Postcolonial narratives and rewritings attempt to address minority responses by recovering their untold stories as a result of European colonization (Reavis). This literature addresses the problems and consequences of decolonizing a country and individual responses to issues of imperialism and racism. Jean Rhys takes on the task of giving voice to historically silenced characters in her novel Wide Sargasso Sea, a precursor story to Bronte's Jane Eyre from the point of view of Mr. Rochester's mad and seemingly bestial wife, Bertha Mason, whose first name is revealed to be Antoinette Cosway. Throughout the novel Rhys uses various symbols to convey the concept of "other" along with themes of social and cultural identity, entrapment, and ecocriticism to reflect the characters' psyches and experiences. Rhys uses the concept of mirrors particularly throughout the Great Sargasso Sea to symbolize Antoinette's double identity, madness, and ultimately deteriorated individuality under a system of patriarchal oppression. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an Original Essay Mirrors initially play an important role in Antoinette's chaotic childhood to convey her dual identity and fluidity between social groups. In a crucial scene in which native Jamaicans besiege Antoinette's house in Coulibri Estate, Antoinette uses her passive and poetic rhetoric to describe an otherwise disastrous situation. When she and her family finally emerge from the burning house, Antoinette alludes to mirrors as she runs toward her childhood friend Tia: “When I was near I saw the jagged stone in her hand but I didn't see her throw it. I didn't feel it either, just something wet running down my face. I looked at her and saw her face crumple as she began to cry. We stared at each other, blood on my face, tears on his. It was as if I saw myself. As in a mirror” (Rhys 45). This scene, full of intensity and emotion, serves as an interesting juxtaposition of two different female experiences. Antoinette, a white Creole girl living in Spanish Town, Jamaica in the midst of post-slavery illegalization, often calls herself a "white cockroach." Throughout her narrative, she does not belong to any social group, as she cannot relate to the black residents of Spanish Town but is also too “exotic” to fit into any component of English culture. Tia serves as a stand-in in a significant way and, as a reflection of Antoinette, expresses the anger and pain that Antoinette ultimately tries to express, but from the other side of the mirror of racial separation. Tia is the image of an identity that Antoinette longs to be her own: a black woman with a sense of belonging, not a white Creole woman trapped in a real community. The concept of the mirror and Tia as a stand-in seems to reiterate what Antoinette knows, that she will never find the sense of belonging or identity she wants for herself. As Antoinette's madness develops, the mirrors reflect her alienation from any sense of identity. The third part of the novel is a frightening culmination of Antoinette's psychosis through isolation that raises the question of whether her madness is inherent or just a consequence of her poisonous treatment and history. Annette, Antoinette's mother, despite her brief appearance in the novel, had the habit of constantly looking for her own reflection in the mirror. Antoinette adopts this part of her mother, perhaps indicating their shared need to be seen in a world that neither invites nor invites them..