Hi everyone, I’ve seen plenty of folks talk about James and as it’s unlikely we’re going to do a book discussion for it in the near future I wanted to start a topic to discuss.
I really didn’t know what to expect coming into it, except that I had watched the movie American Fiction which is based on Everett’s Erasure.
I read Huck Finn ahead of time and was a bit surprised (albeit pleasantly) how much the plot of James diverged from Huck Finn. There’s a lot to talk about as far as the relationship between the two books and I would love for others to jump in.
Overall I was surprised by how violent the book was. I believe that Everett was really focused on portraying the evil and absurdity of slavery, but again that’s something that’s very different between the two books which took me by surprise. The violence at the end of the book wasn’t surprising to me given the tone of the rest of the novel, but I thought adding in the Civil War was relatively random / untapped.
I also thought the emphasis on language and voice was interesting and thought it led to some of the funnier scenes which @lisa.butts also referenced in her review.
Please share your thoughts and anything about the book you’d like to discuss with others!
This book was absolutely incredible. I know I will be thinking about it for a long time. It was so well written, I could not put it down. There are scenes in the book that absolutely brought me to tears (the rape, saving Huck rather then his friend). I was not surprised by the violence. Slavery was (and is) brutal. I can not fathom how such evil could have endured for so long. The violence inflicted by James at the end of the novel was totally understandable.
I re-read Huck Finn before I read James and I think it was helpful. I thought James was brilliant. Jim is given a fully realized voice, intelligence, and agency that Twain’s original novel often denied him. Instead of being seen primarily through Huck’s naive and often racist viewpoint, James tells his own story, offering insight into his thoughts, emotions, and the brutal realities of slavery. It made me realize in a way that I had not thought of before how slaves must have lived their lives in constant fear. My only criticism of the book was how the “twist” was handled. I think it should have been more developed in the story.
I assume you’re referring to that Huck is James’s son, they dropped a few hints along the way but I agree it could’ve been fleshed out a bit more and there isn’t much resolution for the future either.