What Is Sophie's Guilt

There are two recurring themes in the novel Sophie’s Choice by William Styron, which is love and guilt and they lead to the death of the protagonist. In the novel, the love Sophie has for those who mean the most to her shapes her life and the guilt she possesses leads to her own demise. The narrator of the novel is a graduate of Duke University and an aspiring writer who gets close to his roommates Zofia (Sophie) Zawistowski and Nathan Landau. As Stingo grows closer to Sophie, he learns about her dark past in the concentration camp, how she and Nathan met on one faithful day, the destructive relationship between Sophie and Nathan, and the dark guilt she has kept for many years.
In the novel, Sophie has to choose between her two children on which child goes into the concentration camp, and which child gets to be gassed immediately. But, the question is: How did she get into this predicament? The answer is Sophie’s love for her mother. One fateful night changed the course of her life and her children. “I got caught smuggling for a reason which may
seem very absurd. I got caught smuggling meat into Warsaw… It was completely forbidden to possess meat… But I risked this anyway and tried to smuggle the meat so as to help make well my mother.” (Styron, page 155). At the time, Sophie’s mother had Tuberculosis and she wanted to smuggle meat to make her feel better but, the Gestapo caught her and sent her to the concentration camp Auschwitz. Auschwitz was an extermination camp which was originally used for Polish citizens and it was the largest concentration camp (history.com). In the end, Sophie’s mother died a few months after the event. Since Sophie loved her mother, she risked her life to smuggle meat, which is not allowed, to feed her mom whose health is failing. If Sophie did not risk everything for her mother, she would not have ended in the concentration camp and she would have to make a choice which engulfs her with guilt.
Sophie met and fell in love with the seemingly normal Nathan Landau, but as time progresses, she learns that he is not as normal as she and Stingo thinks. “ …I don’t have to explain to you, do I, that Nathan came to be like a brother to me… And then out of nowhere-out of the … blue, Sophie- he turns on me like a snarling dog with rabies.” (Styron, page 334). Nathan is a munificent1 paranoid schizophrenic who drinks and has a propensity2 to use cocaine, Nathan also abuses Sophie physically and emotionally when he has his mood swings. Despite the way he treats her, she never left his side. In the novel, Nathan saves Sophie’s life after she vomits at the public library by sending her to the hospital and paying for all of her medical expenses. Nathan fell in love with Sophie and from that moment forward, Sophie stayed with Nathan. “And we made love all afternoon, which made me forget the pain but forget God too, and Jan, and all the other things I had lost. And I knew Nathan and me would live for a while more together.” (Styron, page 376). By interpreting this quote, the reader can infer the reason why Sophie loves Nathan, and it is because Nathan makes her forget the pain and suffering she endured in the concentration camp, he also makes her forget about the unbearable guilt.
“ ‘You may keep one of your children’, he repeated ‘The other one will have to go.
Which one will you keep?’” (Styron, page 529). This question marks the beginning of Sophie’s guilt. Sophie deals with insurmountable guilt daily, the guilt has to deal with the decision she made at the concentration camp based on this question. When she was asked the question on which child goes to the concentration camp with her and which child is killed immediately by gassing. If she does not choose, both children are sent to the gas chamber. When Sophie says “ Don’t make me choose, … I can’t choose.” (Styron, page 529) the doctor states “Send them both over there, then,” to the aide and that is when Sophie calls out “... Take my little girl!” Sophie is filled with the guilt of sending her daughter to the gas chamber and letting her son live in the concentration camp with her. The memory of this event haunts her until she commits
suicide. At the end of the novel, Sophie and Nathan commit suicide. Stingo found the two lovers on a bedsheet laying down dead. Sophie agreed to commit suicide because she could no longer live with the guilt that she was forced to live with for many years. She lost her loved ones at the concentration camp and her children based on the choice she had to make. Sophie could not live without Nathan so it seems as if death is her only option. The combination of love and guilt ended in Sophie’s death.