The Raging Quiet by Sherryl Jordan

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Recommended: Racism in literature

The novel, The Raging Quiet, written by Sherryl Jordan, portrays the ignorance, suspicion, and prejudice that people feels towards other individuals who have done nothing wrong except for committing an unforgivable crime of being different than the rest of the society. Upon arriving in Torcurra, the protagonist, Marnie, finds herself an outsider in this remote seaside village. Alone in this place filled with unwelcoming villagers, Marnie befriends with two other people, a local priest and a madman named Raven. Like Marnie, Raven is also shunned from this village. When people see the growing relationship between him and Marnie, false accusations are immediately made about them, which add even more pain and suffering to their loneliness in this society. This story deals with the victimization of those who are different from others due to the superstitious beliefs of the villagers and their fear for the new and unknown.

After her forced marriage with Isake Isherwood, Marnie and her husband arrive in Torcurra as foreigners, and she soon becomes a social outcast. Rumors and mutters fall upon this couple when the villagers learn that they occupy the old and isolated cottage used to be the home of the witch who was burned during a witch trial. When Marnie goes to the village market on her second day in Torccura, "[the market] was crowded and noisy, but the voices dropped as [Marnie] approached. She felt curious stares, and heard whispered comments. It took all her will not to run" (47). Marnie also heard someone murmured "They must be sore in need of a solitary life, to occupy that house" (47). The residents, filled with superstitions, could not accept the fact that Marnie and Isake live in a house that is evil and cursed and once occupied by a witch. Already unhappy with her marriage, she felt even more dreary and depressed with the hostile attitude of the villagers. The village priest, Father Brannan, who is the only welcoming person, remarks to Marnie that "Most of [the villagers] have lived in this place for generations, and they know one another's fathers and their fathers before them. They feel threatened by newcomers, especially people they know nothing about" (49). The villagers act toward the newcomers with ignorance and suspicion because they know nothing about Marnie and her husband. Then, unfortunately, just two days after her marriage, Marnie comes home and finds her husband dead from falling off the roof.

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