Cereus Blooms at Night
Encyclopedia
Cereus Blooms at Night is the first novel published by film-maker, artist, and writer Shani Mootoo
. The novel recounts the story of an old lady named Mala Ramchandin through the narrative of Tyler, a male nurse at Paradise Alms House. Although the setting of the novel (the town of Paradise in the country Lantanacamara) is deliberately left ambiguous, it is thought to be patterned after the island of Trinidad
, where Mootoo lived as a child. Cereus
and other flora found throughout the novel, the creolized dialect spoken by the inhabitants of Lantanacamara, and the racial composition of its population (white people
, Indians
, black people
) are all suggestive of Caribbean
society. Other possibilities would include Guyana
, Suriname
, and Mauritius
, all of which have sizable Indian populations.
Part I opens with Mala first arriving to Paradise Alms House. She is heavily sedated and kept under physical constraint. All of the nurses are afraid to attend to her because of her infamous reputation. Tyler, being the only male nurse in the nursing home and a subject of gossip and scrutiny for his alternative sexuality
, is immediately drawn to her. He cares for her and slowly gains her trust. The first sounds that Mala makes are perfect imitations of cricket
s, frogs, and species of birds. However, she does not speak.
Then Tyler begins to tell the story of Mala’s dad, Chandin Ramchandin, which he had heard from his Cigarette Smoking Nana. Chandin’s father was an indentured field labor from India
. At an early age, Chandin became the adopted Indian son of Reverend Thoroughly, a white man, in exchange for his parents’ conversion to Christianity
. The Reverend also wanted to adopt an Indian child in hope to have closer connection with the Indians in Paradise
. Growing up, Chandin found himself madly in love with Lavinia, the daughter of the Reverend and, therefore, his "sister." Attractive and beautiful, Lavinia brushed off all attention from boys and remained in the company of one girlfriend, Sarah, who happened to be Indian and the only other girl in the seminary
school. When Chandin grow into a fine young man, he decided to confess his love to Lavinia. Lavinia firmly rejected his love and announced that she would be leaving for the Shivering Northern Wetlands in three days. Later, Chandin had heard the news that Lavinia was engaged to her distant cousin in Wetlands. Heartbroken yet trying to conceal his feelings, Chandin announced that he has fallen in love with Sarah and wanted to marry her.
Then began Mala’s life. Chandin traveled around paradise with the Reverend, spreading the gospel
and encouraging more conversions to Christianity. Sarah gave birth to two daughters, Pohpoh (Mala) and Asha. In the meantime, Lavinia had returned to Paradise with the news that she broke off her engagement. Lavinia visited Sarah often since they are childhood friends and Chandin again begin to feel the sting of Lavinia’s unattainability. One day, Pohpoh caught Lavinia and Sarah in a moment of intimacy. Eventually Chandin had also notice the unusual affection between his wife and Lavinia. He confronted Sarah. In hope to be with each other, Lavinia and Sarah decided to elope together with the children. However Chandin unexpected returned home early on the day of the planned escape. In the mist of confusion and screaming, Pohpoh and Asha were left behind with their enraged and demented father.
After the news spread of his wife leaving her with another woman, Chandin gave up his religion, his God, and began to drink heavily. Then one night, he raped Pohpoh, his eldest daughter. The sin continued in which every night he would call one of his daughters into bed with him. During the day, the children went to school like other children but, at night, they lived under the sexual tyranny of their father. Pohpoh had a childhood admirer and friend, whom she called her Boyie. One day, she seduced him in his mother’s house but stopped right before sexual intercourse. Back in the nursing home, Mala begins to have visitors, Otoh and his father Ambrose Mohanty. Ambrose was Mala’s Boyie.
Part II of the novel further traces the development of the relationship between Mala and Otoh, a plot line that interweaves with one of Mala’s memories of Pohpoh. In the memory, Pohpoh sneaks out of her father’s home, enters another house, and returns safely, all the while being “protected” by the adult Mala. The memory is rich in detail about the nature that Pohpoh feels, smells, and hears, since the entire time she is covered in darkness.
At the same time that Mala is reflecting on her quite vivid recollections of Pohpoh, Otoh begins to work up the courage to come see her. His father Ambrose had taken up an almost constant sleep and only awoke once a month to prepare provisions (a source of contention with his wife), which Otoh would then deliver to Mala. During one such delivery, Otoh dared to enter the Mala’s yard dressed in his father’s old clothes. Mistaking him for Ambrose, Mala dances with him and then takes him inside to show him the long-decaying body of her father. Terrified, he ran away and collapsed on the street outside. When he recounted what he had seen, the police came into Mala’s house and investigated. Upon discovery of the body, they arrested her and prepared her for a court visit. However, before the police had a chance to retrieve the body from Mala’s house, Otoh decided to make the rather decisive move (especially in comparison to his father) of burning down Mala’s house.
Parts III, IV, and V of the novel are all significantly shorter than the first two sections. Part III provides a flashback
to the budding romance between Ambrose and Mala after he returned from studying in the Shivering Northern Wetlands, culminating in their act of making love. Unfortunately, it is that same day that Chandin realizes his daughter’s affair and, as a result, abuses and rapes her severely. The next day, when Ambrose returns, there is a confrontation between all three. Ambrose runs away during the conflict, leaving Mala to lock her father’s unconscious body in a room downstairs. Part IV of the novel includes the discovery that Ambrose’s wife has left him and an explanation by Ambrose to Otoh that murdering her father had driven Mala mad. She attacked Ambrose anytime he tried to visit. Part V provides a sense of resolution to the novel with the discovery of several letters sent from Asha to Mala that were never delivered and the subsequent attempt by Tyler to contact Asha through this book.
cartographers. This paradise known as Lantanacamara is not a known space understood from an African Safari perspective nor conformed to any colonizer's epistemic norms.
Identity: The individual assertion of one's autonomy
over social norms can be illustrated through Asha Ramchandin, who is strong enough to leave home and search for a new life. Tyler himself in the end openly expressed his affection with Otoh in front of the judgmental crowd of nurses.
Diaspora: The book is filled with flash backs and with Mala's story being told in a first person narrative by Tyler, whom himself is struggling with his gender identity that mirror the transformation that Mala undergoes in reclaiming her self-image. The story is broken by time of present and past, just like a person in diaspora
are torn between their present home and past home.
Secrets: Every character in the book has a skeleton in their closets: Mala's abusive and secretive childhood, Chandin's secret passion for Lavinia, Sarah and Lavinia's love affair, the mysterious disappearance of Chandin, Otoh's 'unnoticed' sex transformation, and Tyler's sexual identity.
Shani Mootoo
Shani Mootoo is a writer who was born in Dublin, Ireland in 1958 to Trinidadian parents. She was raised in Trinidad, where she initially began to explore the artistic and literary world. She began writing and creating visual that drew on her ideas regarding sexual relations between members of the...
. The novel recounts the story of an old lady named Mala Ramchandin through the narrative of Tyler, a male nurse at Paradise Alms House. Although the setting of the novel (the town of Paradise in the country Lantanacamara) is deliberately left ambiguous, it is thought to be patterned after the island of Trinidad
Trinidad
Trinidad is the larger and more populous of the two major islands and numerous landforms which make up the island nation of Trinidad and Tobago. It is the southernmost island in the Caribbean and lies just off the northeastern coast of Venezuela. With an area of it is also the fifth largest in...
, where Mootoo lived as a child. Cereus
Cereus
Cereus is a genus of cactus. The term cereus is also used to describe cacti with very elongated bodies, including columnar growth cacti and epiphytic cacti...
and other flora found throughout the novel, the creolized dialect spoken by the inhabitants of Lantanacamara, and the racial composition of its population (white people
White people
White people is a term which usually refers to human beings characterized, at least in part, by the light pigmentation of their skin...
, Indians
Non-resident Indian and Person of Indian Origin
A Non-Resident Indian is an Indian citizen who has migrated to another country, a person of Indian origin who is born outside India, or a person of Indian origin who resides permanently outside India. Other terms with the same meaning are overseas Indian and expatriate Indian...
, black people
Black people
The term black people is used in systems of racial classification for humans of a dark skinned phenotype, relative to other racial groups.Different societies apply different criteria regarding who is classified as "black", and often social variables such as class, socio-economic status also plays a...
) are all suggestive of Caribbean
Caribbean
The Caribbean is a crescent-shaped group of islands more than 2,000 miles long separating the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea, to the west and south, from the Atlantic Ocean, to the east and north...
society. Other possibilities would include Guyana
Guyana
Guyana , officially the Co-operative Republic of Guyana, previously the colony of British Guiana, is a sovereign state on the northern coast of South America that is culturally part of the Anglophone Caribbean. Guyana was a former colony of the Dutch and of the British...
, Suriname
Suriname
Suriname , officially the Republic of Suriname , is a country in northern South America. It borders French Guiana to the east, Guyana to the west, Brazil to the south, and on the north by the Atlantic Ocean. Suriname was a former colony of the British and of the Dutch, and was previously known as...
, and Mauritius
Mauritius
Mauritius , officially the Republic of Mauritius is an island nation off the southeast coast of the African continent in the southwest Indian Ocean, about east of Madagascar...
, all of which have sizable Indian populations.
Plot summary
At the beginning of Part I, Tyler addresses the general audience. His intention for telling the story of Mala is in hopes that the book will eventually reach Asha Ramchandin, Mala’s long-lost younger sister. Mala is an aging, notoriously crazy woman suspected of murder. She was ordered to Paradise Alms House after the judge found her unfit to stand trial.Part I opens with Mala first arriving to Paradise Alms House. She is heavily sedated and kept under physical constraint. All of the nurses are afraid to attend to her because of her infamous reputation. Tyler, being the only male nurse in the nursing home and a subject of gossip and scrutiny for his alternative sexuality
Sexual orientation
Sexual orientation describes a pattern of emotional, romantic, or sexual attractions to the opposite sex, the same sex, both, or neither, and the genders that accompany them. By the convention of organized researchers, these attractions are subsumed under heterosexuality, homosexuality,...
, is immediately drawn to her. He cares for her and slowly gains her trust. The first sounds that Mala makes are perfect imitations of cricket
Cricket (insect)
Crickets, family Gryllidae , are insects somewhat related to grasshoppers, and more closely related to katydids or bush crickets . They have somewhat flattened bodies and long antennae. There are about 900 species of crickets...
s, frogs, and species of birds. However, she does not speak.
Then Tyler begins to tell the story of Mala’s dad, Chandin Ramchandin, which he had heard from his Cigarette Smoking Nana. Chandin’s father was an indentured field labor from India
India
India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...
. At an early age, Chandin became the adopted Indian son of Reverend Thoroughly, a white man, in exchange for his parents’ conversion to Christianity
Christianity
Christianity is a monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus as presented in canonical gospels and other New Testament writings...
. The Reverend also wanted to adopt an Indian child in hope to have closer connection with the Indians in Paradise
Paradise
Paradise is a place in which existence is positive, harmonious and timeless. It is conceptually a counter-image of the miseries of human civilization, and in paradise there is only peace, prosperity, and happiness. Paradise is a place of contentment, but it is not necessarily a land of luxury and...
. Growing up, Chandin found himself madly in love with Lavinia, the daughter of the Reverend and, therefore, his "sister." Attractive and beautiful, Lavinia brushed off all attention from boys and remained in the company of one girlfriend, Sarah, who happened to be Indian and the only other girl in the seminary
Seminary
A seminary, theological college, or divinity school is an institution of secondary or post-secondary education for educating students in theology, generally to prepare them for ordination as clergy or for other ministry...
school. When Chandin grow into a fine young man, he decided to confess his love to Lavinia. Lavinia firmly rejected his love and announced that she would be leaving for the Shivering Northern Wetlands in three days. Later, Chandin had heard the news that Lavinia was engaged to her distant cousin in Wetlands. Heartbroken yet trying to conceal his feelings, Chandin announced that he has fallen in love with Sarah and wanted to marry her.
Then began Mala’s life. Chandin traveled around paradise with the Reverend, spreading the gospel
Gospel
A gospel is an account, often written, that describes the life of Jesus of Nazareth. In a more general sense the term "gospel" may refer to the good news message of the New Testament. It is primarily used in reference to the four canonical gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John...
and encouraging more conversions to Christianity. Sarah gave birth to two daughters, Pohpoh (Mala) and Asha. In the meantime, Lavinia had returned to Paradise with the news that she broke off her engagement. Lavinia visited Sarah often since they are childhood friends and Chandin again begin to feel the sting of Lavinia’s unattainability. One day, Pohpoh caught Lavinia and Sarah in a moment of intimacy. Eventually Chandin had also notice the unusual affection between his wife and Lavinia. He confronted Sarah. In hope to be with each other, Lavinia and Sarah decided to elope together with the children. However Chandin unexpected returned home early on the day of the planned escape. In the mist of confusion and screaming, Pohpoh and Asha were left behind with their enraged and demented father.
After the news spread of his wife leaving her with another woman, Chandin gave up his religion, his God, and began to drink heavily. Then one night, he raped Pohpoh, his eldest daughter. The sin continued in which every night he would call one of his daughters into bed with him. During the day, the children went to school like other children but, at night, they lived under the sexual tyranny of their father. Pohpoh had a childhood admirer and friend, whom she called her Boyie. One day, she seduced him in his mother’s house but stopped right before sexual intercourse. Back in the nursing home, Mala begins to have visitors, Otoh and his father Ambrose Mohanty. Ambrose was Mala’s Boyie.
Part II of the novel further traces the development of the relationship between Mala and Otoh, a plot line that interweaves with one of Mala’s memories of Pohpoh. In the memory, Pohpoh sneaks out of her father’s home, enters another house, and returns safely, all the while being “protected” by the adult Mala. The memory is rich in detail about the nature that Pohpoh feels, smells, and hears, since the entire time she is covered in darkness.
At the same time that Mala is reflecting on her quite vivid recollections of Pohpoh, Otoh begins to work up the courage to come see her. His father Ambrose had taken up an almost constant sleep and only awoke once a month to prepare provisions (a source of contention with his wife), which Otoh would then deliver to Mala. During one such delivery, Otoh dared to enter the Mala’s yard dressed in his father’s old clothes. Mistaking him for Ambrose, Mala dances with him and then takes him inside to show him the long-decaying body of her father. Terrified, he ran away and collapsed on the street outside. When he recounted what he had seen, the police came into Mala’s house and investigated. Upon discovery of the body, they arrested her and prepared her for a court visit. However, before the police had a chance to retrieve the body from Mala’s house, Otoh decided to make the rather decisive move (especially in comparison to his father) of burning down Mala’s house.
Parts III, IV, and V of the novel are all significantly shorter than the first two sections. Part III provides a flashback
Flashback (narrative)
Flashback is an interjected scene that takes the narrative back in time from the current point the story has reached. Flashbacks are often used to recount events that happened before the story’s primary sequence of events or to fill in crucial backstory...
to the budding romance between Ambrose and Mala after he returned from studying in the Shivering Northern Wetlands, culminating in their act of making love. Unfortunately, it is that same day that Chandin realizes his daughter’s affair and, as a result, abuses and rapes her severely. The next day, when Ambrose returns, there is a confrontation between all three. Ambrose runs away during the conflict, leaving Mala to lock her father’s unconscious body in a room downstairs. Part IV of the novel includes the discovery that Ambrose’s wife has left him and an explanation by Ambrose to Otoh that murdering her father had driven Mala mad. She attacked Ambrose anytime he tried to visit. Part V provides a sense of resolution to the novel with the discovery of several letters sent from Asha to Mala that were never delivered and the subsequent attempt by Tyler to contact Asha through this book.
Themes
Imaginary space: Lantanacamara is an alternative social image. It is not tied down by real geographies or maps. Furthermore, it is not limited to the spaces named by colonial rules and mapped by ColonialColonialism
Colonialism is the establishment, maintenance, acquisition and expansion of colonies in one territory by people from another territory. It is a process whereby the metropole claims sovereignty over the colony and the social structure, government, and economics of the colony are changed by...
cartographers. This paradise known as Lantanacamara is not a known space understood from an African Safari perspective nor conformed to any colonizer's epistemic norms.
Identity: The individual assertion of one's autonomy
Autonomy
Autonomy is a concept found in moral, political and bioethical philosophy. Within these contexts, it is the capacity of a rational individual to make an informed, un-coerced decision...
over social norms can be illustrated through Asha Ramchandin, who is strong enough to leave home and search for a new life. Tyler himself in the end openly expressed his affection with Otoh in front of the judgmental crowd of nurses.
Diaspora: The book is filled with flash backs and with Mala's story being told in a first person narrative by Tyler, whom himself is struggling with his gender identity that mirror the transformation that Mala undergoes in reclaiming her self-image. The story is broken by time of present and past, just like a person in diaspora
Diaspora
A diaspora is "the movement, migration, or scattering of people away from an established or ancestral homeland" or "people dispersed by whatever cause to more than one location", or "people settled far from their ancestral homelands".The word has come to refer to historical mass-dispersions of...
are torn between their present home and past home.
Secrets: Every character in the book has a skeleton in their closets: Mala's abusive and secretive childhood, Chandin's secret passion for Lavinia, Sarah and Lavinia's love affair, the mysterious disappearance of Chandin, Otoh's 'unnoticed' sex transformation, and Tyler's sexual identity.