Although in Breath, Eyes, Memory, by Edwidge Danticat, Sophie loves and cares very much for her mother Martine, the relationship between the two women is strained and somewhat adversarial. This is due to the negative circumstances surrounding Sophie’s existence. Sophie is the product of her mother’s rape, and her mother can not stop thinking about this aspect of their relationship. She has nightmares about the rape every night, and these nightmares are more intense when Sophie is living with her. The bringing together of Sophie and Martine does not improve the lives of either one of them. Their discomfort with each other is foreshadowed by the nightmares Sophie has of her mother before going to live with her in New York. In the nightmares Martine has “arms like two long hooks” (Danticat, p. 28, ch. 4) and is chasing her, trying to catch her. Sophie’s nightmares of her mother resemble her mother’s nightmares of her father. Despite their differences, they are bound together by the same kind of fear, which only increases when they are together. Underscoring the differences between Sophie and Martine is how Sophie prefers Haiti to New York and Martine is scared of Haiti because that is where she was raped. Sophie does not want to leave Haiti to live with her mother. She prefers the company of Tante Marie and her grandmother. She goes to Haiti to take a break from life with her husband, who she does not enjoy having sex with. Martine, when going to Haiti to get Sophie to come back to the United States, wants to spend as little time in Haiti as possible. Her nightmares get worse in Haiti, and she tells Sophie “When I first saw you in New York, I must admit, it frightened me the way you looked” (p.169, ch. 26). On the flight back to New York Martine mentions her “discomfort with being in Haiti,” adding “I want to go back there only to be buried” (p. 179, ch. 28).What pu...
