“Bellocq’s Ophelia” is not just of collection of poems by Natasha Trethewey, but also a strong expression of the importance of keeping different memories. Although, Ophelia prostitutes her body to several men, her past and present recollections of a life of hardship and discriminations help explain why she acts in this manner. Ophelia writes to her dearest Constance Wright partly to justify her immoral lifestyle based on the rough memories she recollects from her society’s discriminative attitude toward her as African American mulatto.
In her first letter home, Ophelia remembers the effects of this racial judgment on her self-esteem. Initially she walks the streets of New Orleans, as confident as a “white woman, so [she] thinks” but shrinks into a “negress again” once she encounters any white stranger (Trethewey 7). She is compelled to lose her sense of importance when she meets with any white stranger. Without the presence of a white stranger, she is free to hold herself in high esteem and bask in the comfort that high esteem. But when she returns back to the sad and harsh reality of the society’s perception of her as a black woman, she becomes an ordinary person without any form of confidence.
Also, Ophelia recollects that she is unable to get a job because she notices that company or merchant “needs a girl,” because the society believes that black women should be restricted to ‘back-bending” work and “picking time” in the “cotton fields” (Trethewey 7, 8). At this point she is hurt by the harsh misrepresentation of her as a “girl,” and by the unfair qualifications that undermine her competence as a company worker. But these are all causes of the way her society views herself and other black women like her. These situations of subjection make her greatly concerned to the point where she feels a certain “desperation that tightens her throat (Trethewey 7),” which reflects her desire to live a life of freedom where is not restricted by society’s perception of her. She needs a new lifestyle that would remove the pressures and burdens of her past and present memories, whether moral or immoral.
Finally, Ophelia recounts that her inability to “keep up her [job] inquiries,” as the “rent was coming due,” made her choose to live and work for Countess P as a prostitute. Like the other memories, this experience portrays the kind of burden she faced in a harsh society. She cannot seem to sustain herself because she has been deprived by the society’s discriminative attitude towards her, giving her no choice but to prostitute herself in such a desperate moment.
In truth, she probably would not have made this decision, were it not for these rough memories that increased her discomfort. Moreover, these are just a few memories that illustrate Ophelia’s feelings and choices toward the life of prostitution throughout “Bellocq’s Ophelia.” Thus, the importance of memories is further communicated through Ophelia’s decision to free herself from desperation, however immoral or unacceptable it might be to the society.
I like how you’ve written thoughtfully about Ophelia’s interactions with whites, Posi. I’m not sure, however, that these people see through her disguise (and it is a disguise; you’ll note that she wears gloves over her dark hands) so much as it is evidence of how she has been taught to act over the years through interactions with other people and the fact that she has been labeled as “black,” despite how she may or may not appear on the outside.