review of JAMES by Percival Everett

 

James by Percival Everett

Several people in our book group at Grand Living recommended this book, including my wife. It is a quick and enjoyable read, especially if you remember a little bit of your reading of Huckleberry Finn a long time ago.  James re-imagines that book with Jim as the main character. He becomes a James who develops into a man of intelligence and courage as he struggles to search out the meaning of friendship, how to become a father to Huck, and how to find his wife and family, who have been sold off to another owner after he has been declared a runaway.

Jim finds the world he needs to become “James” by sneaking into Judge Thatcher’s office and learning to read by studying the books he found there. The power of the word is made clear. As he says, “If I could see the words, then no one could control them or what I got from them. They couldn’t even know if I was merely seeing them or reading them.”  The impact of this was completely subversive.  The dialect of the original is deftly satirized so that as Jim finds his voice, he learns to speak “white” when necessary, which confounds most of the whites he encounters.

 Whole chapters are chock-full of sardonic humor, as when Huck and Jim meet a Minstrel company and end up with Jim being blacked up to impersonate a white man who is impersonating a black man. A bit later on, Jim teams up with a light-colored negro to work a wild confidence game. The light-skinned negro impersonates a white man and sells Jim as a slave. As soon as the money is collected, Jim promptly escapes. One memorable quote comes to mind here.  “After being cruel, the most notable white attribute was gullibility.”

The good humor and satire never allow you to escape the physical and sexual violence that accompanied slavery. The rope and whip are never far away. Virtually every black back carries the scars of bloody stripes and the rape of a black woman by her owner is given a terrifying  treatment.  Throughout the book, you are encouraged to think about what it means to be a slave and how not having freedom can destroy the soul of both the free and the enslaved. It is a fascinating companion to the original classic.

I give it a 5 out of 5.

 

  

Review: The King's Messenger by Susanna Kearsley

Kearsley, Susanna  THE KING’S MESSENGER

I wish to report today a truly happy discovery. It is an enchanting novel by Susanna Kearsley titled The King’s Messenger.  If you like historical fiction, it is based on an office that dates far back into English history. Andrew Logan is a fictional King’s Messenger during the reign of James 1^st of England or James VI of Scotland in the early 1600’s and he is a deeply thoughtful, and complex character with a dark secret. He is assigned to find and bring, Sir David Moray, a real historical figure, to London from Scotland to be interrogated and probably executed by the King or some of his scheming accolytes. A fictional scrivener is assigned to accompany Andrew and because he is not in good health, his daughter (also a fictional character) goes along. A young fictional stableboy named completes the traveling group and the interplay amongst them makes for a true love poem.

The book is fiction, but it delves deeply into a true historical mystery—the fate of the young Crown Prince Henry, son of James 1st and his Queen Anna. Did he die an early and natural death by disease or was he poisoned by the King and and/or his minions. Each new twist draws you deeper and deeper into the characters and their connection to the scheming going on above their station. I was taken especially by an overnight stop made by the group that was set inside one of the old mile forts on Hadrian’s Wall.

 

From the author: History is composed mostly of “people of name.”  Authors try to give significance to the “none else” of name by creating memorable people with complex, even heroic lives who never made the history books. This novel is full of them.

Sir David fond of quoting Marcus Aurelius   “We have but a little time upon this earth. If we do not take the chances we are given, they will go and we will go and not return.”

Definitely a 5 out of 5