I recently finished reading Washington Black, the amazing novel by Canadian novelist Esi Edugyan. In addition to being short-listed for the Booker Prize, it was selected as one of the best books of the year by the New York Times, Washington Post, Boston Globe, The Economist and a host of other publications.
The novel opens in Barbados in 1830 on a sugar plantation. Our narrator, George Washington Black, Wash for short, is an eleven year old slave who watches his new master arrive on the plantation – a master who is vicious and sadistic. Wash comments, “He owned me, as he owned all those I lived among, not only our lives but also our deaths, and that pleased him too much.”
You might think this is going to be a story of brutalities and failed attempts at escapes, but here Edugyan spins the first twist of the novel. His master ‘lends’ Wash to the master’s brother, Christopher Wilde, known as Titch who turns out to be a naturalist, inventor and abolitionist. Titch has brought along materials to assemble what he calls his ‘Cloud Cutter’ – a hot air balloon attached to a boat-like gondola.
Titch enlists Wash as his assistant, teaching him to read and, in the process, discovering that Wash possesses a skill for executing detailed scientific drawings. Across the color line, the two strike up a kind of friendship. So much so, that when it seems likely that Wash will be killed in wrongful retaliation for the death of a white visitor to the plantation, Titch fires up the gas canister, cuts the ropes that tether the Cloud-cutter to Earth and, together, the two ascend into a tempestuous nighttime sky.
But this is just the beginning of Wash’s adventures, not the end. They crash land onto a ship which takes them to Norfolk where Wash discovers a huge bounty has been placed on his head. Then, in short order to the frozen wastes of the Artic then, Wash alone, to Nova Scotia, London, the bottom of the sea and to Morocco. Wash grows into a man and finds a woman but all the while is searching for himself, wondering why his friend Titch has left him and trying to understand how others see him.
It’s a fun and unconventional novel and I enjoyed it. Give it a try. Edugyan is a gifted story teller. Here’s a link to the NYT review.
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