is older than previous Kincaid protagonists, which lends the book a more mature and cynical perspective than in her previous fiction. Still, Lucy has pangs of homesickness and unresolved feelings about her mother, and she has never lived on her own or seen much of the world. With plenty of room for growth, Lucy’s journey takes the form of a bildungsroman
Bildungsroman
In literary criticism, bildungsroman or coming-of-age story is a literary genre which focuses on the psychological and moral growth of the protagonist from youth to adulthood , and in which character change is thus extremely important...
, a novel in which a young protagonist makes the transition to adulthood.
Lucy also joins the tradition of American immigration literature, tales that recount a newcomer’s experience in the United States, such as those seen in Anzia Yezierska
Anzia Yezierska
Anzia Yezierska was a Polish-American novelist born in Maly Plock, Poland.- Personal life :Anzia Yezierska was born in the 1880s in Maly Plock to Bernard and Pearl Yezierski. Her family immigrated to America around 1890, following in the footsteps of her eldest brother Meyer, who arrived to the...
’s Bread Givers
Bread Givers
Bread Givers is a 1925 novel by Anzia Yezierska.-Synopsis:Bread Givers, a Jewish-American female coming-of-age story written by Anzia Yezierska, begins with a 10-year old Sara Smolinsky...
, Willa Cather
Willa Cather
Willa Seibert Cather was an American author who achieved recognition for her novels of frontier life on the Great Plains, in works such as O Pioneers!, My Ántonia, and The Song of the Lark. In 1923 she was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for One of Ours , a novel set during World War I...
’s My Antonia
My Ántonia
My Ántonia |accent]] on the first syllable of "Ántonia"), first published 1918, is considered one of the greatest novels by American writer Willa Cather...
, and Julia Alvarez
Julia Álvarez
Julia Alvarez is a Dominican-American poet, novelist, and essayist. Born in New York of Dominican descent, she spent the first ten years of her childhood in the Dominican Republic, until her father's involvement in a political rebellion forced her family to flee the country.Alvarez rose to...
’s How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accents
How the García Girls Lost Their Accents
How the García Girls Lost Their Accents is a 1991 novel written by Dominican-American poet, novelist, and essayist Julia Alvarez. Told in reverse chronological order and narrated from shifting perspectives, the text possesses distinct qualities of a bildungsroman novel...
. Along with exploring immigration, Lucy, as does much of Kincaid’s work, grapples with tensions between mother and daughter. Colonial themes of identity confusion and the connection between maternal and imperial rule stand out less clearly in Lucy than in Kincaid’s earlier books but have an underlying presence in Lucy’s relationship with her white, affluent employers, her homeland, and her new surroundings.
Plot summary
Eager to leave the West Indies, Lucy longs to leave her past behind. She does not feel nostalgic for her childhood and her homeland, where she felt oppressed by toxic BritishUnited Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
and family influences. This becomes evident when Lucy describes an event that happened in her former school. While attending Queen Victoria Girl's school, she was forced to memorize a poem about daffodils. (This poem, I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud
I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud
"I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud" is a poem by William Wordsworth.It was inspired by an April 15, 1802 event in which Wordsworth and his sister, Dorothy, came across a "long belt" of daffodils...
, was written by William Wordsworth
William Wordsworth
William Wordsworth was a major English Romantic poet who, with Samuel Taylor Coleridge, helped to launch the Romantic Age in English literature with the 1798 joint publication Lyrical Ballads....
roughly two centuries ago.) The poem recalls the beauty of daffodils that the speaker has seen years ago. Lucy cannot appreciate this beauty, because daffodils do not grow on her island. After reciting the poem, Lucy is applauded and she explains that at this moment she feels fake. She feels like people see her as English on the outside but on the inside she hates the English. The daffodils represent Lucy's alienation from both her education, and from her new home.
Lucy also claims that she is trying to escape her mother. The relationship between Lucy and her mother is a central theme. Lucy thought that she has to leave behind her relationship with her mother in order to become an adult. Many things in the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
remind Lucy of her mother. At one point in her relationship with Mariah, Lucy sees Mariah (her boss) and her mother as the same, because they both try to control Lucy. (At other times, Lucy feels like Mariah's friend.) Lucy also sees a resemblance when she sees Lewis cheating on Mariah. Lucy's own father cheated on her mother. Lucy though begins to love Mariah towards the end of the novel. As the novel draws near the end, one is able to discover how Lucy really feels about her mother.
The novel also encompasses Lucy actions in her new home. Lucy makes new friends. She meets a guy named Hugh with whom she has sex. In the park with the children one day, she meets a girl named Peggy. Mariah, the mother of the children, does not like Peggy because she smokes and curses but realizes that Lucy needs friends. Lucy also meets a guy named Paul with whom she becomes close. This novel explores Lucy's complicated sexuality, especially illustrated in Lucy's homoerotic relationship with Peggy. The novel ends with Lucy wishing she "could love someone so much that she would die from it." Lucy's dream of escaping her past leaves her feeling alone.
Main Characters
Lucy: the narrator and protagonistAnnie Potter: Lucy's mother
Mariah: The wife that Lucy works for as an au pair
Lewis: The husband that Lucy works for as an au pair
Tanner: the boy with whom Lucy has her first sexual encounter
Miriam: the youngest daughter of Lewis and Mariah, with whom Lucy develops a special bond
Dinah: Mariah's best friend and the woman with whom Lewis has an affair
Peggy: Lucy's best friend that she meets while in the United States
Hugh: Lucy's first boyfriend in America; he is also the brother of Dinah
Paul: Lucy's lover who feels more for her than she does for him
The Role of Lucy’s Past
The driving force of the novel is Lucy’s past. The story begins with Lucy arriving in North America and the reader is unsure why she left her home. Lucy is continuously referring to and hinting at past events. As her character develops, one learns that Lucy’s past experiences are heavily ingrained into her perspective through which the reader hears the story. As such, Lucy’s past is at the root of the recurring themes within the novel.At several points in the story, Lucy makes observations that may be unobvious to the reader. Lucy seems to see thing coming before they happen. Kincaid does this to give the impression that Lucy is notably intelligent, which turns out to be central to the novel. She spends a lot of time dwelling on her ability to understand things as if to point out she has a superior intellect. Readers discover later that the rift between Lucy and her mom was caused by Lucy’s mom having lower expectations for Lucy. In this manner, Lucy’s expression of her intelligence is directly linked to her rebellion from her mother, which happened in the past.
Another theme that works its way into the novel is the notion of reality. Lucy feels that the people she meets lead fake lives that could be improved if they focus on what matters. She is skeptical of the happiness because of her observations about Lewis and Mariah’s relationship. She is also skeptical because of the negative events that happened back home. She was unhappy enough to leave and it is fundamentally difficult for her to believe everyone is as happy as they seem. This has the effect of making Lucy seem pessimistic. From her perspective, however, she is simply realistic. This viewpoint originates from her past experiences.
Caribbean Heritage
Lucy is from the West Indies. Jamaica Kincaid is from Antigua and it can be safely assumed that Lucy’s character shares the same birthplace. Though this is not stated explicitly, Lucy does make a reference to her home having been named by Christopher Columbus (who "never set foot there") after a church in Spain. Other evidence includes the similarity of Kincaid’s upbringing along with that of Lucy’s character and the references to British colonization.Critical response
Lucy has often been interpreted through the dual lenses of postcolonialPostcolonialism
Post-colonialism is a specifically post-modern intellectual discourse that consists of reactions to, and analysis of, the cultural legacy of colonialism...
and feminist
Feminist literary criticism
Feminist literary criticism is literary criticism informed by feminist theory, or by the politics of feminism more broadly. Its history has been broad and varied, from classic works of nineteenth-century women authors such as George Eliot and Margaret Fuller to cutting-edge theoretical work in...
criticism. Gary E. Holcomb, for example, sees the novel as endorsing a black transnationalist view, as Lucy refuses to be constrained by "colonial, racist, and transnational values" of either Antigua or the US. Edyta Oczkowicz similarly describes Lucy's learning to tell her own story as an act of self-translation, in which she must create "a new personal 'space'" in which her identity "does not have to be defined by the roles of either colonized or colonzier."
Critics have also focused on the many intertexts
Intertextuality
Intertextuality is the shaping of texts' meanings by other texts. It can include an author’s borrowing and transformation of a prior text or to a reader’s referencing of one text in reading another. The term “intertextuality” has, itself, been borrowed and transformed many times since it was coined...
on which the novel draws. Diane Simmons details the way in which the novel draws on John Milton
John Milton
John Milton was an English poet, polemicist, a scholarly man of letters, and a civil servant for the Commonwealth of England under Oliver Cromwell...
's Paradise Lost
Paradise Lost
Paradise Lost is an epic poem in blank verse by the 17th-century English poet John Milton. It was originally published in 1667 in ten books, with a total of over ten thousand individual lines of verse...
and Charlotte Brontë
Charlotte Brontë
Charlotte Brontë was an English novelist and poet, the eldest of the three Brontë sisters who survived into adulthood, whose novels are English literature standards...
's Jane Eyre
Jane Eyre
Jane Eyre is a novel by English writer Charlotte Brontë. It was published in London, England, in 1847 by Smith, Elder & Co. with the title Jane Eyre. An Autobiography under the pen name "Currer Bell." The first American edition was released the following year by Harper & Brothers of New York...
, noting that Brontë was Kincaid's favorite author. David Yost observes that Lucy contains many correspondences to another Brontë novel, Villette
Villette
-Places:Villette or La Villette is the name or part of the name of several places in Europe:-France:*Villette, in the Meurthe-et-Moselle département*Villette, in the Yvelines département*Villette-d'Anthon, in the Isère département...
--including the names of its primary couple (Lucy and Paul), its plot (an au pair adjusting to a foreign culture), its themes (sexual repression of women and self-recreation through art), and its setting (Villettes Paul dies returning from his Caribbean slave plantation)--arguing that Lucy acts a postcolonial reworking of this earlier text. Ian Smith focuses on the scene in which Lucy must memorize Wordsworth's "I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud" at her boarding school, despite having never seen a daffodil in Antigua. Noting that this episode recurs throughout Kincaid's work, Smith asserts that the act here of transcending an oppressive and often-nonsensical British
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
colonial education is emblematic of Kincaid's oeuvre as a whole.