“And to think that I loved this man passionately, to think that I gave him thirty years of my life, to think that twelve times over I carried his child. The addition of a rival to my life was not enough for him. In loving someone else, he burned his past, both morally and materially. He dared to commit such an act of disavowal”
From this extract, it is evident that Ramatoulaye was not at all happy with her husband. This is because he was the cause of her grief; he abandoned her after all those years of marriage. She was also exasperated due to the fact that not only did he want to get married to a woman, but he also wanted to be a “sugar-daddy”. Therefore, she feels that the marriage was unnecessary. This is confirmed by the quote:
“Was it madness, weakness, irresistible love? What inner confusion led Modou Fall to marry Binetou?”
As we can see that Modou caused a lot of pain for poor Ramatoulaye; therefore, succumbing to death, I agree to the statement ‘characters that cause immense pain to another, especially to their consorts, succumb to death.’
Likewise, in Blood Wedding, we see the character of the protagonist, Leonardo. His death is announced by the Beggar Woman and does not come as a shock due to the actions he had performed. The fact that he had angered his wife and caused immense pain to her justifies his death. Living a happy life with his wife, he still insisted in expressing his love for his cousin Bride. Bride was to be married to Bridegroom and during their matrimony, Leonardo came and absconded with the Bride. This was a very unappealing situation as everyone’s emotions ran the gamut from excitement to awe to frustration.
Leonardo deserved to die after he disappointed his wife, family members along with the Bridegroom’s family. He dispensed pain and grief to his wife and that is confirmed by the quote:
“He was a handsome horseman.
Now he’s a mound of snow.
He rode to fairs and mountains
And women’s arms
Now his brow is crowned
With the moss of night.”
The extract above states that the Wife is sorrowful about her husband’s death because of his social nature especially with women. He has flirted around with many women and has deserved such a distasteful death.
Hence, we can observe the lives of both Modou Fall and Leonardo ending into death due to their carefree nature towards the feelings of their spouses. They have been carried away with desire rather than thinking about the consequence of the actions they perform. As a result, they have achieved what they deserved: death.
Contrastingly, one might say that Mawdo Ba did not die even though he performed similar acts to Modou Fall. That is overshadowed by the fact that Mawdo Ba did not dispense as much pain to his wife as Modou did to Ramatoulaye. Besides, Aissatou was not very affected after Mawdo abandoned her in that she had other things to concentrate on such as her career which alienated her from her grief. Moreover, her option to take on a job really paid off as she was remunerated huge sums; becoming eminent and prominent. In other words, Mawdo’s abandonment of Aissatou proved to be blessed for her as she got a chance to pursue a career in which she excelled immensely. Therefore, he did not succumb to death.
Similar is the case for Samba Diack, the husband to Jacqueline. I agree that he did pass on pain to his wife who, as a result, went into a nervous breakdown. But you must concur that, even though, he was distracted by the small pleasures in life (those emaciated Senegalese women), he came back to track when he realised that his wife was really unwell. I quote:
“Samba Diack was kind and touched by his wife’s breakdown.”
Above and beyond, Jacqueline had no grief at all after her miraculous recovery due to the erudite doctor. She had overcome such a major illness and had gone through a lot. Therefore, she had no antipathy for her other half. As a result, Samba Diack did not generate unending pain to his wife; therefore not succumbing to death.
On the other hand, the bridegroom dies because he has dispensed pain not only to his wife (Bride), but also to his own mother. This is because if the Bridegroom had not gone in pursuit of the Bride, he would not have confronted Leonardo. In other words, there would not have been any bloodshed. If this was the case, the Bride would be happy and so would be Leonardo, who would have achieved his lifelong love. Moreover, the Bridegroom would not have departed leading to the Mother not repenting over his demise; just like she did for the other deceased family members. I quote:
“Mother: I said be quiet. (At the door) Is anybody there? (Puts her hands to her forehead.) My son should have answered. But my son’s nothing now – an armful of dry flowers.”
These lines show us the melancholic and frustrated mood the Mother is in since she has lost all her family members now including her ultimate hope of survival: her son, the Bridegroom.
Accordingly, I perceive that the Bridegroom deserved to die as he dispensed pain and grief not only to the Bride but also to his mother.
All in all, we have seen that the statement ‘characters that cause immense pain to another, especially to their consorts, succumb to death’ is apt. Moreover, it can be learnt form this piece of work that the consequence of the action you perform will be commensurate to the intensity of that action. Therefore, Modou Fall, Leonardo and the Bridegroom all deserved to succumb to death. Last but not the least, it can be noted that all the characters that cause immense pain to others in both the texts are the male characters while the recipients of such pain are the female characters.
