Crick Crack, Monkey [Paperback]

Merle Hodge (Author)

Book Description

Series: Caribbean Writers Series

The world of "Crick Crack, Monkey" is a dual one. Tee, the central character, is suspended between the warmth, spontaneity, and exuberance of Tantie's household, into which she and her brother are received when their father immigrates to England, and the formality and pretension of her Aunt Beatrice's world, which Tee is obliged to enter when she wins a scholarship. Tee's initiation into the middle class is an uneasy one: she is confused and disturbed by the discrimination of color and class that she learns at Aunt Beatrice's hands and by the attitudes and values that divide her two aunts. Tee's shifting perceptions find no resolution, only acknowledgment that coherence will require a mature revaluation of her experience.

Editorial Reviews

Review

Young Tee and her younger brother Toddan are taken home by Tantie, their father's sister, when their mother dies in childbirth. Shortly thereafter, their father goes to England and Tee concludes he left, "to see whether he could find Mammy and the baby." The life Tantie offers Tee and Toddan is full of fiercely raucous love; when Tantie is crossed, "the neighbors for six houses on every side of us were generally aware of this fact." Throughout Tee's early years, Mammy's sister Beatrice - a woman with a voice that sounds "like high-heels and stockings" - attempts to get custody of Tee and Toddan. Tee's love and loyalty to Tantie are strained as she grows up and begins to want the pretty clothes and tidy life Beatrice offers. Tantie's bellowing resistance to Tee's desire to live with Beatrice finally dissolves when Tee wins a scholarship and must move in with Auntie Beatrice's family in order to continue her education. To her dismay, everything about living with Auntie Beatrice makes Tee feel bad and she begins to blame Tantie: "If Auntie Beatrice had whisked us away from the very beginning and brought us here, then I would have been nice... and the front door would not have been forbidding nor the armchairs in the living room disapproving." In rollicking and poignant prose, Crick Crack, Monkey tells the story of a young girl caught between two worlds, neither of which feels like hers. -- 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 Jesse Larsen --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Product Details

• Paperback: 128 pages
• Publisher: Heinemann (February 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0435989510
• ISBN-13: 978-0435989514
• Product Dimensions: 7.7 x 5 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #92,011 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #31 in Books > Children's Books > Travel & Cultures > Explore the World > Europe

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars If you enjoyed Miguel Street, You'd love this book., June 4, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: Crick Crack, Monkey (Caribbean Writers Series) (Paperback)

This is one of the rolicking, humorous West Indian novels in the vein of V.S. Naipaul's Miguel Street, Alvin Bennet's God, the Stonebreaker, Austin Clarke's Amongst the Thistles and Torns, and A House for Mr. Bishwas. It captures the bitter-sweet experiences of a little girl growing up in Trnidad and Tobago. An excellent Caribbean novel.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Poignant critique of the effects of colonialism, July 22, 2002

By 

JoAnn Whetsell (Seattle, WA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Crick Crack, Monkey (Paperback)

More than humor, I remember this book for its poignancy, the effects on a young girl of her own culture (black, Caribbean) being denigrated and other cultures and anything associated with whiteness and England being praised. So touching was the scene where Tee is playing with dolls; so telling is her idealization of the dolls' world and the juxtaposition with her own.

Everyone wants the best for their children; this book examines how people decide what is best and how these preconceptions affect the very children they love and want to protect.

5.0 out of 5 stars A Classic Bildungsroman, November 9, 2011

By 

Natarielle Powell (Savannah, Georgia) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Crick Crack, Monkey (Paperback)

This beautifully written West Indian coming of age piece tells the story of Tee and her brother, Toddan who are forced to reside between two worlds as their aunts battle over guardianship of them.

After their mother dies and their father moves to London, Tee and Toddan live with Tantie (their father's sister) and Aunt Beatrice (their mother's sister) during their childhood and adolescent years. As the story centers around Tee's adult and childhood self recalling these experiences, the reader gets a glimpse of the down-to-earth but somewhat loose influences from Tantie and the snobbish but cultured influences from Aunt Beatrice. From one aunt she learns expletives and from the other etiquette.

Hodge cleverly displays Tee/Cynthia's duality and the impact that it has on her child and adult self. Both struggle with trying to exist and coexist in two worlds, fit in with relatives and classmates, learn from the differing cultures that surround them, and find themselves in the process.

One explanation of the term, "crick crack," is that in the francophone islands, when a storyteller wants to tell a story, he or she will shout "Crick!" And those eager to hear the story will shout "Crack." Another explanation suggests that the term is rendered when a storyteller is inquiring of his or her audience whether or not the story told is factual or fictional. Similarly, Tee poses such a question to herself to determine which world to abide in. With an inquiring mind and a "shrieking crescendo," I'll utter, "Monkey break `e back on a rotten pommerac!" You'll have to read the book to get that one.