Washington Black
Ratings75
Average rating3.8
I saw the cover with the Cloud Cutter and was intrigued and booked it at my library. If it had been an other cover I might never have read this book.
Parts of the book is great, parts of the book is slow, a lot is unbelievable. It’s written in 4 parts and the first part is the best part and after that I was sort of hoping it would pick up again, a little slow build up but no, doesn’t happen.
The ease of travelling and no mention of money is unbelievable to me.
Still enjoyed it all in all and I’m happy I read it. Due to the strong first part I will give it a 4 but most of the book is around 3-3,5.
It was entertaining enough to warrant a 4th star but there's no historical note and I consider that bad form. Ultimately didn't live up to the hype, imho, but that applies to most things in life.
I hesitated to read this novel because I thought it was another slave narrative, and they tend to blur together in my mind as they are (usually) too much alike. And that's how this novel begins. But fairly quickly it takes an interesting turn when the young slave is loaned to an English eccentric scientist. Let the adventures begin! Then, for most of the rest of the book, I was fully engaged. Until the end, when it all fell apart.
One sentence synopsis... An eccentric gentleman's choice of a young slave as his prodigy sets off a series of wonderful, heartbreaking adventures fueled by scientific enlightenment and world exploration. .
Read it if you liked... Fantasy works of Jules Verne. .
Dream casting... DeRon Horton as the older Wash and Jude Law as gentleman-scientist Titch Wilde.
Being able to escape into a story is why I read so often. I'll admit that I haven't felt that complete immersion in a while. This book gave me the feeling I was looking for. The author describes the scenery in a way that I can imagine each place Wash visits as if Tarsem Singh were directing it. (The director of The Fall, one the most cinematically beautiful movies ever made.) The storm in the Cloud-Cutter, the igloos in the Arctic, the jellyfish in Nova Scotia. The evolution of Washington Black throughout the story as he grows is authentic. His thoughts, feelings, and overall outlook change throughout his life as shown through his dialogue, but his vulnerability and feelings of abandonment are ever-present. I had to read the last page a few times because the ending was...well it was odd. He did the same thing Titch did in the Arctic, except it was a sand storm instead of snow and he was leaving Tana. I'm just going to assume he comes back because c'mon bruh.
The premise and first half were so good, and the writing is great throughout, but the second half of the plot dragged with a lot of telling and overly wrapped up character connections. I was emotionally invested in Wash for almost all of the book, but the other two main characters didn't draw me in. Dion Graham's audio narration was excellent, but I switched to the book at the end to finish. I was so excited for this to be on next year's BOB list, I'm curious to hear what the kids will think about it.
Well done! I really enjoyed this book. It was equally frustrating and heartwarming. Highly recommend.
Interesting - on my first reading, I gave this a three. On my second reading, a bit over a year later, I'm going to give it a 4.
I think on my first reading I was more caught up in possible plot issues, such as travel and finding people issues. However, on the second reading, I could focus more on the characters.
I'm still not entirely sure what I feel about this book, but I'm glad I read it again.
Summary: I am not sure how to summarize this book.
Washington Black was on a number of best books of 2018. It finally got to be my turn from the library this past week and I quickly read it. I am still not sure what I think of it frankly.
Washington Black is a young slave boy working the fields with his caregiver Kit in the sugar cane fields of Barbados in the 1830s. Seemingly at random, they are ordered into the master's home to serve the relatively new master and his brother's dinner. That chance led to Washington Black being conscripted into working for the master's visiting scientist brother, Christopher (Titch). Titch is a quiet abolitionist, but still takes advantage of the slave labor he has access to and uses the wealth of the family (from slaves) for his scientific investigations. Over a short period of time, Washington (Wash) learns to read and more importantly with his access to pencil and paper and books he discovers that he has a talent for drawing. Titch eventually discovers this and their relationship, while still Master and Slave becomes more complicated.
Due to a plot detail, the two of them leave the island and so starts the story of the next 10 years of Wash's life. There is loneliness, isolation, a semblance of freedom, romance and love. But also a lot of really strange random events that are pieced together to make up the story.
There is a lot of interesting insights into what slavery and white supremacy meant in the world of the 1830-40s. I think the portrayal of the semi-Abolitionist Titch, as wanting to end slavery, but not really be sure about equality is accurate to the history as I have read it. But while I enjoyed the book and I will look for additional books by Esi Edugyan, I think this is one that may have been over hyped. It is interesting, but I am not sure it is really top tier. It has a bit of a feel of The Good Lord Bird by James McBride. Both were about very special boys of about the same age that were ‘freed' but still attached to their abolitions saviors in a not quite slavery but not quite freedom relationship. I saw someone else suggest that this was like Colson Whiteheads' Underground Railroad, which I understand, but wouldn't be my first comparison.
I just am not sure if the plot points are really important as spoilers or not, so I am not going to discuss them. I was not a fan of the end. The pressing concern of the end of the book, felt to me a bit like what I didn't like about Lev Grossman's The Magicians.
It has been a little while since I have really loved a fiction book. I have been reading a lot of solid fiction, books that are worth reading and I am glad I read, but also books that have not completely grabbed me as some books do.
I never thought I would say this but this book needs to be made into a movie! What an adventure and the locations!!!! I'd pre-order my tickets for sure. This was quite a ride! I don't think I have read a more adventurous book in ages. I went into this cold, having very little idea about this story and read it because I'm trying to read the entire TOB 2019 shortlist. I think that may have been the best way to go into it. I was just struck over and over again by wonders!
I loved this story and I love Washington Black, who may be one of the greatest survivors I have read about since....Hugh Glass of Revenant, maybe? Although Wash is surviving in a different kind of violent world.
Side note: I did a mix of book and audio on this one and have developed an aural crush on the narrator, Dion Graham. That voice! Must seek out other titles he has narrated.
It's the story of young George Washington Black, 11 years old as the books start in 1830. He's a slave on Faith Plantation in Barbados, under a new master. Wash understands instinctively that Erasmus Wilde owned their lives, and their deaths, and that clearly pleased him too much. But we're soon introduced to his brother Christopher Wilde or Titch who will change Wash's life. It's an adventure story that sees Washington off to Virginia, the Arctic, Nova Scotia, London, Amsterdam and Morocco jumping from one improbable situation to another massive coincidence. And read that way it's an entertaining, if mostly forgettable read.
But this is a Giller Prize winner, the second for Esi Edugyan! A Man Booker shortlisted title - clearly reading it as a plot driven travelogue is naive. Smarter people than I loved this so what am I missing? Is this wrestling with white guilt - is Titch an ally to Wash or is he simply white knighting to assuage the guilt he feels over profiting from their labours? Or is this more about Wash's struggles in freedom and the commitment to life when all you've ever known is slavery and the narrative that death is the only true escape? Insert shrug emoji here.
Maybe it's the perfect book club read. Seems like faint praise for this much lauded book, but there's a lot to tease out if you want to put the effort in ...otherwise it's just an unlikely story with lots of hand-wavy explanations and convenient plot devices that makes for a nice enough diversion.
My head-scratching review here: https://youtu.be/uRk8q__uqm8
The adventurous story of a young slave who with the help of an eccentric scientist flees his plantation, sees the world and discovers his true calling. Yet it's far from as simple as this description might make it sound. You add the prejudices a young black man encounters in the 19th century. And his personal conflicting relationship with the figures of his past.
While this was an entertaining fast-paced audiobook to listen to, there seemed to be something off in the balance. It felt it had maybe too few adventures for being good adventure yarn, but it also had too many side quests and quirky characters for being a character study.
3.5 rounded down
Washington Black is an imaginative novel that crosses boundaries, boundaries that exist in the story and boundaries that tend to hem in literature. It is a novel that is not easily classifiable, because it is very literary, but it also shows traits of fantasy and adventure. It is historical in setting, but does not allow this to confine its reach. A story of self discovery, Washington Black explores the topics of suffering and rebirth. It sounds like a fantastic novel, and the opening chapters prove this. What a perfect beginning! At 35 pages in, I knew I'd found the best novel of the year, an easy five-star rating. So what happened?
The fact is, Washington Black does little to sustain the wonder created in the opening chapters. The first several chapters are perfect. They're brutal, intelligent, and imaginative. I truly couldn't ask for more. The story opens with an amazingly drawn cast of characters, slaves and plantation owners on an estate in Barbados. We see the plight of the other slaves, as well as the conflicting natures of the plantation owner with his abolitionist-minded brother, through the eyes of young Washington Black—called Wash. The brutality of this particular plantation and the wonders set in motion by the brother, Titch, a scientist, create such a wonderful contrast. It's easy to imagine where this story might be going when Titch takes Wash under his wing, but it's a place that you, as the reader, want the story to go. It's magical, heartwarming, and full of imagery so palpable you can't deny its existence: a Vernes-esque journey around the world with a kindhearted scientist and his assistant, a child freed from slavery.
Unfortunately, this novel just can't maintain the forward movement it needs to claim its potential. The characters, while starting off great, did little to keep me invested in their stories. Sure, their adventure is wonderful, but their actions are wooden and their decisions based on inexplicable coincidences. They failed to carry me along on their adventure. The longer the story went on, the less I believed the magic the story was built on, the less I cared about the narrative.
In the end, I was left with too many questions, but not enough desire to find answers. What was really going on here? In a novel largely based on realism, it is easy to pick out the fantastical elements and analyze them. What was with the allusions to the spiritual personas of our characters: others that roam free of their selves? The existence of these “others” makes me wonder. Who was Washington Black? Was he a spirit of the self that existed in the opening chapters, a spirit making his way back to Dahomey? Was he reborn in the child Titch finds in Morocco? At the conclusion of Washington Black, I don't have any answers, only speculations. These questions display the intelligence of this novel and its author, but highlight the problem that it doesn't go far enough to provide answers or the will to learn the truth.
Washington Black is a powerful and imaginative story with so many great pieces. The writing is exceptionally powerful at times. It just doesn't keep it going, however, and the result is a firework that fizzles out long before the end. I recommend this novel to others, but with the caveat not to build your expectations too high in the beginning. Perhaps if I'd not done so, I would've walked away with warmer feelings regarding this story.
Thanks to the publisher, Knopf Publishing Group, for providing me early access to this title through NetGalley.