Jesmyn Ward

I have read both of Jesmyn Ward 's National Book Award winning novels and loved them. I think she embodies the legacy of Toni Morrison in telling important stories in luminous ways. In this novel we read the first person narrative of Anise, whose grandmother was an Amazon warrior who fled to find a better world for the baby she was carrying, whose mother was raped by the plantation owner and then sent away to auction, and who herself is sold to auction. Her journey from the Carolinas to New Orleans is not unlike Dante's journey to the underworld - Let Us Descend comes from that reference. Anise is a resourceful fighter, forager, and seeker of pleasure. Her world is populated with various spirits, the recreation of her grandmother, and natures own "They Who Take and Give".
The writing is poetic and atmospheric, magical realism that provides historical markers to the Placage women in NOLA and the life of St. Malo. At times for me the spirits slowed the pace of the plot but I don't pretend to not appreciate the talent of the author. I would recommend listening to her interviews regarding the years of exploration and revision of this work.

Lines:
Mama has always been a woman who hides a tender heart: a woman who tells me stories in a leaf-rustling whisper, a woman who burns like a sulfur lantern as she leads me through the world’s darkness, a woman who gives me a gift when she unsheathes herself in teaching me to fight once a month.

They sleep with their mouths open, pink scraped across their cheeks, their eyelids twitching like fish who swim in the shallows.

And everywhere, us stolen. Some in rope and chains. Some walking in clusters together, sacks on their backs or on their heads. Some stand in lines at the edge of the road, all dressed in the same rough clothing: long, dark dresses and white aprons, and dark suits and hats for the men, but I know they are bound by the white men, accented with gold and guns, who watch them. I know they are bound by the way they stand all in a row, not talking to one another, fresh cuts marking their hands and necks. I know they are bound by the way they wear their sorrow, by the way they look over an invisible horizon into their ruin.

The digging fingers of another as he assesses us for mating, brags about his bucks, about the fine ’ninnies we can make, about how much each would fetch, his words a steady bad wind carrying the stench of an animal carcass slaughtered and left to rot in the woods.

“What’s a plaçage woman?”

I sob into the earth. I offer to They Who Take and Give until I’m a hollow gourd: dry of sorrow, spiked with the dregs of memory.

Esther’s brother’s nose is a fin in his face, his eyes the bottom of the deepest part of a river, the black cool where the current cannot reach, where driftwood, whole trunks, sink to silt. His neck, even though he is almost as lean as us, is solid as a young pine.

“Blessing,” she says, and then she’s silent. I count the days since my last bleeding, and suddenly, I know what my reach for pleasure with Esther’s brother has done. I know what the soreness in my chest means. I know that there is a seed, a song, a babe coming to me. I put my hands on my stomach and rock.… (more)

Let Us Descend, Jesmyn Ward, author and narrator
There are few words I can use to describe the brilliance of this book; there is no good way for me to sum it up without revealing too much. Ward has described the horrors of slavery in such dramatic detail that the reader finds his or herself there, in the center of it all, as a witness to the barbarism. Because they were fed a starvation diet, beaten, and abused, subjected to nightmare punishments for whatever whim the owner decided to fulfill, because they were forced to suffer the breakup of their families and the loss of their friends, to endure being raped by the owner, sometimes even sold at his pleasure, many might have entertained thoughts of escape, but it always seemed foolhardy since it was so often futile with unimaginable punishment if caught. I asked myself, what kind of person could tolerate the destruction of humans, bit by bit? Who could treat humans so poorly, even worse than they treated their animals? With every new dawn, every next breath, the future was bleaker for a slave. There was no safe haven, yet there existed a desire for freedom that was unabating.
The world of Arese/Annis is a nightmare world once her mother is sold, but it was not much better when they were together. Worked to the bone, practically starved, taken by the owner to pleasure himself, Arese was born to her mother after the owner raped her. Thus, although she was half-sister to the twin girls in the manor home, their lives were totally different. Arese used to stand by their door, listening to their tutor instruct them. It was in that secret pose that she learned of the expression from Dante’s descent into Hell, that she learned the worlds let us descend. Her mother educated her in the only way she could, she trained her in self-defense and told her to rise, not to descend! Her mother taught her that water was a friend, although it was water that carried her away from her home to this place of captivity. Would water one day save her?
As Annis describes her life, one may be brought to tears or driven to anger. This, however, is a novel, and it tells the story of what took place in the past; there is no rectifying the horrifying lives of these captured people, thought of as less than, thought of as animals who felt nothing or animals that existed for the barbaric pleasure of cruel men and women. These captured humans suffered from every human indignity man could imagine.
Rarely have I felt so moved by a novel. It held such a poetic beauty, as most of Ward’s books do, but this book was magical, filled with legends and spiritual visions. This book takes the readers with it, right into the realm of the slave, and they visibly witness and feel the pain and suffering first-hand, as if it was happening to themselves, and sometimes, even the reader wants it to end a bit more quickly. The author simply takes me places that I do not want to venture, but feel I must. She illustrates life and also the loss of life. She forces the reader to come to terms with the terrible choices slaves had to make, with the terrible lives they were forced to live, with the terrible people who tortured them, but she ends by offering a sliver of hope for the future.… (more)

Raw and heartbreaking

Those familiar with Jesmyn Ward's work know that she takes readers on a journey through places we would rather not see. Lands where adults have long-since given themselves over to their demons, and children lose their innocence at an unfathomably-early age. Such is the case again in her latest novel, "Sing, Unburied, Sing."

With the skill of a poet, Ward introduces readers to tween-aged JoJo, his toddler-aged sister Kayla, and his drug-addicted mother Leonie as they travel to pick up his father who has just been released from the state penitentiary. Ward uses the novel to explore racism, poverty, memories and family bonds.

While Ward is an extraordinarily talented writer (I highly recommend "Salvage the Bones"), I found it a bit more difficult to immerse myself in this book. I appear to be an outlier as this book is getting strong accolades pretty much across the board. The book includes sections that are narrated by "ghosts". Perhaps I am too much of a realist, but I found these sections to be a distraction.

3.5 stars

Thank you to Scribner and NetGalley for a galley of this book in exchange for an honest review.… (more)

This is a very well written, poetic, spiritual and heart breaking story of Annis, a young teenage slave on a rice plantation in Virginia. When she refuses the advances of her owner, Annis and her mother are sold separately and Annis begins the long trek to New Orleans. Her strength and fortitude comes from her mother who taught her to fight and her grandmother who was an African warrior before she was enslaved and sent to America.
Annis and her fellow slaves face incredible hardship as they walk in ropes and chains. They are starved and forced to walk in rain, mud, heat through swamps. The worst part is when still chained or roped they cross streams and rivers.
They arrive at a New Orleans slave market where she is purchased by a sugar plantation owner. She becomes a house servant but like the other kitchen help is treated badly.
Annis devotion and love for her mother are tested when her imagination evokes a spirit called Ada who pretends to be her Grandmother and encourages her to keep moving. This is a complex part of the story as I could not determine if Adam the spirit was friend or foe.
Heart breaking story but well told.… (more)