Passing

Caucasia is a book that traces the boundaries of race, even within families in America. The book is narrated through the eyes of Birdie, who is the daughter of an African American father and a white mother. She appears "white" while her older sister, Cole, appears "black." Caucasia opens in 1975 Boston when Birdie is seven years old and Cole is ten.

In the First section of the book, "Negritude for Beginners" Birdie describes her life living with her sister Cole and her parents in Boston. Both parents are involved in the Black Power movement. Dad is an academic, while mom is working in more informal channels. The breakup of Birdie's family along "racial" lines occurs as the Black Power movement seemingly becomes a more dangerous activity and as it becomes clear that a white wife and daughter are a liability for someone espousing Black Power philosophy. Mom also believes that the authorities are after her for her "revolutionary" activities. After the breakup of their parents, Birdie is taken by her mom and Cole is taken by her dad.

The next third of the book covers the period that Birdie spends with her mother living itinerantly in motels and communes. To protect her daughter and herself from the expected reaction to miscegenation in rural New England (and of course the Authorities), mom renames them both, coaching Birdie with the history of her father being a Jewish intellectual who has passed away. They settle in New Hampshire where Birdie attempts to fit into the white society. Being part black, without anyone knowing it, she finds the casual racism of those around her alienating. When her mother takes up with a local man who typifies the racist bumpkin, Birdie runs back to Boston.

By revisiting people who knew her family she hopes to figure out where her father and Cole have gone. Supposedly they had fled to Brazil to escape the authorities. Her efforts do pan out and she finds out her father was living in Oakland. So, visiting her estranged (and conveniently wealthy) maternal grandmother she gets money to buy a ticket for Oakland.

Reunited with her father and Cole Birdie realizes that her mother's fear of the FBI might have more to do with a persecution complex than reality. Hoping to come to terms with why and how her father abandoned her after promising to find her when it was safe, she realizes that his academic theories of race are separate from how he is able to function in the world. Though race does not exist he had chosen to divide his daughters according to where they fit into racial categories. Cole was equally disappointing in her explanation for why they had not sought out Birdie. Cole only wanted to know why her mother had not tried to find her. Birdie realizes, in the end, that the family members she had been separated from could not answer the questions she had about why she had not been wanted.

This is an excellent novel about coming to terms with family, race, and identity. It is sad that racial categories are so important as recently as 1975, but humans are fond of categorizing the world, including themselves.

Civil War in El Salvador

One Day of Life is told by the matriarch of a peasant family in El Salvador. Originally published in 1980 at the start of the civil war in El Salvador, it is an account of the persecution of one family by government-backed soldiers. Through flashbacks we learn that the son of the matriarch has already disappeared due to his "Communist sympathies."

Lupe, the matriarch, begins her day like any other. Her 14 year old granddaughter, Adolfina, goes out with her younger siblings to get tortillas in the village. By noon a group of soldiers arrive at the family home. They want to take Adolfina to see if she can identify a "wounded man." Since we know that the wounded man was "wounded" by these soldiers it is clear that their intentions are not good. Lupe refuses to let Adolfina go and eventually the soldiers bring the man, near death, to be identified. Only Lupe recognizes him, with grave consequences.

The tension of this story builds gradually throughout the day and the conclusion is unpredictable. As it is describing the tactics Salvadorean soldiers used to intimidate and torture their fellow peasants, all in the name of preventing communist tendencies, it is a story of the viciousness of humanity.

The author of this story, Manlio Arugeta, is better known as a poet in the Spanish-speaking world. He was exiled from El Salvador for nearly two decades, due to his political views. The Salvadorean Civil War lasted from 1980 until 1992. Much credit for the duration is attributable to the generous funding of U.S. administrations, especially Bush I. The UNHCR summarizes the Bush policy in El Salvador succinctly.

Any sufficiently boring history of magic is indistinguishable from boring history

Sometimes a book is published that seems to be exactly the type you will enjoy, but turns out to be a disappointment. An excellent example of such a book is Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell by Susanna Clarke. This book details how magic is revived by two magicians in England in 1806. It is an alternate history. What the book does well is provide a rich literature for British magic in footnotes, create believable historical characters, and engage the reader to the end. The book falls short though in ending badly, in creating unsympathetic (arguably stupid) characters, and giving the female characters no personality or agency.

If the book had had an ending to suit its length it would make up for much, but instead the ending seems patched on. After 782 pages I expect to feel that my reading time was well spent. It is apparent from the fact that "darkness" covers the world at the novel's end that Clarke intends to write a sequel, but why would I read a sequel to a book if the plot can not not be brought to some kind of conclusion in so many pages? One problem many books seem to have is being too long. I think this is a problem of the author not knowing how to end the novel and not doing enough revision. If something could be told in fewer pages then it probably should be.

A second problem with the book is the unsympathetic and boring characters. Neither magician is sympathetic. Jonathan Strange is particularly unpleasant, pompous and self-important. Granted this could be said to be true to the literary form of the British novel, but the plot would be more interesting if the main characters are likeable.

Second, I must object to the comparisons of this book with those by Jane Austen (review). The characters in Austen's novels have personality - both the female and the male characters. In this book the female characters are dull and uninteresting. That the women are boring characters is quite surprising since Jonathan Strange's wife, Arabella Strange, plays a significant role in the book. The issue is the total lack of agency that she has. She has no particular skills or intelligence. When she "dies" her husband finds another young woman to marry, though their marriage is forestalled when Arabella revives. The message of the book seems to be that women are replaceable, but necessary. That is why it is unfair to compare this to Austen. Though Austen's characters had limited agency they did manage to accomplish things, in the private realm. Clarke's female characters are singularly unaccomplished.

The fundamental problem with the book is the concept - making an alternate history of a magical Britain and creating it to be as dull as an actual history. The magic has been taken out of magic.