In The Dew Breaker, ‘Seven’, a Haitian couple struggle to communicate their feelings, partly from Creole’s “limited” expression, the wife’s ineptitude of the English language, and both the man and wife’s bottled up adultery. Taking from the final few lines of ‘Seven’:
Since she didn’t know the language, they wouldn’t have to speak or ask any questions of the stony-faced people around them. They could carry out their wedding march in silence, temporary silence, unlike the one that had come over them now.
Danticat, 52
How could this story be labeled as a tragedy? Does this couple’s deficiency in communication and persistence to stay together pose a toxic relationship? How does the wife’s lack of English inadvertently trap her in an unkindled love for the man?
One thought on “Mini Tragedy: 2/15Q”