I started out not liking the writing style of this book at all. This is the first Proulx book I’ve read, but if her other books are written in the same style, she is the queen of both the sentence fragment and the comma splice. I get that some of the sentences were supposed to be news headlines, and I found that to be clever. However, not all of them were and it truly was like fingers on a chalkboard to me. After a few chapters, though, I found the storyline very compelling. The characters were well drawn, and I was sympathetic to their life situations. I discovered that I wanted to keep reading so I could learn what happened to them.
Quoyle and his family go from the States back to Newfoundland, which is where his father was originally from. Everyone there knows about the Quoyles and it isn’t all good. Quoyle is a kind man, but a bit of a bumbler, or so he thinks. He has a job at the local newspaper writing about car wrecks and the shipping news. (I could have done without the detailed newspaper reports of the s*x abu se cases.) He takes care of his little girls, Bunny and Sunshine, as well as his aunt. Or is his aunt taking care of him? (I was fascinated by her character, especially the certain incident with the outhouse!) All in all, it’s an engaging domestic drama taking place in a freezing, unforgiving climate.
In the end, I still didn’t like the writing style, but I did enjoy reading about this family and Newfoundland. I’m now looking forward to viewing the movie adaptation.
1993, 337 pp.
Rating: 3.5
Winner, Pulitzer Prize
Winner, National Book Award
The Known World by Edward P. Jones has not only won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, but also the NBCC Award and the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award.
Jones really knows how to write his characters. Each one was very clearly defined. I won’t give away too much of the story here but will write a brief overview.
Henry and Caldonia Townsend are slave owners who are black themselves. Henry’s father had freed himself and his wife, and then later Henry. While Henry was still a slave under William Robbins, he became somewhat of a favorite, and was later instructed by Robbins on how to be a proper slave owner. Henry builds up quite a plantation but then dies unexpectedly. How Caldonia, along with her overseer Moses, runs the plantation afterward forms the rest of the novel.
Several issues are presented in the book. Whites’ attitudes towards blacks, both slave and free; the function of “the law;” men’s attitudes towards women (and vice versa); and the question of how and why blacks could own slaves themselves.
This is a very well-written book, and I struggled on whether to rate it a 4 or 4.5. There is some content in the book that downgrades it slightly for me. Consider it a very high 4.
Jay Follett, a dutiful husband and father, travels to his parents’ home because his father is dying. On his way back to his wife and children, he is killed in a car accident. The reaction to this tragedy by his family is told with heartbreaking prose. I was especially moved by the thoughts, feelings, and actions of his son, Rufus. This novel was largely autobiographical for Agee as his father died in a car accident when he was six years old. Sadly, Agee himself died of a heart attack at the age of 45, leaving behind young children of his own.
This novel profoundly touched me as my own father died of heart complications at the age of 44. The death of someone so young affects a family very deeply for many years. It is a tragedy I hope few people have to experience.
I read this for the Banned Book Challenge, and I can definitely see why people would be against it. Some of the themes include incest, rape, lesbianism, language, and drug and alcohol use. I’m not saying it should be banned–just that if I had a teenage daughter, for instance, I would want to read and discuss it with her.
All of the above (and more) happen to Celie, the main character in the book. By contrast, Celie tries to protect her sister Nettie, and Nettie ends up going with a missionary family to Africa. We see Celie and Nettie both grow in different ways through what happens to them. They are separated for 30 years but do keep in contact through letters. It is appalling, really, what men can do to women. This type of novel is always hard for me to read, but sometimes I do think it is necessary for me to venture out of my protected little world into the very unprotected world of other women. If only to appreciate and thank God for what I do have and to pray for and help other women whenever I can.
Daphne – May 22, 2007
I read this either right before or right after the movie came out. Even though, as you say, parts of the book are somewhat disturbing, I thought it was a wonderful story about the human spirit.
Fond of Books – May 23, 2007
I just finished this book yesterday. I had always loved the movie and I loved the book also. I was surprised to see the relationship between Shug and Celie, in the movie it made it seem a one time thing, but of course in the book it goes on for years. However part of me was happy for her just to find love. And after all that had happened to her, I don’t think she could have ever loved a man.
Anyway, a wonderful book!
~rebecca
I loved this book. I loved the writing. It isn’t a heartwarming book, but it is a thoughtful one. These “diaries” chronicle Daisy Goodwill’s life from her birth in 1905 to her death in 199? (we aren’t told the exact year). Each chapter of her life is told from her point of view, although in the book (and sometimes even in a single sentence) she switches back and forth between 1st and 3rd person. We learn of her childhood, her marriages and children, loves and losses, work and leisure, and finally her old age and death. The “chapters” made me think of my own life stages so far and the ones that are to come. All of us have a similar beginning and ending, but it’s the middle that makes life interesting.
There were many, many beautiful passages in this book. I’ll leave you with one as an example of the excellence of Shields’ writing:
Something has occurred to her–something transparently simple, something she’s always known, it seems, but never articulated. Which is that the moment of death occurs while we’re still alive. Life marches right up to the wall of that final darkness, one extreme state of being butting against the other. Not even a breath separates them. Not even a blink of the eye. A person can go on and on tuned in to the daily music of food and work and weather and speech right up to the last minute, so that not a single thing gets lost.
Carol Shields died of cancer in 2003. She was a gifted writer, and I definitely plan on reading more of her works.
"Do not labor for the food that perishes, but for the food that endures to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give to you. For on him God the Father has set his seal." (John 6:27, ESV)
I started out not liking the writing style of this book at all. This is the first Proulx book I’ve read, but if her other books are written in the same style, she is the queen of both the sentence fragment and the comma splice. I get that some of the sentences were supposed to be news headlines, and I found that to be clever. However, not all of them were and it truly was like fingers on a chalkboard to me. After a few chapters, though, I found the storyline very compelling. The characters were well drawn, and I was sympathetic to their life situations. I discovered that I wanted to keep reading so I could learn what happened to them.
The Known World by Edward P. Jones has not only won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, but also the NBCC Award and the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award.
