Quote:
Originally Posted by issybird
I have to disagree about this. I think Sarah wished for death, but I don't think she courted it on any level that would render it suicide. She considered herself to be as strong as a horse. Even more, that was a time when the church was death on suicide, so to speak - couldn't be buried in sacred ground and so forth. I think the priest wouldn't have pushed for a Catholic burial if there had been even a whiff of suicide about her. It seems to me her death could be typical of a certain class of hagiography, where the saint-to-be longs for death to keep from sin.
OK, it occurs to me that you were saying that her going out in the rain had to have been subconscious, since she'd know that suicide would be the worst of sins. In which case, ignore what I just said!
|
My reaction to that part was not that Sarah was courting death, subconsciously or otherwise, but that she was driven to this extreme by the cruelty of Bendrix forcing himself into her presence. It really seemed to me (before I knew so much about Greene's personal life), that Greene was turning Sarah into a sort of martyr, persecuted in one way or another by all the men of her life (to which we might even add the priest). She had made up her mind, made her commitment, but Bendrix wouldn't leave her alone.