How we cite our quotes: (Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote #1
As the author, I alone love her. I suffer on her account. (3.58)
Yeah, sure, but it's probably not the same kind of suffering Macabéa feels. It's more like, "Oh, I feel so bad for you!" Which, not to invalidate it, but it's not quite the same as brutal beatings and constant starvation.
Quote #2
Her aunt would use her knuckles to rap that head of skin and bones which suffered from a calcium deficiency. (3.62)
This is just hard-core suffering in the form of physical abuse. The weird thing is that later, during her visit with the fortuneteller, the narrator informs us that Macabéa "had always believed that her aunt had treated her badly for her own good" (5.396). Is there anyway to think of this early suffering as good for her? Or has it just ruined her life totally?
Quote #3
For the past twelve months she had been suffering from a persistent cold. In the early hours of each morning, she was seized by a fit of hoarse coughing, which she tried to smother with her limp pillow. (3.74)
So, yeah. Not a year-long cold; actually tuberculosis. Not to mention the rickets she developed in childhood. These are both diseases of the poor, and they're still common all over the world. It's pretty awful.
Quote #4
Sometimes before falling asleep she felt the pangs of hunger and became quite giddy as she visualized a side of beef. The solution was to chew paper into pulp and swallow it. Honestly! (3.74)
Macabéa is so hungry that she resorts to eating paper while fantasizing about beef. Moments like this are weird, because it's hard to believe the narrator talking about how happy Macabéa is when he gives us such specific details of her suffering.
Quote #5
There wasn't a trace of human misery in the girl. She carried within her an aura of innocence. (3.100)
Apparently Macabéa's innocence is so pure that she doesn't even suffer. It's like she makes her own reality—but we can't help feeling that we'd still rather have someone else's reality.
Quote #6
I'm in pain all the time. (4.301)
Weird, right? Macabéa claims that she's happy … but she's in so much pain that she has to ask for aspirin all the time. What's super depressing is that she seems to figure that this is just the way life is. You're in pain all the time.
Quote #7
Poor little Macabéa, what a terrible life you have! May my friend Jesus have pity on you, my child! How awful! (5.394)
Okay, the only good thing about Madame Carlota being a total meanie and telling Macabéa that her life stinks is that now Macabéa has hope. After all, you can't have hope for the future unless you know that something is wrong with your present.
Quote #8
Was she suffering? I believe she was. Like a hen with its neck half-severed, running about in a panic and dripping blood. Except that the hen escapes—as one flees from pain—clucking in desperation. Macabéa struggled in silence. (5.424)
Just like always, Macabéa struggles in silence. Luckily, she has the narrator to speak for her.