In Yaa Gyasi’s composite novel Homegoing, themes of gender, race, and colonization are tackled through Gyasi’s ‘broken’ novel structure, in which she portrays overlapping generational stories, rather than a single, unified narrative. Gyasi prefers to tell the stories that popular American history has erased and ignored over the centuries, and attempts to dig into themes that other neo-slave narratives have not yet reached. One such theme is that of the queer experience in nineteenth-century colonized Africa. In popular American culture, historical narratives from ‘the colonized’ tend to focus on the extreme hardships (such as violence, injustice, and bondage), rather than the seemingly less drastic burden of sexual confusion on a teenage boy. …show more content…
As this novel does many times, Quey’s narrative makes many random chronological shifts that carefully piece together his memories. He reflects on his upbringing in the castle, recalling his isolation and dissimilarity to other children. Quey was teased for his skin color, and even his own mother noted she was worried because “he has no friends” (Gyasi, 54). Quey finds a friend and confidant in Cudjo, another boy who lives in the castle. As the boys grow up, Quey starts to notice Cudjo’s bodily changes, and develops a very strong respect and admiration for him. Although Gyasi does not write in first-person, each chapter’s omniscient narrator seems to revolve around the thoughts and of only one individual, so the conclusion could be made that Gyasi’s narrations are reflections of what that character is noticing about the world around them. This connection is particularly strong when Gyasi is describing Quey and Cudjo’s pubescent growth spurts. “Quey grew four inches in one summer, while Cudjo grew muscle. His legs and arms rippled, so that sweat flowing down them looked like cresting waves. He became known far and wide for his wrestling prowess.” (58) By quickly pointing out this intimate and erotic description of Cudjo, Gyasi is providing a hint as what is to come in their relationship, as we know that Quey is the one who is noticing those …show more content…
Quey’s anxiety about the reunion shows the reader that he still has a deeply-rooted attraction to him, although never explicitly stated. This attraction seems to have been forgotten on Cudjo, who is clearly not as nervous. As we are offered a glimpse into his thought stream, we see that Quey is preoccupied with questions about Cudjo. “Why had Fiifi told Cudjo that Quey wasn't married? Had Cudjo asked? How could Quey be welcomed in Cudjo’s village? In his own hut, like a third wife? Or would he be in a hut on the edge of the village, alone?” (65) As Quey daydreams about the possibility of a future with Cudjo, the audience fully realizes the dead-end situation that he is in. We know that Cudjo will never accept him as a lover, so the fantasies that Quey is having are completely impossible. By the end of the chapter, Quey realizes the impossibly of his situation as well – he decides that he will never go to Cudjo’s village. This specific love story is given very little attention compared to other love stories in this text, due to the fact that is Quey’s repression of his sexuality is mirrored by the absence of words in the text. Gyasi’s omniscient narrations work as as reflections of our main character’s thoughts, so by dedicating very little space in the novel to this story, she is saying that this topic would have very little space in the mind of someone in the
Galchen creates the character of her narrator to be very similar to that of the young narrator in “Araby” in a modern setting. In their youth, each narrator becomes infatuated and obsessed with someone who does not realize. The narrator of “Araby” falls in love with his friend Mangan’s sister, as seen in that he states that “when she came out on the doorstep [his] heart leaped” (123). He forms an obsession with her, as evidenced by the fact that he “had never spoken to her . . . and yet her name was like a summons to all [his] foolish blood” and in that “her image accompanied [him] even in places the most hostile to romance” (123).
After months of brooding, Quoyle discovers that Wavey’s late husband, like Petal, was unfaithful and emotionally abusive. Quoyle then initiates an emotional conversation with Wavey and finally is able to accept that his relationship with Petal was unhealthy. Wavey, too, confesses her husband’s infidelity and the two connect more deeply (307-308). They are uniquely situated to understand one another’s burdens – grieving the loss of a lover while simultaneously feeling relieved by the loss of a tormentor. The two can be happy together and still acknowledge the grief that may never fully disappear. Their meeting was facilitated entirely by Quoyle’s journey. It is unlikely that he would have ever met a woman with whom he had enough in common to accept his loss had he remained in his old
Slavery is a term that can create a whirlwind of emotions for everyone. During the hardships faced by the African Americans, hundreds of accounts were documented. Harriet Jacobs, Charles Ball and Kate Drumgoold each shared their perspectives of being caught up in the world of slavery. There were reoccurring themes throughout the books as well as varying angles that each author either left out or never experienced. Taking two women’s views as well as a man’s, we can begin to delve deeper into what their everyday lives would have been like. Charles Ball’s Fifty Years in Chains and Harriet Jacobs Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl were both published in the early 1860’s while Kate Drumgoold’s A Slave Girl’s Story came almost forty years later
In all, Tademy does a great job in transporting her readers back to the 1800s in rural Louisiana. This book is a profound alternative to just another slave narrative. Instead of history it offers ‘herstory’. This story offers insight to the issues of slavery through a women’s perspective, something that not so many books offer. Not only does it give readers just one account or perspective of slavery but it gives readers a take on slavery through generation after generation. From the early days of slavery through the Civil War, a narrative of familial strength, pride, and culture are captured in these lines.
Laurence Hill’s novel, The Book of Negroes, uses first-person narrator to depict the whole life ofAminata Diallo, beginning with Bayo, a small village in West Africa, abducting from her family at eleven years old. She witnessed the death of her parents with her own eyes when she was stolen. She was then sent to America and began her slave life. She went through a lot: she lost her children and was informed that her husband was dead. At last she gained freedom again and became an abolitionist against the slave trade. This book uses slave narrative as its genre to present a powerful woman’s life.She was a slave, yes, but she was also an abolitionist. She always held hope in the heart, she resist her dehumanization.
The notion of slavery, as unpleasant as it is, must nonetheless be examined to understand the hardships that were caused in the lives of enslaved African-Americans. Without a doubt, conditions that the slaves lived under could be easily described as intolerable and inhumane. As painful as the slave's treatment by the masters was, it proved to be more unbearable for the women who were enslaved. Why did the women suffer a grimmer fate as slaves? The answer lies in the readings, Harriet Jacob's Incidents in the life of a Slave Girl and Olaudah Equiano's Interesting Narrative which both imply that sexual abuse, jealous mistresses', and loss of children caused the female slaves to endure a more dreadful and hard life in captivity.
In the novel, the author proposes that the African American female slave’s need to overcome three obstacles was what unavoidably separated her from the rest of society; she was black, female, and a slave, in a white male dominating society. The novel “locates black women at the intersection of racial and sexual ideologies and politics (12).” White begins by illustrating the Europeans’ two major stereotypes o...
Harriet Wilson’s Our Nig is a novel that presents the harshness of racial prejudice during the 19th century combined with the traumas of abandonment. The story of Frado, a once free-spirited mulatto girl abandoned by her white mother, unfolds as she develops into a woman. She is faced with all the abuse and torment that Mrs. Belmont, the antagonist, could subject her to. Still she survives to obtain her freedom. Through the events and the accounts of Frado’s life the reader is left with a painful reality of the lives of indentured servants.
Throughout history, it is not uncommon for stories to become silenced; especially, when such a story is being told by the voice of a slave's. Slaves were not granted the same equal rights as the free men. They also were not seen as whole individuals -- worth less than the average citizen, to be sold and traded as property. Abina Mansha was a female slave whom once lived in Asante but came to live in the British Gold Coast Colony during 1876, after being sold to Guamin Eddoo by her husband, Yawawhah. As Abina claims in her testimony, her purchase was no accident. "Slavery had been abolished throughout the British Empire, a law extended into the Gold Coast in 1874. Yet ironically, the demand for laborers on the growing palm oil plantations and in the houses of those who own them means that the trade in slaves into the Gold Coast does not dry up following the war" (Getz and Clark, 2011, p. 6). Abina And The Important Men: A Graphic History written by Trevor R. Getz and Liz Clarke, but spoken in different perspectives, helps shed light on Abina's personal lifestyle; while the date and location provides us with further insight on how the world reacted to 19th century Western culture.
Beryl Markham’s West with the Night is a collection of anecdotes surrounding her early life growing up as a white girl in British imperialist Africa, leading up to and through her flight across the Atlantic Ocean from East to West, which made her the first woman to do so successfully. Throughout this memoir, Markham exhibits an ache for discovery, travel, and challenge. She never stays in one place for very long and cannot bear the boredom of a stagnant lifestyle. One of the most iconic statements that Beryl Markham makes in West with the Night is:
I was in complete and utter shock when I began to read Disposable People. The heart-wrenching tale of Seba, a newly freed slave, shook my understanding of people in today’s society, as well as their interactions between each other. I sat in silence as I read Seba’s story. “There they [Seba’s French mistress and husband] stripped me naked, tied my hands behind my back, and began to whip me with a wire attached to a broomstick (Bales 2).” I tried to grasp the magnitude of the situation. I tried unsuccessfully to tell myself that this couldn’t happen in modern times, especially in a city such as Paris. How could this be happening? In the following pages of Kevin Bale’s shocking account of the rampant problem of modern day slavery, I learned of more gruesome details of this horrific crime against humanity, such as the different types of slavery, as well as his best estimate of the number of people still enslaved throughout the world, an appalling 27 million.
In Harriet Jacobs Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl, the author subjects the reader to a dystopian slave narrative based on a true story of a woman’s struggle for self-identity, self-preservation and freedom. This non-fictional personal account chronicles the journey of Harriet Jacobs (1813-1897) life of servitude and degradation in the state of North Carolina to the shackle-free promise land of liberty in the North. The reoccurring theme throughout that I strive to exploit is how the women’s sphere, known as the Cult of True Womanhood (Domesticity), is a corrupt concept that is full of white bias and privilege that has been compromised by the harsh oppression of slavery’s racial barrier. Women and the female race are falling for man’s
Harriet Jacobs’ feminist approach to her autobiographical narrative Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl brought to life the bondage placed on women, in particular enslaved black women, during the nineteenth-century America. In an effort to raise awareness about the conditions of enslaved women and to promote the cause of abolition, Jacobs decided to have her personal story of sexual exploitation and escape published. The author’s slave narrative focuses on the experiences of women, the treatment of sexual exploitation, its importance on family life and maternal principles, and its appeal to white, female readers. Likewise, through the use of the Feminist/Gender Theory, issues relating to gender and sexuality can be applied to the author’s slave narrative. Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl and its lack of reception during its own time disclose the strict boundaries and unique challenges Harriet Jacobs encountered and overcame as a woman in antebellum America.
Northup, Solomon, Sue L. Eakin, and Joseph Logsdon. Twelve years a slave. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1968. Print.
The narrator alienated himself from friends and family which caused loneliness and despair, being one of the first themes of the story. He developed a crush on Mangan's sister, who is somewhat older than the boys, however he never had the confidence to confess his inner-most feelings to her. Mentally, he began to drift away from his childlike games, and started having fantasies about Mangan's sister in his own isolation. He desperately wanted to share his feelings, however, he didn't know how to explain his "confused adoration." (Joyce 390). Later in the story, she asked him if he was going to Araby, the bazaar held in Dublin, and he replied, "If I go I will bring you something.' (Joyce 390). She was consumed in his thoughts, and all he could think about was the upcoming bazaar, and his latest desire. The boy's aunt and uncle forgot about the bazaar and didn't understand his need to go, which deepened the isolation he felt (Borey).