The Cheese Stands Alone

A Small Place: page 53:

“The people in a small place cannot give an exact account, a complete account, of themselves.  The people in a small place cannot give an exact account, a complete account of events (small though they may be).  This cannot be held against them; an exact account, a complete account, of anything, anywhere, is not possible.” (Kincaid 53)

            The people of a small place cannot give an account because they do not have an account.  They lack credibility and the respect due to their status as former colony and structurally cannot change this imposition and unbalance.  To give an exact account would be using a foreign mode of value to determine existence.  A complete account would include both sides of the story, with all of the violence and deaths on either side wholly accounted for.  The narrator uses these phrases in repetition to indicate not only the constant need for accounting, but also what counts.  Money counts for the colonists and cannot be split from their purpose on the island in the first place.  Counting events, small as they may be, disvalues the experience and the people who were exploited in the process.   Not being able to account for themselves, nor these events denies responsibility on the people’s part.  An example of unreliable narration here concedes that an exact account of anything anywhere cannot be possible.  The whole story cannot be told because it would mean admitting to the past trauma inflicted and the wounds left there after.  That by association all involved (being those who stayed home on both sides) are equally guilty by association and denial.   

            Why does the narrator say ‘them’ instead of ‘us’?  Does the narrator not include herself in the lacking quality of accountability?  Why not?  The power structure and balance is asymmetrical in favor of the colonists, now called tourists, because the people were never given the opportunity to give an account.  Their accounts were never established, due to their lack of an account in the first place.  The vicious cycle of alienation and discrediting the people was adopted by the people only to be expanded to the same ends.  Pratt speaks of these contact zones, how England continually asserted it’s central authority by constantly repeating it was the central authority thus confirming their status.  England’s account counts before Antigua’s account counts.  The people cannot see themselves outside of this imperial contact zone.  But the narrator says ‘them’, so the narrator solely because of their role of narrator is accounting for herself as well as these events. 

            The narrator’s role was interpellated than self recognized.  Use of the second person throughout the novella gives the finger to that formerly interpellated relationship with the former imperialists.  This passage does not use the second person, which made an impression upon me, because the narrator isolates herself from the people.  Published in 1988, this work speaks back to the overarching monologue voice of the imperialist that spun the show for themselves for years.  After listening to other voices from similar backgrounds speak about veils and looks, this voice gets the mic. Only this voice seems lonely in the conversation with the imperial crown, without their people who haven’t taken responsibility yet.