The Long Song

THE LONG SONG

by Andrea Levy

 

Nominations: Booker Finalist 2010, Dublin Longlist 2012, Women's Prize Longlist 2010

 

Date Read: January 14, 2022

 

The Long Song is a historical novel set in the sugar cane fields of Jamaica. Told from the perspective of July, a slave on the Amity plantation, she experiences enough trauma to last multiple lifetimes. She survives the societal upheaval that marked the ending of slavery in Jamaica and her story remarkably concludes in a satisfying ending. If anyone deserves some rest, it is Miss July. She is writing her story for her son to have as a remembrance of her.

 

July is born a child of rape (but what slave technically isn’t?), her mother Kitty having been raped by their white overseer. From the very beginning, July was loud and made her presence known. She was such a precocious and adorable child that her mistress, Caroline, took her at the age of 9 to be a house slave and her personal servant. Over the years, July (called Marguerite by Caroline because it sounded “prettier”) becomes a sort of confidante to Caroline who you come to realize is mostly isolated on the island.

 

July endures the punishments, demands, uprisings and loss of friends and kin throughout the years. She is an ever endurable woman who relies on her wits and wiles to survive. Her entire life changes, however, after the death of Amity’s owner, Caroline’s brother (John?). She hires an overseer from England, Robert Goodwin, who arrives with a firm belief in the humanity of all beings regardless of the color of their skin. He is immediately smitten with July.

 

By the time Robert arrives, July has already had a son, Thomas, and given him up on the doorstep of the Baptist church. The church elders, fortunately, take him in and educate him in England. She has survived the Baptist Uprising that marked the end of slavery in Jamaica. 

 

Although Robert is desperate for July, he loathes himself for his feelings because he feels like a predator, which he ultimately is. He decides that if he marries Caroline, he can rightfully “have” July. I never quite followed this logic. But have her he does. They fall madly in love with each other, while at the same time Robert increasingly is disillusioned with the former slaves on Amity who refuse to work according to his will. And as with most relationships with a drastic power imbalance, July ends up getting screwed. Literally and figuratively.

 

While I found The Long Song well-written, well-researched and captivating, there was a certain something missing for me. I appreciated July’s powerful voice and the historical period Levy captured, a period of history I don’t know much about. I am certainly looking forward to Small Island, and hoping for that little something extra that I feel Levy is capable of. But what the hell do I know. I could never write a book like this.

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