The Loophole of Retreat

In Harriet Jacob’s narrative, we see the author’s justification and definition of what seems to establish thinking as a kind of masochistic self-imposed imprisonment. In many feminist works we see the issue of imprisonment, not necessarily of the female body, but of the mind. Virginia Woolf further illiterates the significance of the room or space in which women need to further their thought processes for writing and creating. For Linda, her imprisonment is both representative of the physical and psychological confinement of women from a slightly wider perspective—one that gives us the point of view from a loophole of retreat. The loophole of retreat is a metaphor for slavery. The establishment of slavery—with its degradation and oppressiveness of the human psyche—is paralleled with the oppression of women, with its limitations and restrictions of the female soul and mind. Since Linda is a black woman, both her color and her gender are avenues for self-imprisonment. Dr. Flint represents the masochistic tyranny from which women like Linda are forced to go into hiding. Linda has escaped from the slavery of the white man, but she must self-imprison herself in order to maintain freedom. The transcending confinement of women, from one cage to another, demonstrates that women’s struggle for liberation seems an endless fight. Yet, women draw power from these dark and confined places, and use these “retreats” to harbor creative forces against the oppression of men.