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Part 2
Explanation and Analysis—Eliza Jane:
While much of “The Wife of His Youth” is written in a formal style, Eliza Jane’s dialogue features the use of dialect, meaning Chesnutt tries to capture her particular speech patterns and regional vernacular. Take the following passage, for example, which comes as Eliza Jane is introducing herself to Mr. Ryder:
“’Scuse me, suh,” she continued, when she had sat down on the edge of a chair, “ ’scuse me, suh, I’s lookin’ for my husban’. I heerd you wuz a big man an’ had libbed heah a long time, an’ I ’lowed you would n’t min’ ef I’d come roun’ an’ ax you ef you’d ever heerd of a merlatter man by de name er Sam Taylor ’quirin’ roun’ in de chu’ches ermongs’ de people fer his wife ’Liza Jane?”
Here, Chesnutt uses unusual spelling and grammar in order to help readers “hear” the way that Eliza Jane, as an uneducated and formerly enslaved Black woman, would speak. For example, he writes “Excuse me, sir” as “’Scuse me, suh” and “I’m looking for my husband” as “I’s lookin’ for my husban’.” The long second sentence of her speech roughly translates to “I heard you were well-known and had lived here a long time, and I hope you don’t mind me asking if you’ve heard of a mixed-race man named Sam Taylor who has been looking for his wife Eliza Jane.”
While some scholars today criticize the use of dialect by people who are of a higher social class than the characters they are writing, Chesnutt is using it here to communicate the class discrepancy between the two characters rather than to mock people like Eliza Jane. He wants readers to understand the life that Mr. Ryder left behind after the Civil War and how much he has changed over the intervening 25 years. While he likely spoke in this way when he married Eliza Jane, he now uses formal English.
That Mr. Ryder ultimately decides to publicly acknowledge his marriage to Eliza Jane in front of his educated mixed-race community at the ball demonstrates that he wants to be loyal to his former wife, even if that means people judge him for his relationship with a lower-class woman.
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