In On a Desert Shore, Marina escapes confinement in a madhouse. However, she is still subject to her father’s patriarchal control, which he has the power to exert beyond the grave. And yet she is as inclined as Olivia to speak her mind and to enact her own will. In writing this novel, I grew very fond of Marina, in part because she reminds me of the many impassioned and outspoken young women of all backgrounds with whom I have worked in my teaching career.
A last word about the title of this book. Marina is shipwrecked “on a desert shore” in an alien land that does not welcome her, even though she is half English and has been mostly raised in England. But to me the title also suggests what William Wordsworth calls “the still, sad music of humanity” or Matthew Arnold refers to as the “turbid ebb and flow of human misery,” the tide that comes in year after year and century after century. Why do we keep singing the same old song? I think it’s because we cling to our proud systems, which are based on the lust of greed and the urge to dominate.
September 29, 2015
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