Ramatoulaye near the end of her epistolary is “persuaded of the inevitable and necessary complementarity of man and woman” (88). She goes on to talk about how love is less than ideal. “Love, imperfect as it may be in its content and expression, remains the natural link between these two beings” (88). Love in its content and expression, solely by itself is perfect. It is the way humans utilize it that makes it imperfect. Her next comments I agree with. She explains that love only works if both parties are sincere, accept each other for their successes and failures, praise them instead of listing faults, and sharing each other’s thoughts. When these are put into motion correctly you get a marriage that should, with maintenance, last.
Ramatoulaye and Aissatou’s largest obstacle that they had to face is their husbands’ choice of polygamy over monogamy. Through the new marriage and the death of Ramatoulaye’s husband, Ramatoulaye realizes that it was possible “despite everything, [she] remain faithful to the love of [her] youth” (55). Ramatoulaye’s love for Mawdo Bâ was so great that even after his death she could not marry another. “Tansir and Daoda having been rejected, there were no more barriers between the suitors and me. I then watched filing past and besieging me old men in search of easy revenue, young men in search of adventure to occupy their leisure” (70). Ramatoulaye viewed her suitors as animals or beastly. Aissatou agreed with Ramatoulaye that “man is one: greatness and animal fused together. None of his acts is pure charity. None is pure bestiality” (32).
The hatred and disgust that came with the change in Ramatoulaye’s marriage helped her to make the decision to believe in fate. Everything was being dumped onto her. “Just as I thought, my friend: it never rains it pours. This is my luck: once misfortune has me in its grip, it never lets go of me again” (80). Ramatoulaye, to overcome her bitterness, thought of human destiny. She thought, “Each life has its share of heroism, an obscure heroism, born of abdication, of renunciation and acceptance under the merciless whip of fate” (11). Ramatoulaye believed that there was no way out of her circumstance. A pessimistic view never helps a distraught relationship, but rather it destroys it.
In the following quotes she does not take the view that I take. Marriage starts out as a friendship. In its essence marriage should be a union of best friends. In one of Ramatoulaye’s comments she states “Friendship has no splendours that love knows not (54).” Ramatoulaye misses that if two are truly best friends than the love that flows from that shall get you through troubling times. Ramatoulaye goes on to say, “[Friendship] grows stronger when crossed, whereas obstacles kill love. Friendship resists time, which wearies and severs couples” (54). In a marriage based on a similar philosophical ideology, there is a basis for common ground that leads to a foundation on which the marriage can always retrograde to. Having the same foundation allows for a relationship to transcend the difficult obstacles.
Ramatoulaye during her epistle discloses her opinions or attitude towards many political topics. One such topic is woman’s role in society. With this role came the problem of monogamy and polygamy. America has very little polygamy because women and men are taught to be at the same level. Even our society, one without polygamy, still goes against God’s law on marriage. God made woman to be a suitable helper not to be an equal to Adam (Gen. 2:18-25). I do believe that America’s way of dealing with this issue is better than how the Senegalese did. Ramatoulaye wanted to, through love, change women’s role in society.
