Identity In 'The Time Of The Doves'

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Savanna Adams English 105 11/3/2014 Essay 3 – Prompt 5 Finding Natalia How in control of one’s own identity can one be? Every situation, choice, and decision can ultimately change one’s overall makeup. The way one chooses to react and handle the unfavorable circumstances tells others the most about that individual’s strengths and weaknesses. Natalia in, “The Time of the Doves,” by Mercé Rodoreda is young woman who loses control of her identity when she is stripped of her given name and caught in inescapable abuse. Early on in the novel, Natalia claims that “it was hard for me to say no if someone asked me to do something,” which exposes her need to please others (Rodoreda 15). When she is meets Quimet in the Placa del Diamant, she shows her immaturity and longing for attention from the opposite sex despite the fact that she is engaged. Quimet begins to call…show more content…
She is caged like the doves that he hopes to sell to people for pets but gave away due to the lack of value he saw in them (100). Mateau remarks, “…the best things was to kill it, that it was better to die than to live tied up like a prisoner” (65). This response symbolizes how little Colometa had begun to value her own life, regardless that it was not her own statement, and she sees herself in Mateau’s comment. In essence, Colometa’s main purpose is to serve Quimet and take care of their two children. She has no identity, because she became a product of Quimet’s selfish desires. Colometa runs into Pere, and he wishes “Natalia” luck in her marriage. Colometa is taken aback by this gesture due to the weight of kindness it contained, but also because he called her Natalia. Her given name comes off foreign, and she hardly recognizes it (56). Her lack of objecting to Quimet’s every need had turned her into a completely different person than the one that Pere had once loved, and the girl that Quimet had met at the Placa del Diamant. Natalia no longer

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