Isolation vs. Imprisonment

The main difference between isolation and imprisonment is that isolation seems self-imposed whereas imprisonment is isolation beyond one's control.

Both Desdemona and Lefty are imprisoned by the impenetrable confines of their small village and thus turn to one another as an outlet for their desires. Eugenides illustrates this desperation when he refers to them as "a man and a woman, in lonely and pressing circumstances." He also succinctly describes the cycle of imprisonment on such a small island when he writes, "no one to love: no love. No love: no babies. No babies: no one to love."

Desdemona seems similarly imprisoned by her own desires, phenomena Eugenides refers to as "periphescence." She attempts to curb the feelings of "giddiness, elation," and "fever," that erupt whenever she's with Lefty, but she's ultimately imprisoned by her own sexuality and a slave to these emotions. Lefty is similarly imprisoned by his feelings for Desdemona, illustrated by how he prays to God for deliverance from his supposed perversion. Cal contemplates how much of his grandparent's feelings were chemically based, referring to the "heart's rigged game" as if one is biologically imprisoned by desire.