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Similes
Chapter 13
Explanation and Analysis—Rape and Trauma:
In Chapter 13, Angelou describes the behavior and attitudes of the nurses who care for her following her rape. Notably, these nurses seem to subconsciously equate the act of rape with that of consensual sexual intercourse. This attitude imprints itself on young Maya Angelou, affecting her perception of the assault. In an example of situational irony, Angelou echoes the nurses' sentiments, comparing her own rape to puberty:
I was eight, and grown. Even the nurses in the hospital had told me that now I had nothing to fear. "The worst is over for you," they had said. So I put the words in all the smirking mouths.
The situational irony at play in this passage reflects broadly on society's treatment of women and young girls. One might expect the nurses to regard Angelou's rape as a horrific and traumatic event. Instead, they associate Angelou's rape with puberty, placing it on the same level as an important milestone in human reproductive development. Angelou is "eight, and grown"—in the eyes of the hospital workers, her sexual assault takes on the form of a kind of prepubescent puberty.
The false equivalency at the heart of this ironic passage stems from society's undue fixation on female sexual "purity." Whenever a women or girl has her first sexual encounter—even if that encounter is non-consensual and violent—the event is considered important because it marks that person's loss of sexual "innocence." This obsession with female virginity is often stronger in religious communities, including the one in which Angelou grew up. As a consequence, Angelou has been primed in her home environment to consider any first sexual encounter incredibly important. She views her rape as life-defining, as opposed to something she can move on from—an attitude that perhaps worsens the traumatic after-effects of the assault.
Related Themes:
