one that looks at colonialism from the point of view of the oppressed. In the post-colonial paradigm, colonizers typically arrive, are kind while they are appropriating the knowledge and resources of Native peoples, and then, when they have what they want, increasingly turn on the Natives and label them "other" and somehow monstrous so as to exploit them, or, conversely, assimilate them into their dominant culture in a subordinate, slave-like roles. Two classic works of literature that exemplify these paradigms are Shakespeare'sThe Tempest and Defoe's Robinson Crusoe. In The Tempest, Prospero, the colonialist arriviste on the island, is at first kind to Caliban. Once he has Caliban's knowledge, however, Prospero decides Caliban is a monstrous threat and enslaves him. In Robinson Crusoe, Crusoe decides the Native he saves from death is "worthy," renames him Friday, and assimilates him into European cultural norms.

Wide Sargasso Sea is a good example of both of the post-colonial paradigms of The Tempest and Robinson Crusoe. Rochester is kind long enough to marry Antoinette and get her fortune, but then he turns on her and decides she is the monstrous "other," polluted, potentially insane, and made dishonest by her native island culture. Like Crusoe, he renames her, calling her Bertha to trying to efface the traces of the dangerous and threatening exotic he finds in her. He cruelly takes her with him to England, where he tries to force her to assimilate to British culture, which she cannot do. In the process, he drives to her madness and robs her of her voice. In Jane Eyre, she never gets to tell her story, which is overwritten by the normalizing voices of Rochester and Jane, representatives of the dominant culture. Only in Wide Sargasso Sea do we gain access to Antoinette's voice and perspective, the voice and perspective of the colonized other.