Wednesday, October 26, 2016

THE UNDERGROUND RAILROAD





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The Underground Railroad, Colson Whitehead, Doubleday, 2016, 306 pp


Summary from Goodreads: Cora is a slave on a cotton plantation in Georgia. Life is hellish for all the slaves but especially bad for Cora; an outcast even among her fellow Africans, she is coming into womanhood - where even greater pain awaits. When Caesar, a recent arrival from Virginia, tells her about the Underground Railroad, they decide to take a terrifying risk and escape. Matters do not go as planned and, though they manage to find a station and head north, they are being hunted.

In Whitehead's ingenious conception, the Underground Railroad is no mere metaphor - engineers and conductors operate a secret network of tracks and tunnels beneath the Southern soil. 

My Review:
I liked this novel very much and I admired several things about it. It is the story of a runaway slave in pre-Civil War times and follows her journey to freedom, a journey she has not fully completed by the end of the book.

The stages of her escape and her continuous flight from the slave catcher who pursues her are harrowing. They also reveal the stages a person who has been enslaved might go through to overcome the effects of that enslavement, to find a sense of self, and to learn how to live with more freedom than ever experienced before. I was impressed by the way Cora's journey paralleled the experience of African Americans over the last 200 years or more, including the reality that the social journey is also still incomplete.

Making the Underground Railroad an actual train that runs underground works on so many levels. I am sure I am not the only school child to have originally imagined it that way.

Cora, the runaway, is a great character. She is tough and vulnerable at the same time. She learns from experience, learns to read, and uses the survival skills attained as a slave, while carrying in her heart both the pain and the pride of the knowledge that her mother ran away before her and was never found. 

However, I did not totally love this novel. In interviews, the author says that he read every slave narrative he could get his hands on before writing it. Having read a couple of those myself, including Twelve Years A Slave, I felt that many of the scenes in this book were familiar. His research showed in the writing a bit too obviously. I don't know how else he could have done it and it is important that he is bringing these stories to new readers and keeping them alive. It just bothered me.

Sometimes I lost track of the reality of Cora as a character and felt I was hearing the author's voice more than hers. I think this is Colson Whitehead's first foray into historical fiction and I have found that quibble in other first historical novels before.

Everyone in my reading group was positive about the book, and this is a group that is usually widely divided about anything we read. So that is an indicator that Whitehead has the ability to reach white, middle-aged women on a topic that is full of negatives. Believe me, that is no small feat!  


(The Underground Railroad is available in various formats by order from Once Upon A Time Bookstore.) 

13 comments:

  1. It sounds like a book that should be read regardless.

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    1. You always exactly get the gist of my reviews!

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  2. Your review makes me want to read this book.... I only have a few concerns about the "copy-paste parts" of the author...I wish you a tip top tastic day :)

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    1. Thank you my friend. The day is ending and it was pretty tip top tastic because I am reading a good book and I had a meeting with my favorite reading group tonight... I wish you one of those days tomorrow:-)

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    2. Here we enjoy our last days of vacation. "Potato Holiday" it's called like that. See you tomorrow :)

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  3. I'm not a huge fan of alternate history, but I've had this on my TBR since I fist saw it discussed in the blogosphere. Yours is the first "did not totally love" review that I've seen. I perhaps will hold off a bit on my reading.

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    1. It is not exactly alternate history except for the aspect of making the railroad a real one instead of a figurative one, but the rest of the history is accurate and set in its proper time. But then, you will want to read it in the proper time for you!

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  4. There have been so many positive, often glowing, reviews of this work and yet... I don't really know why but somehow it just doesn't grab me. But your review was very interesting and balanced, I thought.

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    1. The more I think about the book (and that must mean he got to me in some ways) I feel I want to read more by this author. He has written various kinds of fiction. I think he is both in and out of the mainstream, but has a unique approach to fiction. I wonder if I knew his writing better, I would get more of what he is trying to do. And I will now watch for what else he writes because he might still be coming into himself as an author.

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  5. Having the results of reserach showing up in the book the way you describe would bother me a lot. But the "real railroad" underground railroad is a refreshing original - I am going to find this book and check it out. Alana ramblinwitham.blogspot.com

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    1. Good decision Alana. Thank you for commenting here and welcome to the blog!

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  6. I'm glad you articulated what you didn't care for about the book. I do have a copy of it from BEA this year where I heard the author talk. I do plan to read it. I think I was waiting after having finished a couple slavery novels -- I think I needed a subject break. But I will return to it.

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    1. It was interesting because when I finished it I felt I liked it quite a bit. Then when we discussed it in reading group I liked it even more because all of them found it so good. But those little quibbles did stick with me. I agree that one needs some respite from slavery novels!

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