Many critics of My Mother's Autobiography have pointed out the unrealistic aspects of Xuela's extremist character. Her lack of remorse, her emotional detachment, her love of the dirty and "unclean," and her all-consuming need for total control over everyone and everything around her give her an almost mythical quality. A more complete and humanistic character would have doubts and flaws that Xuela does not seem to possess. In light of Xuela's deep resentment of authority, stubborn love of the degraded and unacceptable, intense rejection of the "master-slave" relationship, and, above all, her hatred of British and British culture, many critics have embraced the idea that Xuela is highly symbolic of the conquered and colonized races whose blood constitutes hers. There are many complex parallels between Xuela's character and the collective psyche and culture beliefs of the "conquered" races of Dominica. Yet, instead of sinking into despair, Xuela refuses to graciously accept her lot in life. She soon rejects the imposed cultural perception of herself as inferior. Her description of her elementary school teacher is prescient: "a woman of the African people, who I could see, and found in this a source of humiliation and self-loathing, and wore desperation like an article of clothing, like a cloak, or a stick on which he constantly leaned, a birthright that he would pass on to us" (15). Xuela then explains the distinction between Africans and Caribbeans in his Dominica. "My mother was a Caribbean woman, and when they (the class ) mi they looked this is what they saw. The Caribbean people had been defeated and then exterminated, thrown away like weeds in a garden; the African people had been defeated but had survived. When... halfway through the paper... den. She understands this, although Xuela also possesses a deeply rooted need for control over her personal kingdom, likely caused by her hatred of the British's control of Dominica, as well as her unhappy childhood. Above all, Xuela makes loving herself her life project and, as one reviewer notes, "she does so with remarkable dedication" (Mead 52). a temple for her, a place to feel safe and loved. Xuela says she loves herself out of necessity, because the world she lives in is cruel and has little love to give her. Xuela's character is difficult to accept, from any point of view. . She is almost inhumanly resilient and her hatred of all things Western and white is all-consuming. For these reasons Xuela is sometimes seen as an abstraction, a symbol of the suffering of an entire people.