Jamaica Kincaid's "Girl"

The reading of the biography of Jamaica Kincaid leads me to envision a sad, young girl feeling unloved and oppressed. It is heartbreaking to know that Kincaid doesn’t look for happiness, “absolutely not at all interested in…happiness”. It would make one wonder just how harsh life with her mother truly was. However, in life, we aren’t guaranteed to be happy, hopefully to find joy in what we have and contentment in it. It sounds as if this is what Kincaid was able to do. Many of us might be able to lead a less stressful life if we could resign ourselves to this belief.

Reading the account of the “Girl” made me think of my relationship with my daughters. As a parent, I have always been concerned how my girls feel about me as their mother. Some of the lines in the passage make me think of myself: I was always trying to help them learn what I felt was the right way to act to be an accepted member of society. They tell me sometimes I went overboard in this area of instruction. However, I know my coaching was done out of love for them. I am not sure about the feelings of the mother in this reading. I can’t fathom saying to my daughter “not like the slut you are so bent on becoming”. What a horrible thought to have about your child.

If “Girl” is a personal account of Kincaid’s life, I can understand some of the discontent she could have felt toward her mother. I would be curious as to the degree of difference in the relationship between her and her mother before the other children were born and afterwards. Was she loved and treated like a child before and then simply turned into a chore doer afterwards? What was the mother’s motivation in the story? The style of the writing, as constant commands, makes we wonder also if this is the way the mother sounded: constantly sounding off demands without any relief.

I would be curious as to the manner of Kincaid’s relationship with her children.