The modern classic novel “The Help”, set in the 1960s, follows the stories of African-American maids working in white households. Aibileen, a wise older maid, her best friend the coarse Minny, and a collection of other maids tell their stories of working for white women to Eugenia “Skeeter” Phelan, an up and coming journalist searching for something new and unexplored. Among all of these strong personalities is Celia Rae Foote. Celia is a Marilyn-Monroe lookalike born and raised in Sugar Ditch, a rural Mississippi town, and one of the most impoverished places in the United States of America until the early 1990s. According to Minny, Sugar ditch is “..as low as you can go in Mississippi, maybe the whole United States.. I saw pictures in the
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This is largely because of her marriage to Johnny Foote, the ex-fiance of Hilly. As made clear in the novel, Hilly is the queen bee of Jackson, and she uses her influence to keep the other women from befriending Celia. The terms of Johnny and Celia’s marriage are not quite modest, as it seems to have been mostly due to the fact that she was pregnant with his child. In addition to this, Celia’s tight clothing is seen as distasteful by the other women, although it is much to the enjoyment of their husbands. The collection of these things keep Celia isolated from the Jackson community. She is a lonely woman who spends her days home alone, and in acts of desperation phones the Benefit women every day with no response, shows up to their houses, and attends (and makes a fool of herself at) the yearly Benefit party, the largest social gathering in Jackson. She is prone to debilitating bouts of depression, which are due to her many miscarriages. This is because she places her worth as a wife in her ability to bear Johnny’s children, which appears to be impossible with her fourth miscarriage occurring in the novel. However, she eventually realizes that Johnny loves her for who she is, despite her inability to reproduce or to keep a
This is largely because of her marriage to Johnny Foote, the ex-fiance of Hilly. As made clear in the novel, Hilly is the queen bee of Jackson, and she uses her influence to keep the other women from befriending Celia. The terms of Johnny and Celia’s marriage are not quite modest, as it seems to have been mostly due to the fact that she was pregnant with his child. In addition to this, Celia’s tight clothing is seen as distasteful by the other women, although it is much to the enjoyment of their husbands. The collection of these things keep Celia isolated from the Jackson community. She is a lonely woman who spends her days home alone, and in acts of desperation phones the Benefit women every day with no response, shows up to their houses, and attends (and makes a fool of herself at) the yearly Benefit party, the largest social gathering in Jackson. She is prone to debilitating bouts of depression, which are due to her many miscarriages. This is because she places her worth as a wife in her ability to bear Johnny’s children, which appears to be impossible with her fourth miscarriage occurring in the novel. However, she eventually realizes that Johnny loves her for who she is, despite her inability to reproduce or to keep a