『사파이러와 노예소녀』: 기억과 치유의 서사

Abstract

This paper aims at analyzing the narrative of memory and healing about a girl who ran away to avoid sexual violation but returns after 25 years in Sapphira and the Slave Girl. Upon creating and solving the sexual sadism based on the cruel plotting of Sapphira against the sick body, Cather is connecting Sappphira’s violence to the ugliness which often hides beneath the serenely natural world such as the Double S ravine. As a violence lurks everywhere, Cather wants to acknowledge the need to comprehend the violation and solve it within the larger context provided by endurance, memory, and forgiveness. As the seasonal circle happens, Henry, Rachel, Till, and Nancy promise their reunions colluding to cure the ugliness of the unforgettable past in order to get on with their lives. Cather’s characters accept the passage of time as well as loss and pain, being confident that reconciliation and recuperation can make up for them. They believe the sustainable connection between past and present, based on the essential role of memory in all the processes of endurance and understanding, on memory as an essential component in the process of healing. By the way, Cather thinks of this healing power as an intrinsically natural force rather than the identification of some regenerative force with a specifically female identity