As time progressed, Manon’s hatred for her husband only equaled her disdain for her slave. Sarah soon bore a son to Manon’s husband while Manon never reproduced. Because of conventional marriage customs and rights of slavery, both women, in essence, become property to the same man. As a wedding gift, Manon’s aunt gave her a young slave, Sarah, to accompany Manon to her new plantation home. Manon Gaudet is a young wife in a loveless marriage to a bankrupt, cruel planter in 1828 Louisiana. What is property? Is it a tangible thing you own? Or could it be something else – a spirit, a soul, a sense of freedom? In her Orange Prize-winning novel, Property, Valerie Martin explored the essence of property, ownership and freedom, using slavery and antebellum marriage to examine these themes. “That is precisely my grievance,” I explained. “Would the fact that the servant I brought to the marriage has borne him a son, and that this creature is allowed to run loose in the house like a wild animal, would that be, in your view, sufficient cause for a wife to despise her husband?”
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