She lives like an exile in the place she was taught to think of, despite its distance, as home. She is claimed like a resource then discarded when she becomes unpalatable. Through Phillips’ eyes, Rhys personifies the fading of the British empire. The book is framed by the one unhappy visit she made to her Caribbean home as an adult. Phillips’ novel focuses on her childhood in Dominica, her difficult transition to life in England and her years of drifting from one affair to another in damp and shabby digs. In between the two world wars, she published a handful of autobiographical novels about rootless women, but she always depended on the men who were her patrons until the publication of “Wide Sargasso Sea” near the end of her life rescued her from obscurity. She left for England at age 16 for school, then worked as a chorus girl and muddled through a string of unhappy relationships across Europe. Rhys was born on the Caribbean island of Dominica when it was still a British colony.
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