Customer Reviews

Scarlet Sister Mary (Brown Thrasher Books)

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

 

 

Written by former plantation mistress Julia Peterkin, Scarlet Sister Mary is a novel of intellect, individualism, coltish word play, tradition and most importantly, respect. The novel, like, Their Eyes Were Watching God and The Color Purple, is written in an old southern vernacular, and it tells the story of Sister Mary or Si May-e, a young and sprightly woman at the novel's start. It is some time after Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation, and freedon (used loosely, historically speaking), has come for those individuals who were field slaves or indentured servants. Their opportunity to flee has come, to seek opportunities for self and financial betterment. For some, however, betterment is not up north or anywhere else in the country; it is exactly where it is: the native coastal terrain of South Carolina - the setting for the novel. Religion, faith, folklore, generational history and magic are the ties that bind the folksy and hard working men and women of the Quarters. Dignity and peacefulness does not come from being nomadic, as was in the case of the pioneers to the Midwest and far West; it is closer. It is in the hoeing, the field labor, the mud between the crevices of the rough and crackling flesh. It is in the earth. To combat the joyous harshness of the work is love and a family. And thus, Sister Mary comes into the picture; she is at the marrying age, and July, her suitor, is ready to be her protector and provider. Or so one would believe. Using faith in lore and mythology, Sister Mary's marriage is almost doomed from the start: "'Do, Master, look down and see what a rat is done!' Mary's heart flew up into her mouth. Cold chills ran over her as she ran to see what happened. There it was, a great hole gnawed deep into the bride's cake's tender meat...she fell into bitter dumb sobs...Such bad luck was hard to face." (p.29) And it only advances to something worse via the aid of a love charm and another woman's insatiable lust for the groom's affections. Time passes, and Mary is all alone with her son Unex (shortened for Unexpected). A suffocating cover of depression smothers Sister Mary, and as time heals old wounds, Mary rises into a life of self-satisfaction and sexual gratification. She enters the dominion of sin and religious transgression; she is altered in the eyes of those around her. From Sister Mary, she becomes Scarlet Sister Mary - red with hungry passion as the adjective implies. She has a flock of children, but they are not heart children, as in the case of Unex, but they are passion, lust children. Redemption is nil, and her destiny upon her final breath (in the eyes of her brethren) is clearly understood; her spirit, her soul, is scudding rapidly to the flaming and billowing sulphur pitts of hell. Can redemption and acceptance ever come into her grasp? Will peace ever rectify the wrongs incurred in her heart and mind? Her somewhat sardonic life philosophy and world-weary actions narrow down the chances for hope. But that hand-clenching curiosity does get solved. Banned in Boston when it was first published in 1928 and winner of the 1929 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, Scarlet Sister Mary is a classic among classics - lyrical in prose and description, vivid in the intellectual exploration of the "Negro question" - (vii) and complex as well as humane. But it is by no means an accurate representation of a specific catagory of people. Consequently, the work, although brilliant, is slightly antiquated and beguiling.

Scarlet Sister Mary is the story of a free-spirited woman's life in the post-Emancipation South. It is unique in its portrayal of an African-American community as capable of independent existence in the South at that time. The culture of the community is portrayed most interestingly and permeates through the religious, spiritual and even medical undertones of story. While Peterkin tells a poetic tale of an independent, strong, rebellious woman (of whom you grow dearly fond, and cannot help but cheer her on in her resistance), one finds it hard to wonder how accurate a picture Peterkin paints as one who viewed African-Americans in the South rather than lived as an African-American in the South. But all in all, this book is a must read (and if you attempt to read it as you would imagine people read the book when it was first published, you have a most scandalous story of taboo story before your eyes!)

Totally absorbing, wonderful read about the South Carolina Low Country and it's Gullah people. I loved it.

I didn't dislike this book but it was a bit of a chore to get through. It told the tale of a black community trying to figure out their new freedom. It followed the life of Sister Mary and her dozen children. None of the characters particularly stood out to me and I wasn't really taken in by the narrative. It was interesting from a historical perspective, but I would have liked to see more emotion coming from it, or being elicited from me.

In summation : I can't say that I'm particularly thrilled to have read this, nor do I expect it to stay with me for long. This is one of those books that a year from now I will be unable to recall much about.

This delightful story by Julie Peterkin caught the eyes and surely the hearts of the committee to garner the Pulitzer Prize in 1929. Mary has the misfortune to become besot by July, the biggest rascal in the Quarters. The love-charm that Old Daddy Cudjoe makes for her comes too late to win back July as he drops out of sight with Cinder and is lost from Mary's life for the next twenty years. Mary goes on to be the Venus of the Quarters eventually having nine children by an untold litany of befogged lovers. A word of advice Mary gives to Seraphine, her eldest daughter, is telling of her view of men. "But don' never let yousef tink on one man all de time. It'll run you crazy if it don't kill you." After the death of her first-born son, Unex, Mary undergoes a religious conversion and welcomed back into the Heaven's Gate Church. But she secretly holds something in reserve.

I'm not really sure what I thought of this book. Mary was an interesting character, and watching her go through life, raising her kids, and dealing with a somewhat harsh life was interesting. She lives on an old plantation, after slaves have been freed. She walks a different path than many of her neighbors, and because of this she is often called a sinner, though she enjoys her life as much as she can and doesn't wish to sin. I wasn't bored while reading the book, but I wasn't devouring each page either. The ending was a little abrupt, and due to the religious nature of the book, I'm not really sure that I got the overall message. It was an easy read though, and a relaxing one.

Sister Mary wants to be a good girl, but when you are young and in love with the most handsome no count man around, well sometimes you fail. She does get married in time to hush those gossiping women, but having a hard life can harden a woman, and you can't expect her to be alone all the time when her husband runs off.
At the time this book was written it was slammed by many other black authors for being written in black southern dialect. At first that made it hard to read, but it soon fell into a rhythm that felt good to read. I could hear the voices.
I have been reading the Pulitzer's and not liking most of them. This is one of the better ones, and I loved Sister Mary. She took what she could from a bad life to try to make a good one without complaining, and she lived her life the way she chose in spite of what people said, which was quite a feat in that time period.
This is a book you read, put away, think about off and on for a few years, and then pick it up and read it again and have all new thoughts about it.