When first reading this group of short stories by Z.Z. Packer I truly thought I was going to have a long week of reading ahead. I was not able to grasp the angle of her tone being used here, but soon caught on to these splendid, morally soaked passages. Each story has a distinct knowledge of the social high ground, but does not always choose to engage in this knowledge. There is also a distinct religious undertone in her stories. In "Every Tongue Shall Confess" we meet a gospel singer in the church choir, Roberta, who is also a nurse in a local hospital. She has been bullied by the people in her life and by her job. She has been sexually assaulted by the great Reverend of her church but decided not to tell anyone about it due to her own embarrassment. When the Reverend decided one day while driving her home to stick his tongue down her throat and hands down her paints, he became very hostile towards her for not letting him know that it was that time of the month. I thought this situation was awkward for the both of them but really how could the Rev. get mad at her when he was the one who was acting inappropriately. The fact that he got upset about this shows how shallow of a man he is. He is a star at the church and beloved by the community. However like most men of power he knows no boundaries, and sees no faults in any of his actions. Roberta is a dedicated nurse as well as a great singer; she even makes a point of calling all her patients on her days off. It is during one of these calls where her destiny is made clear to her, but not right away and not very clear at first. She mistakenly connects with her patient’s roommate, an old blues guitarist with a deep soul. He also has a thing for Roberta and tries to convince her that they should get dinner together and spend some time getting to know each other. Roberta changes the subject to religion saying that he should be concerned with changing the fate of the bluesmans' soul. She declares that Jesus can save his soul, but only if he let would only let him in. He tries to make a deal with her saying that if Jesus saves his knee he will start going to church regularly. She believes that there is no deal making with god and that he should go to church no matter what happens to his knee. In the stories' climax we see Roberta singing in the choir when she notices the blues guitarist standing with the aid of his cruch, and with his trusty guitar strapped to his back. He decided that seeing her was worth the price of admission, and that it is undeniable that they were placed on this earth to save one another.
In "Our Lady of Peace" we are given a glimpse into the inner city Baltimore school system. Tired of not being able to make her rent our narrator decides that she will become a schoolteacher. Sounds simple enough but is it? This story resonated with me because it shows the true perseverance of teachers, and the strife they deal with on a daily basis. Most people think that there could not be an easier job, summers and holidays off, but as we see here there is a whole lot more than meets the eye. Our narrator has trouble enticing the class with her lesson plans, and controlling the classroom. She turns to Sheba, a juvenile delinquent living at the Our Lady of Peace home for children, which is actually more like a jail. Sheba has a bad reputation; it is rumored that she shanked her former teacher at her old school. The students quickly fall into line when Sheba decides that they should shut up and pay attention. Everything seems to be working out until Sheba turns on the teacher, she gets pregnant and stops coming to class.
While trying to restore peace to the classroom and her life the teacher decides to on a peace offering to Sheba, she offers her a ride home. Things do not work out as planned and our narrator is upset with the world as it is today. She cannot stand the nonchalant attitude of the inner city youth, two of which are taking their sweet time crossing the street in front of her. Fed up with it all she decides to floor the gas pedal to give the kids a scare. She ends up accidentally hitting one of the kids, and flees the scene. She eventually decides that she is no longer cut out for teaching these kids who don't care for learning or advancement in any way shape of form. It took a bunch of chaos for her to realize where her peace lies, one thing is for sure, it is not at Our Lady of Peace.
posted by Michael Clark
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The short story "Brownies" takes place at a summer camp (Camp Crescendo) located on a reopened high school band and Hockey field near the south suburbs of Atlanta, Georgia. At the camp, the African American Brownie troop of six young girls, (from an inner city school, Woodrow Wilson Elementary, which is predominately racially segregated, encounters the "invaders." A White girls Brownie troop #909, exiting their bus the White girls have a special appearance, "their complexions of ice cream:strawberry, vanilla" (p.1), but smell like "wet Chihuahuas." A plan is developed when the African American Brownie troop girls learn and believe that one of the fourth grade girls from the White troop addressed them with a racial slur. Over a period of four days, the African American Brownie troop confirms their suspicions and plan a "lesson" for the other troop. Suggestions for the "lesson" include, "beating" the White girls up or placing "daddy-long-legs" in their sleeping bags. A Secret meeting is held to talk about the lesson, with the culmination of events ending in the "messy, with leaves and wads of chewing gum on the floor"(p.13) camp bathroom. A story that stands out in this collection is "Speaking in Tongues," in which a Sunday school-ish 14-year-old runs away to Atlanta and is taken in by a pedophiliac pimp. It would be very easy for the characters in this story to be portrayed as the naïve innocent, the man who takes advantage of her, the hardened street girl saving for a way out who ultimately rescues the young heroine. But Packer's portrayals paint each character a shade of gray. She is an author who presents the facts as she sees them and lets her audience draw their own conclusions like many of the other books in which we have been reading recently . Packer's characters are often, though not always, very smart. Many are struggling to rise above their circumstances, yet they feel trapped by things beyond their control: their parents, their faith and their jobs.
In "The Ant of the Self," a champion high school debater picks his father up from jail and reluctantly drives him to the Million Man March in Washington, D.C. There, the father hopes to sell exotic birds to "the Afrocentric folks there." The son tells us, "He's so stupid, he's brilliant, At the March, he hears a preacher. and realizes getting rid of his good-for-nothing father isn't so easy because he is not happy with him.
I think that these stories and this book were excellent a good read. I wasnt drawn to the humor like in the last books we have read but her stories are extremely intertesting.
blog post brittany rehain
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