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January 30th, 2009

After Chair of the English Department Jeffrey J. Cohen introduced GWU President Steven Knapp who introduced author Edward P. Jones, Jones read two selections from his Pulitzer Prize winning novel The Known World:

From Chapter 5, the story of Sherif John Skiffington attempting to quell the fears of his sister-in-law Clara Martin. This roughly corresponds to pages 147-154 and 162-164 in the Amistad paperback edition of the novel.
From Chapter 8, the story of runaway slave Jebediah Dickinson and his attempt to collect a gambling debt from Fern Elston. This roughly corresponds to pages 247-260, excluding the last paragraph on 260.

Jones began each excerpt by providing a brief history of the characters involved, to help the audience understand their relationships in the excerpt. Although primarily intended for those who had not read the novel, I also appreciated Jones’ notes as refreshing my memory of the text. Jones then took questions from the audience. It turns out that his opening line––“My soul’s often wondered how I got over…”––was based on a remembrance (or misremembrance) of a Negro spiritual, and it appealed to Jones so he placed it at the beginning of the book. The phrase was not intended to have larger significance in the text, although a case can be made that it does have larger significance in the text.

I will not catalogue the way in which Jones spoke, stood at the podium, or returned to his seat. Those details are best absorbed by attending a reading in person. I will mention one thing about the audience’s reaction to his reading. The audience laughed at Jones’ few intentionally-humorous phrases. On at least once occasion, however, the audience laughed at a sentence that would not be humorous when reading the entire novel, but which was humorous in the context of the excerpt:

“All this time Mann thought he was dealing with a white woman and he was never to know any different” (255).

I assume the majority of the audience laughed at the notion that anyone would be so foolish to mistake a white woman from a black woman. Except, by this point in the novel, Jones has fully established that Fern appears white; it is only her heritage that makes her “black.” In the context of the entire novel, Mann’s mistake is unremarkable; it is ordinary. And the ordinary is not intended to be humorous.

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Tags: Edward P. Jones, Events, GWU, reading, Wang Visiting Professor in Contemporary Literature
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The Real Reason We Picked Jones & "The Known World"

January 29th, 2009

At approximately 6:00 PM today, Edward P. Jones finished his inaugural reading as the first Wang Visiting Professor of Contemporary Literature. Now, I am finally able to reveal the truth behind the selection of Mr. Jones as the first Wang Visiting Professor.

There exists a clause in the bylaws of the Columbian College of Arts & Sciences that the selection of any new faculty member, visiting or otherwise, must be slow and difficult. I can testify that such was the case for the selection of Edward P. Jones. Faculty deliberated in the English Department war room. The superiority of Strunk over White was debated. The aggregate weight (kg) of Nobel laureates was compared to that of Pulitzer winners. Much shaking of fists, wringing of hands, and pointing of fingers occurred. Other less appropriate hand gestures were witnessed. In a moment of inspired malice, candidates for the professorship were eliminated based on their use of the Oxford comma. To decide between the final candidates, a Google Book Search was conducted. Edward P. Jones emerged victorious.

The real reason why the English Department selected Edward P. Jones as the spring 2009 Wang Visiting Professor in Contemporary English Literature:

On the day they saw Hope and the mule in the rain, that child, Wilson, had been a year and some months in Washington, DC, at the medical school of George Washington University. Wilson had learned a great deal at that university, and his mind would have contained even more but well into his second year the cadavers began to talk to Wilson, and what they said made far more sense than what his professors were saying. The professors, being gods, did not like to share their heaven with anyone, dead or alive, and they sent the young man home in the middle of his second year. – The Known World, Page 343

For the record, the medical school was put on probation for having an excess of loquacious cadavers, not because it has too many self-righteous professors. Every university has too many of those.

Tags: books, Edward P. Jones, Wang Visiting Professor in Contemporary Literature
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“My soul’s often wondered how I got over…”

January 28th, 2009

As Jeffrey previously observed, GWU will be experiencing another inauguration tomorrow: that of the university’s first Wang Visiting Professor of Contemporary Literature. I can only hope that Mr. Jones, with his hand firm upon The Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism, does not flub the swearing in.

With another new beginning at hand, it is appropriate for me to revisit my inaugural post as Communications Liaison. Some twenty-seven days ago, I presented my initial observations on The Known World as a way of introduction, and of demonstrating that I actually read the book. In my earlier musings, I suggested that Jones’ enigmatic zeroth-page words “My soul’s often wondered how I got over…” come from the mouth/mind of Henry Townsend. I confess that I developed this theory midway through the text; during the penultimate chapter, I had formulated an alternative explanation; after the final chapter, I had again accepted Henry Townsend as the likely speaker. I will elaborate on this point for two reasons:

Self-indulgence, for my briefly-entertained alternative theory is more interesting than the likely reality;
Question of Authorial Purpose, for I daresay Jones consciously intend for me to formulate a certain theory, reject it for a more intriguing one, and then be forced to accept it again in the face of last-minute evidence.

Let me explain. (Warning: Spoilers ahead!)

The focus on Henry Townsend in the first half of the book––his childhood, his family, and his death––implies his ownership of the opening phrase. It is easy to picture him observing and recollecting the events of the novel after having “gotten over” to Heaven. However, the latter half of the book (especially after Chapter 7), provides evidence supporting the thesis that it is Calvin, not Henry––Caldonia’s brother, not husband––who is speaking those words from Heaven. This evidence culminates in the penultimate chapter, presented as a letter written from Calvin to Caldonia. Calvin writes of arriving in Washington, D.C., a place he has always wanted to visit. He has met Alice Walker and Moses’ wife and son, who run a successful hotel. They give him steady employment and good lodgings. All developments that are contrary to what Jones previously led his audience to believe.

In the preceding chapters, Jones never mentions Calvin successfully arriving in Washington, D.C.; he writes only that Calvin spends much of his later years caring for his ill (and undeserving) mother. His arrival in his “dream” city can just as well be his arrival in Heaven; the ease with which he finds friends and employment a sign of Heaven’s bounty. Similarly, Jones allows his audience to believe that Alice, Priscilla, and Jamie were murdered by Moses. Their unlikely appearance can be taken as another sign that Calvin is beyond the grave. The chapter’s epistolary form suggests that Calvin is communicating to Caldonia from a distance––if not from the real D.C., then from Heaven.

Some of this evidence might be dismissed as coincidence. However, Jones is not shy of magical realism or of toying with his audience’s expectations. He has shown that there is life after death, as in the cases of Augustus and Mildred Townsend. The ostensibly minor status of Counsel Skiffington, written out of the narrative in Chapter 2, is reversed when he reappears in Chapter 7 and becomes a major actor in the latter half of the book.

In all, it seems more likely that Calvin’s letter is written from Heaven than from reality. The only flaw in this interpretation is that Jones makes it clear that Calvin has written a tangible letter to Caldonia. If the novel ended with Calvin’s valediction, then it would be implied that he was indeed writing from Heaven; the actual ending of the novel (Caldonia reading the letter) precludes this. The only way my alternative theory works is if

Caldonia is imagining reading the letter, as in a dream;
The tangible letter is another example of magical realism, and was indeed sent from beyond the grave.

As it is, I believe these assumptions are too large to make. I wish Jones had ended the novel with Calvin’s letter, allowing for a more ambiguous interpretation of the text. The survival of Alice et al. has major implications for the portrayal of Moses and John Skiffington. The fact that I can reasonably posit an alternative interpretation of the novel’s end raises questions about Jones’ intent. Is the audience intended to identify the speaker of the opening phrase? Is the audience intended to reverse its ideas about the opening phrase? If so, why?

Perhaps at tomorrow’s reading by Jones, I will seek the answers to these questions. In the meantime, I would love to hear your responses to my possible alternative interpretation.

Tags: Edward P. Jones, opinion, review, Wang Visiting Professor in Contemporary Literature
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“Liaison. A Book of Maps. The End Helps the Beginning.”

January 1st, 2009

Salutations from the new English Department Communications Liaison, Calder Stembel:

“Liaison” is the first word on the first page of the first novel by Edward P. Jones. It is also the first word of a less renowned piece: this blog post. On the first of the first of 2009, “Liaison” is the first word of my first blog post as Communications Liaison for the GW English Department. A position that will find me liaising with students, faculty, and administration with abandon and glee.

Technically, eight words appear before “Liaison” in The Known World, on the zeroth page of the novel: “My soul’s often wondered how I got over…” More on these words later. The point of this paragraph is how I got over––to be the new Communications Liaison, blog contributor, and all-around friend to the English Department. I won’t bore you with the details; I’ll just write a few words in the style of Jones’ chapter headings, and you can piece together the rest:
“Sophomore. The Drama of Literature. Cinematic Shakespeare. Technology Improves Bacon. Trivia In Jeopardy.”

If you’re still reading, the next few paragraphs discuss The Known World. Spoiler Alert: Henry Townsend dies. (Otherwise, my thoughts are spoiler-free.)

Back to the introductory phrase that Edward P. Jones was kind enough to include on page 0 of The Known World, so as not to disturb my wonderful introduction. “My soul’s often wondered how I got over…” It is easy to ignore these words the first time you read The Known World. Not because they are printed at the absolute bottom of the zeroth page of the novel (they are), but because they are meaningless until you have finished the book. Why do authors introduce their novels with phrases that only become meaningful when you finish the book? With the book’s 388 pages behind me, I would like to posit a possible meaning of this phrase. Imagine “protagonist” Henry Townsend sitting in Heaven, looking down at the world. Imagine him reflecting upon his life. Imagine him regretting owning slaves, and wondering how the hell he got into Heaven (pardon the juxtaposition). Mystery solved. I feel like a kid from Ghostwriter.

Jones’ title is similarly meaningless until you have finished the book. In the fine tradition of To Kill A Mockingbird or The Catcher in the Rye, the title is derived from a minor incidence within the novel, but is also significant to the work as a whole. In this case, the title explicitly refers to a map of the world owned by John Skiffington, and mentioned in Chapter 5. Here, Jones writes: “The map had come from the Russian in twelve parts, each weighing about three pounds, and Skiffington had had a time putting it together” (174-5). In the same way, Jones pieces together disparate characters and events into a holistic map. The stories of a Canadian publisher, an executed Frenchman, and a twentieth century academic seem tangential to the main narrative, but enlarge the world of the main characters. Jones’ “known world” is not one of geography, but of personality. Having finished the novel, I don’t have a clear picture of Manchester, of William Robbins’ plantation or Henry Townsend’s house. But I have a better conception of the relationships between black and white, slave and free black, husband and wife, and lover and mistress; Jones elucidates them more clearly than river lines or mountain ridges on a map. Jones excels at portraying a large, lived-in world, one that is not a small, isolated Virginia town, but one that is but a piece of a larger country and larger narrative.

Jones’ title is mentioned in the chapter heading to Chapter 5: “That Business Up in Arlington. A Cow Borrows a Life from a Cat. The Known World.” Every chapter is introduced by similarly enigmatic phrases. My new title is mentioned at the beginning of Chapter 1: “Liaison. The Warmth of Family. Stormy Weather.” The headings are initially reminiscent of Brecht’s technique of Verfremdungseffekt (“distancing effect”), used in plays like Mother Courage and Her Children, in which initial chapter summaries remind the audience of the artificiality of the play. Jones’ headings also remind us that we are reading a book, a representation of reality, and not experiencing reality itself. However, unlike Brecht’s summaries, Jones’ headings are meaningful only after reading the chapter. Although they are a reminder of artificiality, they help the reader to remain actively engaged in the text: at the end of each chapter, I found myself paging back to check Jones’ heading, to see if I could recognize his allusions. They are yet another piece of the narrative map Jones constructs to reveal The Known World.

When you have finished navigating The Known World, there are a few more ways in which you can engage the text. Be sure to read “An Interview with Edward P. Jones” in the Post Script of the book. Most of your lingering questions about his technical and authorial decisions will be answered. When you have finished that, find a current picture of him, so you can be sure to recognize him when he passes you on campus. To get a better look at Jones, attend his inaugural reading on Thursday, January 29, 2009, at 5 p.m. in the Jack Morton Auditorium (free and open to the public). Be sure to thank the English Department and your new Communications Liaison.

Tags: Edward P. Jones, novel, opinion, review, Wang Visiting Professor in Contemporary Literature
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