Poring through the pages of this book, I wondered what story line I would rant about. The book covers approximately 200 years - 7 generations of Mayfields - cramped into 560 pages. I read somewhere about the beauty of learning history without having to move from one's location.
I picked the book during a recent visit to God's country and was drawn as much by the names of its writers - Two sisters...Ntozake Shange and Ifa Bayeza - as from the history it depicted. African American History intrigues me and this was a worthy book having just met at a conference, folks 'like me' from from Haiti, Turks & Caicos, Barbados, Trinidad, St Lucia... I could not help musing as I sat through the conference or on the metro, that one of the British Empire's great experiments really did impact the world in a grand way.
The book is matrilineal with the North Star being Mah Bette; of the first set of emancipated slaves and her blood flowing through generations of strong women. The blood mingles with that of men, also portrayed in the book, but their impact is peripheral to the story, as the characters, through the generations, look back to the North Star for guidance. The family, through generations, is remarkable, resilient and strong...standing out for one another and surviving. The family is also whoever we chose to make family..."almost family" and "adoptive families" are sometimes the way we manage. I got to researching the book, read the acknowledgements and biographical notes and like many a book - though fictionalised - a lot mirrors the life and ancestry of the writers. I have always held that everybody has a story to tell. Sometimes we tell it, sometimes it passes orally down through generations and other times it dies in our hearts. The story is reminiscent of the Jefferson-Hemmings saga...some stories we take to our graves. I reckon in the complex relationships between slaves and their owners...the storyline and bloodline moves from mother to child rendering the male parent irrelevant.
I was drawn to Mah Bette, the most. Mah Bette is an enigma. She has to be, given that she is the matriarch. She is pragmatic and the thread around which her descendants thrive. How did Julius Mayfield Snr bear children with his own daughter, Betty alias Mah Bette? Wasn't that contrary to the laws of nature even in the days of slavery? What is the eventual storyline of Julius Mayfield jnr who was stolen from Mah Bette at birth and passed as heir to the Mayfield fortune? Weren't the truths of his real origins self evident? What became of Mah Bette's daughter, Elma - Did she perpetuate the bloodline? How does Mah Bette's daughter, Blanche deny her on mother, even for expediency?
The book does not dwell too much on the intrigues - the stories are told as a matter of fact - they are indeed tales of survival and betterment of oneself, by any means possible. As always, one must play to the best of their ability, the cards that one is dealt. The storyline is complex and complicated and leaves more questions than answers. Why did Tom Winrow disappear? What happened to Osceola Turner's parents. Who raped Eudora? What draws me to the book is that despite "losing" all her four children, Mah Bette is stoic and faces the challenges that are dealt her with pragmatism. She is rewarded with a fertile line and very many descendants who carry her name through 7 generations and possibly beyond.
The book does not dwell too much on the intrigues - the stories are told as a matter of fact - they are indeed tales of survival and betterment of oneself, by any means possible. As always, one must play to the best of their ability, the cards that one is dealt. The storyline is complex and complicated and leaves more questions than answers. Why did Tom Winrow disappear? What happened to Osceola Turner's parents. Who raped Eudora? What draws me to the book is that despite "losing" all her four children, Mah Bette is stoic and faces the challenges that are dealt her with pragmatism. She is rewarded with a fertile line and very many descendants who carry her name through 7 generations and possibly beyond.
Names intrigue me...each time I fill out a form, I wonder what is in a name? Osceola Turner - Turner was neither his father's name nor his mother's and Deacon Turner wasn't his blood brother. Elma Winrow - Winrow wasn't her father and in college, she went by Elma Diggs taking on her uncle's name. Deacon Turner changes his name to Deacon Holstein...taking on his wife's name. Lizzie Winrow names herself Mayfield Turner, dropping Lizzie and taking her boyfriend's name posthumously...In changing our names, we oftentimes desire to reinvent ourselves...To seek one's true identity. Sometimes we seek to remove the preposterous burdens of the names bestowed upon us. What pushed the authors to drop their "slave names" and adopt knew names when their parents and siblings didn't? Why do we, swahili speaking peoples, name our children Joy and not Furaha, Faith and not Amani, Grace and not Imani, Hope and not Tumaini? Which is one's true self...the one we choose and live or the one we are assigned? What is in a name? Why are we encouraged to pass our children with names such as Stacy, Stephanie, Nancy, Hillary, Winstone, Dieudonne, Diogratious and a multitude of other "strange" names.
Reading this book, I will never be able to pass someone without perchance marvelling that they were living a different story....Not necessarily their own but someone else's.
No comments:
Post a Comment