Tetiyette and the Devil

Tetiyette and the Devil
The story Tetiyette and the devil is told by a seventeen year old girl who is telling a tale that is from a rich oral tradition of Caribbean tales. Tetiyette and the Devil begins as a fairy tale through the text “Once upon a time”. This short tale talks about a young women name Tetiyette, who is very hard to please and found no one to her likings in marriage, so she goes through all these men who are referenced as animals in the story and doesn’t like any of them based on their looks. Soon after she comes across a handsome man who is dressed in beautiful clothing, and decked out in all the gold he owned “The Devil”. Finally Tetiyette is pleased with the man and accepts her hand in his marriage. After accepting her hand in his marriage, Tetiyette’s mother says “no man can be that beautiful”. The mother then gives tetiyette a pen and handkerchief to stab her husband to see if blood flows out he is human, if slime oozes out he is a “devil”. One night she does as her mother said and slime oozed out automatically. The next morning she stabbed herself and blood flowed on the handkerchief and handed it to her mother saying the man is human and is not a liar. Tetiyette and her husband then lived on with their life’s until one day the devil was eating her up, she than started to cry out to her mother and the devil manipulated the mother by saying her daughter just doesn’t love him. She than cried out to her father and her father could care less. Her mother is concerned but couldn’t do anything about it, Tetiyette cries out to her brother “Oh, Little Brother, Little Brother! Be-air drum! The man to whom they married me, Bel-air drum! Is eating me up! Bel-air drum! Is swallowing me! Bel air drum! “(Esteves, Carmen C., and Lizabeth Paravisini-Gebert,1991 p. 3 )He then notices a change in tetiyette voice and goes to the kitchen and grabs a knife, and by the time he had reached his sister the devil had swallowed half of his sister. He slits the devil open and his sister was in one whole again.
I personally think that the author conveys this story to many single young women. The purpose of this tale is a reminder to how one loses themselves due to toxic relationships. In reference to the devil eating her up was metaphorically saying he was changing her little by little.