Customer Reviews

Sapphira and the Slave Girl

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I live in Winchester and recently began reading Willa Cather's books because she was born here. Her most beautiful writing appears in "My Antonia," but I loved "Sapphira and the Slave Girl" too, for taking me back 150 years to the way life was in my area. Cather lived that life, and although her books are fiction, she, like many authors, includes bits of her own life and experiences in her writing. I could follow her up to Timber Ridge, down to Winchester, and was so absorbed in her writing that I felt I'd stepped back in time and was watching her beautifully painted scenes and hearing her realistically-written dialog for myself. I don't read much fiction about the midwest (where most of the rest of her books take place), but I have read all of her midwestern books. They are worth it!

As I was reading this book (which is thought provoking) I also was thinking thoughts similar to the previous reviewer, i.e., would the black people in the book really think this way in real life; (Example, some of the slaves would talk about the other slaves calling them "no count niggers". One of the slaves was offered freedom and a job in Pennsylvania but turned it down saying he wanted to stay where he was). I assume there were all kinds. All kinds of slave owners and all kinds of slaves. Perhaps some of what the author writes was true for some people but not true for others.

I really find it interesting that The "Master" (Mr. Henry Colbert) and his daughter (Mrs. Blake) would go to such trouble to make sure that Nancy (the slave girl) did not come to any sexual harm by Mr. Colbert's nephew Martin. Would this have really happened or would, in most cases, people in their position have turned a blind eye? Would a slave actually have felt comfortable going to a white person about this trouble?

I found it a bit hard to digest that the slaves were so ultimately loyal and simple and that the slave owners were to some extent so lenient. Was this a truthful depiction based on some facts the author uncovered or were theses all-false assumptions that she accepted as truth?

Of course I am reading this with all of the influences of a 2003 consciousness.

I think this book is perhaps showing a side to slavery that maybe did exist, just perhaps not on a widespread basis. I would hope the author did some type of research to substantiate what she wrote. It does make one contemplate...

Review written by a black person.

Although this book wasn't what I had expected, it was a good book. The book had wonderful details of the setting and all the characters included. Will read again.

Willa Cather lived in Virginia until sometime between the ages of 9 and 10 but did not write about thoman who is slightly biwe state until her last novel Sapphira and the Slave Girl. The novel is not one ter about her masterpieces but is still quite good. The potrayal of Sapphira an utterly self asorbed woman who is never totally comfortable about her move to a backwoods part of the state She becomes jealous of Nancy one of her slaves when her husband shows affection for her and the arrival of her rakish nephew complicates things. This is an interesting non stereotypical view of slavery and is well written stylistically. Avery good novel which I strongly recommend

Having never read a novel by Willa Cather, but only knowing of her work by it's reputation, I was anxious to read something of hers when our book club chose her as an author. Not wanting to pick something everyone had read I picked "Sapphira..". While the lead character of Sapphira was an interesting psychological study in narcisistic behavior in the face of sexual and physical repression, I found the depiction of African Americans, and slavery as a whole, to be unrealistic and naive. While there is an obligatory anti-slavery sentiment in the book, it is under-cut by the impression that the slaves are basically simple, happy folk, who are only upset when they are mis-understood, have somehow displeased thier owners, or are the objects of sexual predators. While the young slave girl, Nancy, does escape and become something of a success (as a domestic) in Canada, that part of her life is never detailed, and is only briefly mentioned. It is evident from the characterization of the strongest Black characters that the author subscribed to the liberal ideal of race relations found during her time (wise Whites can lead Blacks out of ignorance if only Blacks will let themselves be lead). This can be seen by Nancy's mother Till, and her former relationship with an English housekeeper, the Miller and his head Millhand who refuses to be freed, and Nancy who turns to Sapphira's daughter Rachel for advice and finally escape. This book is best read for the insights it can give us into the attitudes towards race, and slavery, fostered during the first half of the century soon past, rather then anything resembling historical accuracy.