Property

PROPERTY

by Valerie Martin

 

Award: Women’s Prize Winner 2003

 

Nomination: Dublin Longlist 2005

 

Date Read: June 19, 2023

 

In Property, Martin so deftly portrays how slavery poisons both the owned and the owner. From the perspective of Manon, the reader gets a glimpse into the privileged yet vacant life of a plantation owner’s wife. Manon is contemptuous of her husband Gaudet, a man who she initially thought truly desired her. With the arrival of Manon’s slave Sarah, she can see that Gaudet simply desires women.

 

Sarah was initially Manon’s mother’s slave and she was presented to Manon as a wedding present. Sarah was sent to the husband’s plantation ahead of Manon’s arrival, to prepare the property to receive the newlywed mistress. Upon Manon’s arrival, she could already see her husband’s desire for Sarah. And after two children follow, Manon no longer cared to uphold the charade of her marriage, loathing her husband’s visage, touch and business sense.

 

With an outbreak of cholera in town, Manon is summoned to care for her ailing mother, who passes shortly after she arrives. With her mother’s death, she can finally see an opportunity to live independently of her husband, since her mother’s cottage and estate would be more than enough to sustain her. When Manon returns to the plantation and attempts to convince her husband of her plan, he adamantly refuses. He needs the inheritance to settle other debts he has incurred.

 

Somewhat accepting her fate, Manon continues with the motions of living daily life until one day an insurrection arrives on their very doorstep. The slaves who have revolted are vicious and end up killing Gaudet, gashing Manon’s face and shooting her in the shoulder and causing Sarah to go on the run. Manon survives the ordeal, but her brutalized heart doesn’t seem to endure.

 

We learn of Manon’s father’s attempts to be a decent slaveowner, who sacrifices his family for his convictions. We see the contrast with Gaudet’s brutal style, where he relishes humiliation and frequent punishment. We can see the reasons slaves ran away and rose up against their owners. Slavery is an institution that poisons anyone who goes near it.

 

In the end, once Sarah is brought back to Manon’s side after a month of running, I was captivated by two truths. Manon was remarking that Sarah had an experience that no woman could understand – that of living as a white man – since Sarah passed as a white man during her escape. This acknowledgement of Manon’s own lack of true power is telling.

 

The other is Sarah telling Manon that when she went to the North, she was invited to sit at the table, instead of waiting on it. She was treated as an equal. When Manon asks if that interested Sarah, she said it very much did. Manon seemed almost surprised by the answer. Who wouldn’t want to be treated as an equal? 

 

So much of this too short book is about the squelching of rebellions, the capturing of runaway slaves, means of keeping slaves in check. Didn’t this come across as exhausting to those whites who were living this? I can’t imagine how anyone ever felt safe trying to keep control over something so unnatural. And as far away as I’d like to think we are as a country from this poisoned legacy, we really aren’t as far as we should be.