a magnificent distraction

Sadly, this is only the second or third time I've seen this movie (despite the fact that I own it). However, it was really good, as usual. So, the first time I saw this film was during a summer film class in my MA program where we focused on auteurship and Spike Lee films. That means that when I watch it, I'm always remembering those issues of shot-type, camera angles and lenses, film stock, and general composition. This time around, with a little bit of distance between me and the film, I was struck by the artistry of many of the shots. There's a particular sequence that occurs when Malcolm X is first gaining serious popularity. In this sequence, we're hearing a voice over of one of his more famous speeches, and we're seeing images of him sitting on a bed in a hotel room watching actual footage from the Civil Rights Movement (and the events leading up to it). In this sequence, every time we see Malcolm the camera is slowly zooming closer and closer on his eyes so that by the end we've moved from a full body shot to an extreme closeup of his eyes (and those iconic glasses). I never paid much attention to this sequence before -- most likely because I was busy watching the newsreels and trying to figure out the context of those events (which I'm much more familiar with now that I've just finished all the readings on the African American literature portion of my reading list, and since I've taken a couple of classes that touched on the historical and cultural context of that era) and wasn't able to really look at what Lee was doing with it. I think it's a really nicely done sequence that helps to help the viewer understand the complexity of the situation Malcolm X was in -- preaching the ideals of one belief system while watching the real-world occurrences he was trying so hard to help people overcome.

Okay, so on a far less serious note, I enjoyed the use of wide-angle lenses throughout the film, and the colors and stylization of the entire opening portion (with its bright colors, choreographed movements, and elaborate wardrobes). Great film -- I'll have to revisit it more often.

I haven't read this book since I taught it the last time -- which was about 3 years ago, I believe. It's a powerful story, and one that never ceases to frustrate me throughout the reading. Walter Lee just drives me crazy...until the end, that is. But this time around I found him a lot more bearable. I'm not sure what's changed in me to find more understanding for me, but it was a different reading experience this time. Mama seems to be the only character who sees what's happening to him, and while I still get annoyed with him when he keeps cutting Ruth off and not letter her share the news of her pregnancy with him, I also found myself much more sympathetic to his plight than I have been before. While I still think he's quite a selfish character in some ways (most obviously, when he uses not only his own portion of the insurance money, but Beneatha's as well), this time around I also realized he's quite a generous character -- in his own way. He doesn't see his actions as being potentially harmful or cruel -- he honestly believes that his plan can succeed, that he might be able to help his family, to improve their situation. When he explains himself at one of his low points, he tells Mama:

Sometimes it's like I can see the future stretched out in front of me -- just plain as day. The future, Mama. Hanging over there at the edge of my days. Just waiting for me -- a big, looming blank space -- full of nothing. Just waiting for me. But it don't have to be. (73-74)

His hopefulness comes through here. His potential despair -- the ability to see this huge and empty future just waiting to swallow him up -- isn't able to squash his hope. He still sees the possibility for happiness, for success, for something other than nothingness. I think this is why later on, when he hits his lowest point, it's so painful to watch him wallow in his hopelessness. After Asagai's last visit, Walter Lee's pride is gone and he tells Beneatha:

You and that boy that was here today. You all want everybody to carry a flag and a spear and sing some marching songs, huh? You wanna spend your life looking into things and trying to find the right and the wrong part, huh? Yeah. You know what's going to happen to that boy someday -- he'll find himself locked in a dungeon, locked in forever -- and the takers will have the key! Forget it, baby! There ain't no causes -- there ain't nothing but taking in this world, and he who takes most is smartest -- and it don't make a damn bit of difference how. (142-143)

This is the low point, and what I failed to see in previous readings was just how utterly defeated Walter Lee was. I don't think I fully appreciated what it was he lost in this scene -- what it was that had to die inside of him before he could speak these words. But this time around, I realized why Mama was so profoundly saddened by this speech, and why Beneatha wanted to sever any links connecting her to the man who spoke these lines: Walter Lee lost his moral compass, his pride, his integrity -- everything that made him a decent and honorable person; he lost his humanity. This time around, I think I finally got Hansberry's message.

First impression: Reed's novel reminds me of Gerald Vizenor's writing. It's incredibly complex, dense, and crazy -- and he makes up his own language. Just as Vizenor talks about Postindian survivance and trickster tales, Reed talks about mumbo jumbo and HooDoo culture. I loved it. I can't wait to read more Reed -- he's amazing. A new favorite!

Okay, so my more intelligent-sounding thoughts? Yikes, where do I even begin. I hate to say it, but I feel like I was just skimming the surface with my understanding of what was happening in this book. I mean, I got the basic storyline, but there was so much going on all at once that I felt like I was in a little over my head. But I'll do my best. I think the end of the novel was really the crucial part, as far as what Reed wanted to accomplish here. I mean, the idea that the Jes Grew pandemic was sweeping the nation, making everyone sing and dance and have a good ol' time (and that these longstanding white-based organizations wanted so desperately to stop it that they [plot spoiler!!] enacted the Great Depression just to shut it down) was entertaining and an interesting thought experiment (I don't mean that in a demeaning way). But it was really the end when Papa LaBas and Black Herman went to arrest/apprehend Hinkle Von Vampton and Hubert "Safecracker" Gould that we get the full backstory of Jes Grew and the deeper historical implications of the fight against this "disease." And of course, you know I'm always a fan of this kind of historical rewriting -- Reed takes all these ideas and cultural elements traditionally attributed to European (read: white) progress and turns them on their heads by illustrating how they all stem from African (Egypt, in most cases). This is another move that made me think of Vizenor, just because I think both authors are doing something similar here: the move to claim credit for the invention of these things (and to discredit other things, like Jesus...who I believe they referred to as a charlatan) and to expose the theft of African culture by Europeans is a way of decentering the West and pointing out that western ideas of "civilization" have in fact led to widespread barbarity throughout history, and that there's something wrong with the histories we tell ourselves about the past.

In any case, you have to read this one! It's really quite incredible, and while it's dense and took me a few days to read, it was well worth it! I may end up an IR junkie, adding him to my list of greats like Gerald Vizenor, Karen Tei Yamashita, and JK Rowling (yes, I just lumped all those authors together).

When the blurb on the back cover said Dutchman was "designed to shock--its basic idea, its language and its murderous rage," I suppose I still wasn't really expecting what happened. I mistook Clay's impassioned rant as the shocking event, only to discover that (plot spoiler!!) the truly shocking event was Lula's murder and her complete lack of affect during and following this act. During Clay's rant, though, I think the politics of Baraka's work really comes through. This is not to say that I think Baraka actually believes that murder is the ultimately solution to the problems of African Americans, but I do think this rant is intended to snap the audience out of any sort of comfortable place they may have allowed themselves to fall into and to confront them -- violently, in a way -- with one side of this situation and a very powerful statement that race relations are not what some people would like to say they are, and that there is still a very present and deeply felt problem in modern-day America (especially give the play's original performance date of March 24, 1964). For me, the point at which Baraka's drama really hit me over the head with its vehemence was toward the middle/end of Clay's speech when he says:

If Bessie Smith had killed some white people she wouldn't have needed that music. She could have talked very straight and plain about the world. No metaphors. No grunts. No wiggles in the dark of her soul. Just straight two and two are four. Money. Power. Luxury. Like that. All of them. Crazy niggers turning their backs on sanity. When all it needs is that simple act. Murder. Just murder! Would make us all sane. (35)

While I don't believe Baraka meant these words literally, the idea itself is extremely powerful: all one group of people needs to cure them of their forced insanity is to eliminate the other group. The two cannot coexist -- not in the way they have been, anyway. I think what makes this play all the more gripping is the fact that the problem is clearly nowhere near being solved. Clay's body is dumped off the train -- by the other passengers, not by Lula! And when the play ends, she's at it again with the Young Man who walked onto the train right after everyone else made their mass exodus. Haunting is about the only word I can think of to describe it, but it doesn't come close to being a strong enough word for that label.

This collection isn't my favorite by Hughes, but it's still high quality poetry...by which I mean it gets me thinking about Hughes' themes and characters (yes, characters, despite the fact that it's not a narrative poetry collection). The repeated idea of a dream deferred crops up throughout this short collection; my favorite of these instances is the poem "Deferred" (413-4) in which a hodgepodge of voices come together to voice their little wishes, their everyday dreams that have had to be put off. The sometimes grand but mostly simple wishes (owning a television set, buying a white enamel stove that has been desired for decades, passing an exam, etc.) are so poignant, perhaps because of their juxtaposition with each other. Nobody's asking for a million dollars or a tropical island -- they're asking for things that many people consider creature comforts (things taken for granted by those who aren't struggling to get by). This poem, more than the others about hopes and dreams that have been put off out of necessity and survival, really brought home the point about what can happen when we put these things -- large and small -- on hold in order to attend to the day-to-day realities of living.

I also particularly enjoyed the poem "Mellow." This poem struck me not because of its subject matter, but because of the imagery and the beauty of the language itself:

Into the laps
of black celebrities
white girls fall
like pale plums from a tree
beyond a high tension wall
wired for killing
which makes it
more thrilling. (405)

It definitely embodies some of the underlying tensions running throughout the collection -- tensions surrounding race and sexuality. However, it isn't one of the poems that focuses on Harlem (as so many of these poems do) or on what it means to be an average Joe living in Harlem in the post-WWII era of financial strain, racial discrimination, and everyday dangers.

This novel made an interesting statement about history. Ursa's position in life is compressed by the collective histories of her Great Gram, her Grandmama, and her mother and their relationships with men (most significantly, the Portuguese slave owner, Corregidora). Instead of being able to live her own life, Ursa's life is driven by the women in her family and their instructions to her to produce "generations" and pass their histories down to those generations. However, because of this history that is constantly bearing down upon her, she's unable to truly give herself over to love. Granted, I wouldn't really deem the men in her life as being worthy of her love, but it seems like she's unable to love fully even when she thinks she wants to. Jones' decision to (plot spoiler!!) put Ursa in the situation where she is physically incapable of bearing her generations complicates her life by bringing into question not only her purpose in life, but also the way she lived her life up to the point at which Mutt's abuse caused the loss of her womb. By putting this particular character into a situation that prohibits her from passing on her history, her origins, Jones' novel interrogates the significance of history in the lives of contemporary African American people. Ursa's character has been damaged by her history; she lives her life simultaneously attached to the man who enslaved her great-grandmother and her grandmother (Corregidora, whose name she retains even in marriage and whose photograph is one of her few possessions) and also hating him (spreading word of his misdeeds and evil ways to those in her life). However, when Mutt's jealousy results in the loss of her womb (and her unborn baby), she is forced to reevaluate her life and the relationships she's had. She eventually seeks out her mother's history, which has also been buried beneath the Corregidora history, as a means by which to find a way to live her life outside of Corregidora-history. I guess what I'm trying to say is that Ursa's life is a testament to the need to move forward, even though her family history is important and shouldn't necessarily be forgotten or erased.

On another note, I must admit that Ursa's character was a bit difficult to get along with. She reminded me of Alice Walker's character, Celie, in The Color Purple in that both Ursa and Celie often fail to react visibly to the people around them. However, where Celie gave the reader an indication of her emotions, Ursa's character is far more distant and often remains frustratingly impenetrable even to the reader, leaving us as much in the dark about her emotions as the other characters are. While this was somewhat unpleasant to endure (especially as a reader who likes to have a close relationship with the protagonist), it did seem to serve a purpose: the reader had no more insight into Ursa's interior than Mutt or Tadpole or Cat. In fact, while Ursa was relatively likable, she was also somewhat irritating (in a manner similar to Arvay in Zora Neale Hurston's Seraph on the Suwanee) in that she seemed to have some closed-minded views (especially regarding Cat and her sexuality) that were in such stark contradiction to what the other characters deserved that it was sometimes difficult to follow her through her life. Overall, though, I think Ursa's lack of transparency further illustrates the way she was raised to fulfill a singular purpose: make generations, pass on the history of Corregidora. Her emotionless style of living reflects the history she's supposed to rail against, but has actually allowed to become part of her. Just as her Great Gram was forced into prostitution by Corregidora and her Grandmama was forced into concubinage by the same man, so Ursa has -- like her mother before her -- given up the part of her that can allow her to freely give her love and resigned herself to a life of sexual captivity. The men in her life use her sexuality against her, and eventually she comes to realize that she'll have to play their game. This makes me uncertain of what to do with the ending. I'll admit that it seemed...out of place. I didn't think she'd ever (mega plot spoiler!!) go back to Mutt, and I certainly didn't think she'd do it in the way she did. I'm not sure if I should be happy because I think she might have regained control of her own sexuality, or if I should be unhappy because Mutt's still getting her to do what he wants her to, and she's still stuck trying to figure out what it is that will please him. I want to say it's the former, but I think it might actually be the latter.

I read two stories from this collection: "The Final Inning" and "Whose Song?" Both stories deal with the issue of homosexuality within African American culture (here, they're specifically situated in the Bronx) -- but they go about it very differently.

In "The Final Inning," the formal aspects of Glave's writing are especially interesting. He uses a lot of parentheticals and colons and dashes in unusual ways as Greg examines his own thoughts, emotions, and sexuality. For example, when Greg reacts against the word "faggots" his thoughts are interrupted by other thoughts (also his), which Glave writes as "couldn't you keep it downtown with all them downtown faggots ( -- :don't call them that: -- ) that came up to the funeral?" (166). Because Greg's character is in a state of mental and emotional distress throughout this story, these unusual punctuations serve to highlight that distress and his continual mental interruption is expressed through parentheticals and sentence fragments isolated by dashes and the nontraditional use of colons. Greg also makes up words, or combines them (as you will). For instance, his son is of extreme importance to him, and he is described several times throughout the story as holding onto Greg Jr. "tight tighttight" -- a repetition and combination of words that focuses down on the action.

In "Whose Song?" the idea of song comes up constantly: a nightbird's song, a sorrow song, a blue song, a homie's song, a song unheard, a shadowrain song...the list goes on. Mixed in with all the kinds of songs are all kinds of musical ideas -- melodylessness, screaming, singing, etc. The juxtaposition of this musicality with the utterly depressing and dark plot events makes the idea of song -- of rising above, of drowning beneath, of bringing the soul out into the air in song -- seem fleeting and ungraspable. It also makes the happy moments seem really far away (especially since their songs are described with tender and nostalgic language) and feel like they're being crushed beneath the weight of the dark moments of the present (which are described with violent and harsh language). It's a troubling story, a deeply disturbing look at the ways people are damaged and how their pain can be used to damage those who have not been hurt in the same ways...yet.

This collection was, as you can imagine, easier for me to follow (since it's "narrative poetry" and therefore each poem or group of poems revolves around a defined plot with specific characters). I really enjoyed this collection, actually -- especially the longest poem in it: "Epic of Song" (which is actually composed of 23 shorter poetic segments). I thought the characters in this poem were actually really complex, and that Star's exploration of her sexuality was made all the more interesting because of the many factors playing into it -- her relationship with Candy, who is at once her first female lover and her boss; her relationship with Evalena, who is her coworker and lover, but also her friend; her desire to succeed as a musician, which becomes more complicated once Candy dies -- that illustrated the complexities of any relationship. I'm not sure I like how that is phrased, but I can't think of a better way to say it, so there it is. Anyhow, I enjoyed the rest of the collection as well -- not just the one poetic sequence. Clarke's poetry seems most interested in exploring female relationships (sexual or otherwise). Her poems are not formatted according to any highly formal poetic style, but they flow smoothly and with a rhythm of their own. Well, since I'm so "bad" at reading poetry, I can't think of much more to say about this collection despite the immense enjoyment it gave me and the interest I have in how Clarke is approaching her larger themes within this body of work.

I can't remember the last time I read this novel, but I know it was nearly a decade ago. It's funny, but I remembered where the title came from (an African American girl who wished for blue eyes) but not the rest of the plot. I found myself very interested in the way Morrison employed the sort of revised Dick-and-Jane narrative throughout the novel. The first two pages of the novel are a brief Dick-and-Jane story that is repeated three times -- the first in its normal format, the second without punctuation, and the third without punctuation or spaces between words. This reading, I realized that when she opens certain chapters with sections from these first two pages, the snatches of Dick-and-Jane narrative she opens the chapters with actually bring something to bear on the plot events of those chapters. In other words, she takes this seemingly-innocent child's story and brings it to bear on the rest of the novel. When she uses an excerpt from it to start a chapter, it highlights one aspect of that chapter and brings the reader's attention into focus around that aspect of the chapter. For example, she includes the following snippet at the beginning of a chapter in which we meet a woman whose relationship with her cat is more important to her and more intimate than her relationship with her husband and that with her son:

SEETHECATITGOESMEOWMEOWCOM
EANDPLAYCOMEPLAYWITHJANETHE
KITTENWILLNOTPLAYPLAYPLAYPLA (81)

Interestingly, she often uses these passages ironically. For instance, the chapter where we learn that (plot spoilers ahead!!) Pecola's mother doesn't really like her children, and that she prefers the little white girl whose family she works for, we get an excerpt that reads:

SEETHEMOTHERMOTHERISVERYNICEMO
THERWILLYOUPLAYWITHJANEMOTH
ERLAUGHSLAUGHMOTHERLAUGHLA (110)

By situating this passage at the beginning of the chapter, Morrison foregrounds the mother-daughter relationship that will become so crucial in this chapter. The fact that Pecola's mother doesn't like her children and resents Pecola for her ugliness from the day she is born becomes extremely ironic in light of this passage that includes a laughing and playful mother. The irony is stronger and harder to deal with in the chapter about Pecola's father, Cholly. The opening excerpt (132) includes a big, strong, smiling father. This portrait of familial happiness is grossly distorted as the chapter leads up to Cholly's rape(s) of his own daughter. The way Morrison writes the passages so that they're bleeding together also lends a certain creepiness to them. The repeated lines, such as "laugh, Mother, laugh" turn into zombie-like commands that make the passages erie instead of cheerful. This mood permeates the entire novel, and really makes the reader see just how wrong things have gone in Pecola's life. The twisting of the Dick-and-Jane narrative underlines the twisting of "normal" family roles (parents as loving protectors of their children) so that the world these children live in becomes distorted -- a minefield of dangers where dangers should not exist.

I struggled my way through this book, to be perfectly honest. That's not to say that it wasn't a good read, but that it was difficult after finishing Seraph on the Suwanee (which was a much more absorptive read) and dealt with subject matter that I'm less interested in (i.e. religion). However, there's a lot that I gained by reading this novel. Tying it in with the other African American novels I've read recently, it seems to be part of a larger body of work that's interested in interrogating the religious values that are so much at the heart of the culture by focusing in on different characters. Baldwin seems most interested in religious hypocrisy, which becomes most apparent in John's father, Gabriel. Gabriel is a kind of preacher, but he's not really living a life that would be considered in accordance with the teachings of the Bible. His sister, John's Aunt Florence, says it the most directly at the end of the novel when she reveals her knowledge of Gabriel's unclaimed (and now dead) son; she chastises Gabriel and tells him how his life is really working as she sees it:

"Yes," said Florence, watching his face, "you didn't give her no bed of roses to sleep on, did you?--poor, simple, ugly, black girl. And you didn't treat that other one no better. Who is you met, Gabriel, all your holy life long, you ain't made to drink a cup of sorrow? And you doing it still--you going to be doing it till the Lord puts you in your grave." (243)

These sentiments are at the heart of the novel, and crop up throughout it (although this is the place where they become the most explicit). There is a wide variety of characters - in both the past and the present -- who have vowed to live a good life according to the Bible only to find themselves in situations where doing what their hearts want and doing what Christianity dictates are completely at odds with one another. The fact that Baldwin situates the most vile character of the novel (Gabriel) as a man of the cloth while simultaneously situating decent, good characters (Deborah, Elizabeth, Florence) as perceived sinners and fallen women highlights the hypocrisy he's so interested in exposing.

It's also interesting that Balwin chooses to explore these issues through a boy who's just turned 14. John's story begins and ends the narrative, with his (foster)father's, mother's, and aunt's stories coming in the middle of his story. The entirety of Part Two is actually analepsis taking place during the evening worship where John will eventually endure his own struggle with his faith. I think part of what this accomplishes is that we're seeing a boy whose entire family -- the good and the bad -- has essentially failed at merging their own happiness with their faith, and here's John who is struggling with his own inner turmoil and trying to decide which direction his own life will take. In the aftermath of Part Two, it becomes clear that John's struggle is somewhat unrealistic. Each of his role models has been through the same struggle, and each has fallen (in their own eyes). How can John possibly succeed? And I think this is the question Baldwin wants the reader to leave with. If he wanted the reader to be more optimistic, why would he include that final exchange between Elisha and John, during which John implores Elisha:

John looked at his father an dmoved from his path, stepping down into the street again. He put his hand on Elisha's arm, feeling himself trembling, and his father at his back. "Elisha," he said, "no matter what happens to me, where I go, what folks say about me, no matter what anybody says, you remember--please remember--I was saved. I was there." (252)

 Despite the apparent attainment of salvation, John's words speak of uncertainty, or even of a kind of conviction that it will not last. He has no choice but to enter his house again -- the same house where he lives with his mother and his (foster)father, and where he is beaten and his mother is beaten and his brother is beaten. And it doesn't look hopeful. It doesn't seem like it's going to last, and John's own words indicate his awareness of this.

Honestly, I haven't read Hurston for over ten years...and even then, it was Their Eyes Were Watching God that I read (not that I actually remember anything of that novel, unfortunately...perhaps after I finish my exams I'll give it another go). I must admit that it wasn't what I thought it would be. I suppose I've gotten too used to movies and TV and the way they kill off, traumatize, and generally destroy their characters at the drop of a hat. I spent half the novel worried that something was going to happen to Arvay and/or Jim (something horrible and criminal), and can only admit my extreme relief upon reaching page 352 and finding that they made it out alive. And, what's more, happy! Okay, okay, enough of my emotional reactions to this novel. I was really intrigued by the way Arvay's prejudices and preconceptions were confronted for the entire novel. At first, her unusual notions seemed to be simply naive reactions to her own happiness. However, as the novel progresses and Arvay is forced to deal with people from all different walks of life and cultural and racial backgrounds, her stubborn ignorance becomes obvious (and aggravating) to the reader. Because we have no choice but to experience Arvay's thoughts and emotions, we have no choice but to at least tolerate (if not accept or understand) where she comes from and try to consider what it means to be so used to your own way of thinking that you can't see the flaws of the thing.

While that's interesting, and I certainly think Arvay is a sympathetic enough character to allow most readers to be on her side (even if she frustrates them to no end), there was another aspect of the novel that was...troubling: Jim's treatment of Arvay (this could be broadened to a more general discussion of male/female relations, but I'll stick to Jim and Arvay). From the beginning, he seems to know more about her than she does about herself, as evidenced by his little stunt with the turpentine in her eye. This is okay, even if it does rub me the wrong way just a little bit, but where it started getting flat out weird for me was on the day of their marriage. When Jim rapes Arvay, she comes back for more and realizes her love for him. Years later, Angelina's beau tells her that she'd better be careful or he'll rape her, and she tells him that she's going to help him rape her. But that's not Arvay and Jim. There are many smaller instances -- moments where he patiently (and patronizingly) tolerates her ignorance and intolerance -- but the next major instance occurs shortly before he leaves her when he makes her strip and stand before him, naked, scrutinizing her (and humiliating her) and never giving any explanation or justification for his cruelty. I don't really know what to make of all these little problematic moments sprinkled throughout the text, but I know that there's something going on with gender and relationships that's problematic. For now, that's about as far as I can puzzle out about it.

Finally, Hurston's sending some strong messages about religion. It's not my favorite topic to discuss, so I'll keep it short, but basically Arvay's clinging to her Bible (and her gross misinterpretations of its contents) is shown in an almost entirely negative light. Jim comments on this several times, and Carl Middleton (her brother-in-law) illustrates the same principle. I'm not sure whether the overall message is a kind of religion-is-bad sentiment, if it's more focused around religious hypocrisy, or if it's more about the inadequacy of religion in some respects. It's strange. It's interesting. That's all.

Angelou's poetry is a lot easier for me to follow than other kinds of poetry (ahem, lyric poetry, ahem) because each poem tells a story. I know, I've said this before. I think I might have said it for each and every last one of the poetry collections I've written about in this blog. Well, there it is -- the bare truth. I like narrative poetry. So, back to Maya Angelou.... Of course, her poems are also different in that the stories they tell are not always of a specific individual, but of a somewhat abstract, more general individual. Oftentimes, the poems appear to be about African Americans in general (as opposed to a specific person), which is of course highlighted by Angelou's interest in the African American experience, history, and culture. Take the title poem, "Still I Rise." It's a good example of a lot of the things I've been talking about here. While the narrative "I" appears to be an individual, the poem is general enough that there are no specifics about this person other than their race (African American). The last two stanzas provide a good example of what I'm talking about:

Out of the huts of history's shame
I rise
Up from a past that's rooted in pain
I rise
I'm a black ocean, leaping and wide,
Welling adn swelling I bear in the tide.

Leaving behind nights of terror and fear
I rise
Into a daybreak that's wondrously cear
I rise
Bringing the gifts that my ancestors gave,
I am the dream and the hope of the slave.

This poem also brings up the unique rhythms Angelou uses. Okay, so maybe I can't call them "unique" so much as I can say they're not conforming to any rigid forms of poetry (sonnets, ballads, etc.) but instead have a rhythm all their own. She uses a lot of rhyming in her poems, but she seems to like to play with how she uses rhyme. It's not always coming in the form of rhyming couplets or rigid internal rhyme scheme. Instead, it's (again) a very rhythmic rhyming that is tailored to each specific poem. Within one poem, she might switch up the rhyme scheme from stanza to stanza. She does this in "Life Doesn't Frighten Me" -- some of the end rhymes (the -all sound, for instance) occur throughout the entire poem rather than just one stanza, while other end rhymes come in and out for single instances. The first stanza reads:

Shadows on the wall
Noises down the hall
Life doesn't frighten me at all
Bad dogs barking loud
Big ghosts in a cloud
Life doesn't frighten me at all

Obviously, here the rhyme scheme is fairly simple. However, the third stanza is different:

I go boo
Make them shoo
I make fun
Way they run
I won't cry
So they fly
I just smile
They go wild
Life doesn't frighten me at all.

Here, not only is the rhyme scheme different (rhyming couplets, essentially), but the structure is different enough that it could appear to be from a different poem entirely. The 3-words-per-line format is interesting, and reminds me of Gwendolyn Brooks' "We Real Cool" in the way it truncates language and makes its own kind of linguistic sense. Suffice it to say, I enjoyed this collection immensely (a true feat for a poetically intimidated reader like myself).

The last time I read this book, I was a senior in high school. I figured I wouldn't really remember the story, despite the fact that I remember liking it, but I was wrong. As I read, I continued to recall characters' names before they were introduced (most especially Shug Avery), and to have an inkling of what direction the events were headed in. However, my pseudo-vivid memories of the novel also made me realize just how much of it went over my head when I read it way-back-when.

I think what made the novel stick so firmly is the depth of the characters. They're so vivid, more so than even Ellison's characters (who had nearly 600 pages to develop). This is especially true with Celie, of course, since she's the one writing most of the letters and we get her inner perspective much more than the other characters. But the character dynamics are probably the most interesting thing to me in this novel. The way their relationships continue to shift and grow in new directions is fascinating, and the way their lives become increasingly connected is also really interesting. I know, I know..."fascinating" and "interesting" are such vague terms. Let me see if I can clarify. The way Walker weaves together her characters' lives and their always-changing romantic ties to one another seems to be a great feat of verisimilitude on the one hand (because in real life, this constant shifting is always occurring) and idealistic on the other (because all the characters find happiness in their relationships by the end of the novel, which entails a great deal of open-mindedness and acceptance on a level that not all characters actually seem capable of). But the way that the characters change and mellow with age is certainly what keeps the story interesting to read.

To be frank, I love a story with a happy ending, and so this tale appeals to me on that level. However, I think it's really difficult to write a believable happy ending (much more so than to craft a believable unhappy ending), and Walker has mostly succeeded on that front. It's not a conventional happy ending, as Disney would most likely want to have; instead, it's a complicated ending with lots of twists and turns, lots of history, and lots of personal growth for each character. In this sense, I think Walker did an admirable job with it because the ways different characters changed and grew over time was quite believable in most ways.

As for the novel's form, well, someone told me that it's the first epistolary novel in the African American tradition. As such, I find it interesting to look at exactly who Celie is addressing her letters to. For the first half of the novel, all the letters are addressed to God. Ordinarily, this would be quite straightforward...except that Walker complicates even this in the second letter of the novel. Celie writes that when her mother asked her where her first baby came from, she replied that it was God's. Of course, it was her stepfather's, so this calls the "God" of the letters' addresses into question. Lending further suspicion to this idea is the fact that when she refers to her stepfather in these early letters, she calls him only "He" -- with a capital H just like in the Bible when God is referred to with the same capitalized pronoun. Is Celie, in fact, writing these letters to her stepfather? It's a question I have no answer to, especially when Celie and Shug have their discussion on religion and the reader is privy to Celie's ideas of what God looks like (a very large and very old white man with lots of hair).

A veritable tome of a book, but what a story. From the very beginning, I couldn't put it down. Ellison's unnamed narrator tells a compelling story, even though he's not particularly lovable. His various flaws generally serve to make him more human, and to make the reader wish he would have his eyes opened sooner rather than later so he can get on with his life.

One thread that caught my attention was the one having to do with fighters. From the very beginning, the narrator illustrates his ability to fight. Whether you want to consider his example from the introduction (where he talks about beating up a man only to realize the man can't see him because he's invisible) or the instance where he goes to give his graduation speech and becomes entangled in a physical fight with the other boys who were brought there for that purpose, fighting is a crucial part of his life. It's through his first fight (the latter instance mentioned above) that the narrator gets his precious briefcase -- that symbol of so many things. When he takes Mr. Norton to the Golden Day -- the decision that ends his formal education -- the entire bar becomes a roiling fight (even though he stays out of it this time). When he gets his first job, he fights Lucius Brockway the same day he is injured and has to be hospitalized. When he gives his first planned speech, it's at an old arena where years ago a prizefighter "had been beaten blind in a crooked fight, [a] scandal that had been suppressed, and [...] the fighter had died in a home for the blind" (334). When he comes up against Ras the Destroyer, it's in a fistfight in the dark streets. And finally, when he becomes invisible (or really realizes his invisibility) it's as he runs from a fight, flees from Ras' men, falls into the coal pit, and is shut out from the world. I'm not sure exactly what to make of all the fighting imagery except at the most obvious level: the narrator has to fight for every important step in his life. He has to fight for his very life at times, and he continues to struggle rather than to give up. It's only when he truly flees from a fight that he sinks into invisibility...falls into that near-lifeless state his life is in when the novel ends.

Perhaps the most intriguing thread of this novel was what the unnamed narrator's grandfather said on his death bed, which continues to haunt the narrator throughout the story. He said,

"I never told you, but our life is a war and I have been a traitor all my born days, a spy in the enemy's country ever since I give up my gun back in the Reconstruction. Live with your head in the lion's mouth. I want you to overcome 'em with yeses, undermine 'em with grins, agree 'em to death and destruction, let 'em swoller you till they vomit or bust wide open." (16)

This, of course, leaves an impression on the narrator, but he continues to think that the whites are going to think he's a traitor when in fact it's his own people he's treacherous to all along...it just takes him some time to figure it out. His struggle with this cryptic bit of advice from an old and dying man serves as a kind of marker of his progress as he works his way through his own life. The various ways he considers his grandfather's words indicate his mindset and his guiding principles each time he ponders this outburst.

This novel reminded me a lot of the kind of sea tales that were popular in the 1800's (like Melville's Benito Cereno) as well as of The Rime of the Ancient Mariner. In other words, I liked it a lot even though it read like a story from a different time...which is appropriate, I suppose, since Johnson set it in the 1830's.

One of the things the novel really asks the reader to think about is the transformative nature of the Middle Passage. Throughout Rutherford's journal entries, it becomes increasingly clear that he is not the same person. At times, he mentions this explicitly, but at other times he observes it in others or simply says things that he wouldn't have when he was in New Orleans. While the cruelty of the slavers and the suffering of the Africans is obvious, Johnson doesn't choose to focus on it as much as he focuses on the ways that suffering alters the core of everyone's being. When we see the way that (plot spoiler!!) Rutherford has changed at the end of the novel, when he's with Isadora and aboard a gambling ship, Johnson's message becomes clear: the Middle Passage altered the world. Everyone was changed by it. Everyone was affected, nobody walked away without feeling at least some of its impact. I think Johnson's working really hard to make a huge statement about humanity with regards to slavery.

Throughout the entire novel, different characters are in bondage to other characters in a variety of ways, and this is part of how Johnson approaches the issue of slavery -- by showing the many ways people keep others under their power. There's Papa and his underworld of crime (and Rutherford is indebted to him with his life), there's Isadora and her money (Rutherford is also indebted to her), there's Falcon and his ship (he's bound to Papa while his crew is bound to him), Santos and Jackson (both of whom have bound themselves to their masters -- Falcon and Reverend Chandler, respectively), there's Belaka (whose mother has bound her to Rutherford, and who Rutherford has bound himself to), and of course there's the Allmuseri (who are literally enslaved by Falcon and his crew). By creating a world in which everyone is connected to everyone else, and (more importantly) everyone is somehow indebted to, bound to, or held captive by someone else, Johnson complicates the historical outlook on slavery. There's a moment that reminds me of what Butler was doing in Kindred in this novel:

"During a storm, you could never relax, be overconfident, or let fear show upon your face. You developed what Cringle called a 'flood mentality'--that is, you were always prepared to have water high as your waist. During each crisis, every action had to be aimed at helping your fellow crewmen. You cold not afford to tire. Your duty was always to insinew your ship; if you hoped to see shore, you must devote yourself to the welfare of everyone, and never complain, and constantly guard against showing weakness. Looking back at the asceticism of the Middle Passage, I saw how the frame of mind I had adopted left me unattached, like the slaves who, not knowing what awaited them in the New World, put a high premium on living from moment to moment, and this, I realized, was why they did not commit suicide." (186-7)

Just as Butler used her strong female protagonist to address the question of why there weren't more uprisings during slavery (not that there weren't any, or weren't many), Johnson uses his African American protagonist to explore a similar issue with newly enslaved Africans traveling to America under horrible conditions. In many ways, Johnson's work is preoccupied with issues like this, most of them relating back to moral codes...but that's for another day.

What an interesting premise -- I'm really interested in the conflation of past and present, the active role required by the protagonist to ensure her own existence, the interaction between contemporary life and history. I had a concern that Butler's novel had the potential to turn into a thought experiment with little depth or serious consideration of the matter. However, it definitely was much more than a simple thought experiment. Instead of just asking what might happen if a modern African American woman suddenly found herself in the antebellum South, Butler pushes the novel to get at some much deeper issues. For instance, she interrogates the idea that African Americans accepted their slavery when they could have fought harder and gotten out of it by showing how her characters (even a modern American woman) are coerced into their roles on top of the physical threats and dangers as well as the legal and vigilante repercussions surrounding any "disobedience." By giving Dana a white husband, Butler further complicates the situation by forcing the reader to consider the situation from both sides of the color line. It would have been interesting if she had made her protagonist an African American man who happened to be married to a white woman, but it also would have changed the entire plot (obviously). I did find myself wishing for this at some points just because Kevin's race lent itself so easily and simply to the master/slave structure, and because Dana's role as caretaker sometimes rubbed me the wrong way (to be fair, these are my own anti-domestic issues coming out, not anything Butler did).

I remain fascinated by Butler's decision to have the time shifts come about in moments of near-death. I'm still a bit puzzled by it, but find it interesting that she chose to focus in on these dangerous moments -- these times when the characters feel that they are in mortal peril. It's interesting that Rufus finds himself in these situations as often as (or more often than) Dana (if she were allowed to live her own life without being pulled back into her past). I was also curious about her decision for Dana to never reveal her ancestry to Rufus, even when (plot spoiler!!) he was about to try to rape her. Perhaps it's unreasonable to expect that to have made a difference for him, but it's also something that felt like a loose thread.

One last thing: Butler selected Rufus and Dana with great care, and the results are this complex novel filled with moral gray moments. By beginning with Rufus as a boy -- a boy who clearly has the potential to be kind and treat people fairly -- Butler emphasizes the deep structural racism of American culture in the antebellum South and the ways that even kind-hearted white people might ultimately be nurtured out of their natures (if that makes sense). Also, but thrusting a strong contemporary African American woman back into the past and gradually forcing her into slavery, she confronts certain notions (as discussed above) that attempt to justify slavery (to an extent). Also, by illustrating the many physical and emotional forms of coercion placed upon each slave (as recognized by the increasingly helpless Dana -- made more and more helpless as she comes to care deeply for the other African Americans on the plantation), she brings the reader to an understanding of the many pressures and dangers facing all of them.

This collection is definitely haunting. At first, I was kind of enjoying the content, since each of the poems is quite narrative (always a plus for me, since I struggle with poetry, especially of the lyric variety)...but then I reached "A Bronzeville Mother Loiters in Mississippi, Meanwhile, a Mississippi Mother Burns Bacom" and realized that it was about Emmett Till. From that point out, the poems veered toward the serious and solemn, and the violent and dark. Not a good collection for me to read at night...in the dark...because I'm a total wuss.

Anyway, Emmett Till and the ensuing events continued to haunt the collection every few poems as Brooks touches on the legal aspects of the trial and the verdict, the impact of his death on his mother as well as on the family of the man who murdered him, etc. Given the book's publication date (1960) and the date of Emmett Till's murder and the trial's conclusion (1955), it seems reasonable to assume that the dark undercurrents woven throughout the entire collection were strongly influenced by the young boy's murder. The subject matter of the poems is oddly highlighted by the almost sing-song rhythm and rhymes of Brooks' poems. This rhythm doesn't mock or undermine the content, but instead adds to the melancholy mood.

I've read novels in verse before, but none quite like this. The poetry of Moss' novel really comes from the language (as opposed to the form, although that's there as well). The image of a young slave woman stitching her words onto cloth and wearing them like petticoats is beautiful, but Moss has created so many layers of meaning around these layers of fabric. On one level, there's the idea that this is a woman writing her way to freedom. On another level, she's practicing an act that is forbidden, and is going about it in a poignant and deliberate manner. On yet another level, she's defying Peter Perry by taking something he wanted her to see (the luna moth) and transforming it into her own idea (the cloth diary). Then, on top of all of that, there's the luna moth itself: a creature that has an extremely short life span, that transforms itself via cocoon, and that cannot be contained for very long. This final layer has so many implicit meanings -- Varl-as-moth, novel as bildungsroman of sorts, slavery as a possession of the body but not the mind/will, etc. Suffice it to say, the novel is accomplishing many things and tackling many different issues through this one title image.

On a completely different note, the novel has a definite preoccupation with deformity -- what Varl classifies as not only physical difference (because it's not always a "deformity" despite her continued use of that word) but also emotionally twisted situations. There are several characters who might be classified as "abject" (as Kristeva use the term) -- including Albino Pearl and Dwarf Sully, who have natural differences; Jessper, who inflicts her own difference with the iron (thereby making her suddenly "interesting" to Peter Perry); and Mamalee and Varl themselves, who are intellectually different in their intelligence and their level of education. But more important to the core of the novel is the emotional deformity (depravity?) that surrounds Peter Perry. Varl describes him as a "collector" of unusual slaves, which is why he continues to search for these abject figures to bring to his homestead. Then again, he also thrives off of his mother-in-law's death, charging people to see the hive that honeybees have made of her rotting corpse. And most significantly, there are his relationships with the women in his life: his scholarly relationship (which Varl sometimes speculates goes beyond exchanges of words) with Mamalee, his neglectful/disdainful relationship with Ralls Janet, and his oddly desirous yet abstinent (for the time being) relationship with Varl. In other words, throughout the novel, Peter Perry is depicted as the one who has the deformity (rather than those around him) because of his twisted approach to life. Even at the end, when he (plot spoiler!!) renames Perryville "Varlton" it becomes clear that the entire thing is a kind of experiment he's performing to observe what happens with the three main women in his life (Mamalee, Varl, and Ralls Janet). In other words, he's sick. Or, to use Varl's word, he suffers from "extreme deviancy."