Challenges Faced By Lucy Potter In Lucy By Jamaica Kincaid

In the novel, “Lucy”, by Jamaica Kincaid, the main character Lucy Potter goes against many common challenges that immigrants coming into the United States typically face. On the contrary to these “normal” immigration challenges, Lucy also comes across numerous situations of her own within her new lifestyle overseas that she wasn’t expecting. Of these challenges she faces, one of her biggest and ongoing problems, which is her connection to her life back home. She has a constant struggle dealing with her family troubles and leaving behind the life she considered to, “drown her soul”(3).

Lucy thinks that coming to the United States will not only let her achieve her independence, but also allow her to break away from the poor childhood she faced

In the beginning of the book, Lucy talks about how she was overwhelmed by her new world. She would “wish to be back where she came from”, (6), even though the conditions were poor and the people there caused her to feel such rage. The West Indies is often talked about from Lucy’s perspective in very poor taste. She had expected to escape the place she was leaving behind, but has troubles doing so. She sees her life in America becoming seemingly alike to her home. She says, “I could see the present take a shape – the shape of my past”, (90). This shows Lucy’s struggle to adjust to her new world. When a place can be so different than where one was living their whole life, it can be overwhelming and hard to take in all at once. While she is trying to alienate herself from her homeland, she keeps getting reminded of her home in some way. This makes her challenge of disconnecting herself from her family and old life even harder than she

This is not something easy for Lucy to do and becomes even harder when she hears that her father has passed away and left her mother “a pauper”, (126). The death of her father again brings her back to her childhood days, which consisted of many memories of her mother. Shortly after this incident occurred, she comes into contact with her mother and furthers her alienation from her homeland. She does this by sending a letter to her mother, which contained money and an apology for what she was going through.

Lucy finally overcomes her problems with her family and childhood. Lucy writes her mother a letter that contains an address that was “made up off the top of my head,” (140) because Lucy had finally accepted that she may never talk to her again. In doing so, Lucy allows herself to make peace and acceptance with her negative childhood. Breaking off the ties she had to her family helped to make this