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Praisesong for the Widow
- Sales Rank: #162547 in Books
- Brand: Plume
- Published on: 1984-04-16
- Released on: 1984-04-16
- Original language: English
- Number of items: 1
- Dimensions: 8.00" h x .50" w x 5.30" l,
- Binding: Paperback
- 256 pages
- Great product!
Review
Throwing into suitcases all she brought with her on this Caribbean cruise, Avey Johnson knows she has to go home. She wonders why she has been dreaming of her childhood, of the months of August spent on a small island with her great-aunt. Were these dreams of the Shout Ring and her great-aunt's stories of the slave ships from Africa causing the knots in Avey's stomach? Then, forced to wait overnight in Grenada for the plane home, Avey loses herself in memories of her marriage. It had been a "successful" marriage, taking her from Harlem to Brooklyn to White Plains, New York. But now she feels that her and her late husband's financial gains were made at the cost of their history and passion for life. The next morning, as she walks on the beach in a dream-like trance, emotionally drained from her night of memories, she encounters a man about to leave on his annual trip to his native island of Carriacou. His dancing the Juba dance triggers Avey's memories, and she is talked into going with him. On Carriacou, sixty-five-year-old Avey touches again the feelings of her family, her heritage, and comes to understand, in new ways, traditions she has long forgotten and the importance of knowing - and remembering - her past. -- For great reviews of books for girls, check out Let's Hear It for the Girls: 375 Great Books for Readers 2-14. -- From 500 Great Books by Women; review by Holly Smith
About the Author
Paule Mashall is the author of Brown Girl, Brownstones, The Chosen Place, The Timeless People, Praisesong for the Widow, Soul Clap Hands and Sing, Reena and Other Stories, and Daughters. Born and raised in Brooklyn, New York, she is now Professor of English at Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond, Virginia.
Most helpful customer reviews
20 of 20 people found the following review helpful.
Odd Style, but Deeper Meanings
By Jacob Baldassini
...The occasionally brilliant wording and the solid characterization make Avey Johnson an engaging protagonist. Her journey from a confused, troubled widow on an expensive cruise to a liberated woman with deeper understanding of her cultural and familial heritage make this book worth reading. This journey is interspersed with recollections of her relationship with her dead husband. This allows the reader to empathize deeply with her plight.
On a Caribbean cruise, Avey Johnson begins to have symptoms of both mental and physical illness. Driven by needs she doesn't understand, she leaves the cruise and finds herself adrift in a tide of Patois-speaking islanders, who are all intent on a cultural pilgrimage to a neighboring island. Her meeting with an island patriarch draws her into the pilgrimage as well. There, she learns that this is the culture she abandoned at the same time she abandoned her working-class roots.
The flashbacks to her life with her husband Jay not only chronicle her life preceding the cruise but also give a greater understanding of Avey as she throws herself headlong into a mysterious journey of self-discovery. The greater familiarity with the character is one of the book's strongest points.
The reason the book only rates four stars is that its symbolism makes it inaccessible when simply read for pleasure. This is not an offense worthy of a whole star, so my actual rating is four and a half stars, or 90%.
The symbolism sprinkled throughout the book does provide constant rewards, though- like Shakespeare, you can never finish gaining new insight through re-reading.
I feel confident in recommending this book to anyone who enjoys character-driven fiction. The symbolism was made apparent to me, as I read the book as part of a writing course. With that in mind, use only as directed.
9 of 9 people found the following review helpful.
I really enjoyed this book
By A Customer
This is a sensitive and introspective account of a woman coming to terms with her husband's death and her own independance. It's a shame that we don't hear Marshall's name as often as we do Walker's, Morrison's. We hear more about Terry McMillan's vapid and superficial writing than we do about a really talented writer like Marshall!
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful.
One woman's epiphany, courtesy of a Peach Parfait a la Versailles
By D. Cloyce Smith
A widow for four years, Avey Johnson has stanchly held herself up, living in the suburbs of New York City, lonely and adrift yet mostly conforming to the expectations of her friends, associates, and three daughters. While on a cruise in the Caribbean, however, she is troubled first by a dream and then by a comprehension of the vacuity of the experience (not to mention the insistent demands of her friends to have fun, damn it), including an epiphany of sort when confronted by a peach parfait in the artificial environs of the appropriately named Versailles Room. To the angry dismay of her farcically domineering friends, she leaves the ship for good at the port of the next island, fully expecting and intending to take the next plane back to New York. But her moment of resolution leads to an emotional collapse, and in Grenada her adventures (and misadventures) truly begin.
Marshall intersperses flashbacks from Avey's marriage and memories from her childhood with scenes from her impulsive flight to Grenada and her equally spontaneous escape with a group of complete strangers to the offshore island of Carriacou. What becomes apparent to the reader, as well as to Avey, is that she has lost touch with who she is and where she came from: not only with her South Carolina roots and her days as a young adult in Harlem and on Halsey Street in Brooklyn, but also with the African heritage that her aunt had often urged on her as a child. It is not simply that she has become "too white" but rather that the process of assimilation into an unquestioning and comfortable suburban life has made her not much of anything at all.
There is a certain pedantic quality to Marshall's prose, a sporadic appeal to heavy-handed symbolism that turns the book's themes into a capitalized Message: don't abandon your roots. But the intricate portrait of Avey Johnson largely dispels the thought that Marshall is simply preaching; this is indeed a praisesong for a widow rather than a sermon for readers. In fact, if I were to choose one word to summarize Marshall's prose here it would be "visceral." The language she uses to describe Avey Johnson's collapse and reawakening is both guttural and painstaking; the reader is not simply an observer of her trepidation, mortification, and confusion but also a participant in the blank nightmare her life has become. (I can't imagine the reader that won't be squeamishly horrified when Avey's emotional troubles turn physical.) While the final destination of Avey Johnson's late-life voyage is no surprise, the path she takes to get there is both excruciating and inspiring.
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