Childhood Hauntings

The Icarus Girl, written by Helen Oyeyemi, is a thrilling read.  Eight-year-old Jessamy Harrison is the daughter of a Nigerian mother and English father.  Jessamy has a hard time making friends at school because she often has screaming fits.  Her mother decides to take the entire family on a trip to Nigeria, where Jess makes a friend, Tilly Tilly.  When the family returns back to England, Tilly Tilly finds herself there as well and soon her visits with Jessamy become more and more disturbing.

An important part of the novel is that Jessamy had a twin sister who died at birth.  Twins are an important part of Nigerian culture and are viewed as practically sacred.  Nigerians believe that twins share a soul and if one twin dies at a young age, the surviving twin will have an imbalanced soul, according to the article entitled “The Birth of Twins” on the Horn Blend website.  In order to fix this imbalance, Nigerians will have a sculpture called an ibeji statue carved to house the spirit of the deceased twin.  I think this is why Jessamy has become such a troublesome child.  The article also stated that in Yoruba culture, twins are thought to have divine powers and the ability to hurt people that upset them.  Although Jessamy does not find out right away about her lost twin, there seems to be a greater force at work within her, which is where Tilly Tilly comes in.

Jessamy finds out through Tilly Tilly that she had a twin sister named Fern.  This startles Jessamy’s mother, as she doesn’t know how Jess could have found out about her twin.  The following quote illustrates Sarah’s (Jessamy’s mother) distress: “Three worlds!  Jess lives in three worlds.  She lives in this world, and she lives in the spirit world, and she lives in the Bush.  She’s abiku, she always would have known!  The spirits tell her things.  Fern tells her things” (Oyeyemi 181).  This leads me to believe that Tilly Tilly is Fern, who may be trying to balance their soul.  I find this to be supported in the following quote: “You have been so empty, Jessy, without your twin; you have had no one to walk your three worlds with you.  I know – I am the same.  I have been just like you for such a long time!  But now I am Fern, I am your sister, and you are my twin…I’ll look after you, Jessy…” (Oyeyemi 176).  Unfortunately this revelation only brings trouble for Jessamy.  If Tilly Tilly is Fern, that would explain why she tries harms the people who hurt Jess, whether it is her teacher or the girls who are mean to her at school, and why she tries to take over Jess throughout the novel.