Skip to main content

Notes on The Soul of the Rose

Delphinia leaves Gauvain and Oskar staring resentfully at each other.

Distraught, Delphinia listens anxiously for word of Gauvain till she is lulled into a semi-conscious state. It is in this state she travels to Oriente's room.

Delphinia steps into Oriente's room, drawn by Oriente's "presence." She dares to take her diary from the room and read it in secret.

However, Beatrice interrupts with unsettling news. Adelia is to arrive within days. As soon as she is able, Delphinia requests an interview with the Markgraf, but Gervaise tells her he has left on an unexpected journey.

Delphinia is filled with anxiety as shadows gather and a storm builds. Unanswered questions leave her restless. Feeling afraid at all kinds of sounds without her room, she secures the door and lights a candle, determined to soothe away her terror by reading Oriente's diary

Oriente recalls her earliest childhood days and Oskar, the boy charged with pushing her wheelchair. Circumstances beyond her understanding separate them, and Oriente becomes lost to the world. She isolates herself in a secret world. When Oriente is a teenager Oskar appears again, and her childhood obsession with him separates. He is entranced with her and refuses to be apart from her, thwarting convention to embrace her.

When Gauvain returns Oriente confesses her love for Oskar, not anticipating his violent reaction. He sends Oskar away, and Oriente dies desolate of any hope at happiness.

Her miserable state of mind haunts Gauvain long after her death, as Delphinia learns. She feels close to Oriente, and becomes close to Oskar when he returns to the estate without revealing what she knows of his relationship with Oriente.

Adelia arrives at the castle unexpectedly, and Delphinia is devastated. She feels the full force of her forbidden love for Gauvain when he cuts her off completely, treating her like a stranger. She finds that to cope with the pain, she must retreat to a land of dreams.

Oskar is the only other person fully sensible of Delphinia's forbidden love with his half-brother. Given that Gauvain destroyed his own love he is in a position to gloat, or wreak revenge. However his heart is moved by Delphinia's passionate nature. When he learns how deeply she feels Oriente's companionship he vows to place her as Gauvain's wife and oust Adelia.

Adelia is with child and desperate to marry Gauvain as hastily as possible. When Delphinia learns her deception she is heartbroken that Adelia is attempting to deceive Gauvain in such a way, but knows he is too wise to be fooled by her loving act.

Popular posts from this blog

The secret to a happy home

I finished Marion Harland's guide tonight and I wonder ceaselessly at two things. 1. She is so down on America! Even more than I am. She complains of things in which I am so well-steeped I could not see them for what they were. In particular, American style and cookery. It is true that our food, which we count as so much more generous in portion than the overseas counterpart, is as coarse and indecorous as it is plentiful, but as an American woman I cast up my hands and declare I would rather spend my time on something else. She makes an interesting point about American women's fashions. In France women wear what looks good on them, and in America women wears what comes off the manufacturing line in the latest style. It is very conformist, and I have to admit I feel it in myself, for I would be embarrassed to wear something that is "out" even if it flattered me better. 2. Harland's other point I feel clearly from last night's experiences. I looked in my journ...

Sprouts

Sprouts Originally uploaded by ladyhildegarde . I am getting sprouts. Hopefully they are carnations. It is such a beautiful spring day. It's good I'm taking the chance to come outside: I have craved a moment to reflect on something beautiful.

Blanche, a re-telling of Snow White

I began this story after reading a collection of short stories by Angela Carter. “Snow White” has always been a favorite tale of mine and I have placed this re-telling in nineteenth-century rural Louisiana. Near Vacherie, Louisiana, there are not only swamps but also old beautiful plantations. Some of them are restored but others are abandoned and ruined. The places I have seen captured my imagination and I combined them with my impression of Snow White as an object of envy and lust. My heroine Blanche is a hard-working girl who longs to be rich and to live in New Orleans, where her father was born. She is threatened constantly by the attention of the rustics who live around her. Her stepmother beats her when she finds Blanche in Jean-Jacques’ arms. When Blanche runs away from home she is beguiled by Philipe de la Roche, who persuades her to live in New Orleans in a fancy house with seven women. Blanche does not realize that the women are prostitutes. The farmer Jean-Jacques, who love...