The Autobiography Of My Mother

THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF MY MOTHER

by Jamaica Kincaid

 

Nominations: Dublin Finalist 1998, National Book Critics Circle Finalist 1996, PEN/Faulkner Finalist 1997, Women's Prize Longlist 1997

 

Date Read: September 21, 2022

 

Xuela Richardson was born never knowing her mother. She died giving birth to her, leaving her existence a mystery. The little she knows about her mother have been handed to Xuela in small stories and trinkets of her existence.

 

Xuela’s father, recognizing he wasn’t capable of raising an infant on his own hands Xuela off to his laundress to raise. The laundress treated her as a slave, never honoring her personhood, never offering love or comfort. In this cold environment that focused on survival, Xuela became enchanted with nature, with color, with the deliciousness of the physical world and, most importantly, her changing body.

 

The one gift Xuela’s corrupt father gave her is the benefit of an education. At a time when only boys went to school, Xuela’s father insisted she go as well, paying for her to attend. She had to walk long distances to get there but she enjoyed her time there overall.

 

Eventually, her father remarried and his new wife, Xuela’s stepmother, did not like her; in fact, she hated her. Was it because she was born of her husband’s first wife whom he actually loved? Or was it for Xuela herself that she hated? Although Xuela never found out, she was able to avoid the mysterious spell in the form of a necklace she had been given. She put the necklace on the dog and within days he had died.

 

While Xuela is incapable of love, she is capable of great passion. She is seduced as a school girl, has an affair with a married stevedore, and ultimately marries Philip, who she does not love. The gossip about Xuela is great with the women calling her a whore, a slut and even a murderer. Many believed she poisoned Philip’s first wife so that she could take her place.

 

Through these twists and turns of life, Xuela is ultimately focused on learning about her mother. With no real information to inform her search, Xuela imagines what it was like when her parents met and fell in love. She imagines what her mother felt and thought and the values she held. Xuela inserted herself into these imaginings and tries to define her happiness, her values and her life within the confines of these broad strokes.

 

I have never read Kincaid before and I found this novel to be incredibly repetitive. While Kincaid’s prose is absolutely luscious, I found parts of this tedious as she tried to sort out her own heart and mind and even still I didn’t fully understand her motivations. Why marry a man that you don’t love? Since passion is what united them, couldn’t you have continued with the affair instead of marrying him? I still have a lot of questions that will remain unanswered.