Celebrating Fifty Years of Picador Books Winner of the National Book Award 1990 The Apocalypse would definitely put a crimp in my career plans. Rutherford Calhoun, a puckish rogue and newly freed slave, spends his days loitering around the docks of New Orleans, dodging debt collectors, gangsters, and Isadora Bailey, a prim and frugal woman who seeks to marry him and curb his mischievous instincts. When the heat from these respective pursuers becomes too much to bear, he cons his way on to the next ship leaving the dock: ...
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Celebrating Fifty Years of Picador Books Winner of the National Book Award 1990 The Apocalypse would definitely put a crimp in my career plans. Rutherford Calhoun, a puckish rogue and newly freed slave, spends his days loitering around the docks of New Orleans, dodging debt collectors, gangsters, and Isadora Bailey, a prim and frugal woman who seeks to marry him and curb his mischievous instincts. When the heat from these respective pursuers becomes too much to bear, he cons his way on to the next ship leaving the dock: the Republic. Upon boarding, to his horror he discovers that he is on an illegal slave ship embarking on the Middle Passage, the portion of the triangular trade route that saw slaves transported from Africa to the US. Staffed by a crew of criminals and degenerates, the Republic is on a mission to enslave members of the legendary Allmuseri tribe, while the sadistic yet philosophical Captain Falcon has a secondary objective: securing a mysterious cargo that possesses a terrifying and otherworldly power. What follows is a story of Rutherford's battle for survival, as he finds himself juggling loyalties between the ship's crew and the enslaved passengers, and is forced to use every ounce of the charm and cunning that he possesses to endure the desperate conditions and battle the myriad deadly forces on the high seas. A masterful blend of allegory, black comedy, naval adventure and supernatural horror, Charles Johnson's wildly inventive Middle Passage is a true modern classic. Part of the Picador Collection, a series showcasing the best of modern literature.
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New. B-format paperback. Picador Collection . In Stock. 100% Money Back Guarantee. Brand New, Perfect Condition, allow 4-14 business days for standard shipping. To Alaska, Hawaii, U.S. protectorate, P.O. box, and APO/FPO addresses allow 4-28 business days for Standard shipping. No expedited shipping. All orders placed with expedited shipping will be cancelled. Over 3, 000, 000 happy customers.
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PLEASE NOTE, WE DO NOT SHIP TO DENMARK. New Book. Shipped from UK in 4 to 14 days. Established seller since 2000. Please note we cannot offer an expedited shipping service from the UK.
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The quotation "Homo est quo dammodo omnia", attributed to Saint Thomas Aquinas, may be translated "In a way, man is everything". It serves as one of three epigraphs to Charles Johnson's 1990 National Book Award winning novel, "Middle Passage". Robert Hayden's poem "Middle Passage" about the terrors of slavers and a statement from the Upanishads: "Who sees variety and not the Unity wanders on from death to death" serve as the other two epigraphs for Johnson's beautifully complex and erudite philosophical novel, set largely on an illegal slave ship from New Orleans in 1830.
Charles Johnson (b. 1948) became the first African American novelist to win the National Book Award following Ralph Ellison's "Invisible Man" which received the honor in 1953. A professor of philosophy and English for many years, Johnson is also an essayist, screenwriter, and novelist. He has long been a practicing Buddhist. "Middle Passage" reflects his interest in understanding America, its history, and capacity for change. The book is also a sea yarn of sorts written to entertain. The book is heavily allusive to the literature of the sea, particularly to novels of Herman Melville and to Homer's "Odyssey".
The main character and the book's narrator, Rutherford Calhoun, 22, is a manumitted former slave from southern Illinois who has moved to New Orleans where he becomes a gambler, womanizer and petty thief. He has a relationship with Isadora, an African American schoolteacher from Boston. When he becomes pressed by his debts and by Isadora's desire to marry, he stows away on the first ship out of New Orleans, a rickety and illegal slaver, with the suggestive name, the "Republic". (Congress had outlawed the international slave trade in 1808,) In a memorable opening sentence, Calhoun observes that "Of all the things that drive men to sea, the most common disaster, I've come to learn, is women." The "Republic" sails to Africa in search of taking captives from a tribe called the Allmuseri. This is a fictitious entity. Johnson elaborately develops the belief system of the Allmuseri, and their god, who becomes a captive on the ship together with his people.
The book combines realism, philosophy and myth. Calhoun is tough and street-smart and has a remarkable way with words. He changes from a thief to a writer and reflective thinker in the course of the book. He also is possessed of remarkable erudition, attributed to the kindness of his former master, a learned clergyman who hated slavery, in Illinois. Scenes on the outgoing voyage, in Africa, and on the return are described in detail in passages which range from the humorous to the shocking. The leaky and unreliable "Republic" is buffeted by storms and Calhoun becomes involved in a mutiny by some of the crew against the captain, in the captain's efforts to defend himself, and in a rebellion by the Allmuseri en route.
The history in the book is combined with a great deal of anachronism and with philosophical/religious discussion which owes a great deal to Buddhism. Thus the novel is not a straightforward history of a slave ship. Rather, Johnson probes beneath the surface to develop a metaphysics about non-duality -- the unitary character of experience -- and an understanding of the United States, tied into non-duality and based upon the need of Americans of every background to see and understand themselves as a people and to avoid polarizing fights about identities. A crucial goal of the book, I think, is to help Americans to understand themselves. Late in the novel, as his character is transformed by his experiences Calhoun reflects upon what America, with its faults, has come to mean to him as a black man:
"The States were hardly the sort of place a Negro would pine for, but pine for them I did. Even for that I was ready now after months at sea, for the strangeness and mystery of black life, even for the endless round of social obstacles and challenges and trials colored men faced every blessed day of their lives, for there were indeed triumphs, I remembered, that balanced the suffering on shore, small yet enduring things, very deep, that Isadora often pointed out to me during our evening walks. If this weird, upside-down caricature of a country called America, if this land of refugees and former indentured servants, religious heretics and half-breeds, whoresons and fugitives-- this cauldron of mongrels from all points on the compass -- was all I could rightly call home, then aye: I was of it. There, as I lay weakened from bleeding, was where I wanted to be."
I thought of the approaching Independence Day holiday in reading this book. I also thought of the polarization in our country and of the need for people of varying identities and beliefs to come together as, in the simplest metaphor in this book, seamen on a ship. I have seen interviews Johnson gave in the years following "Middle Passage" in which he discusses the role of American literature in encouraging individuals to think of themselves as sharing in an America rather than being entrapped in their own smaller ideas of identities. His book has great breadth and development as it moves from the individual story of Rutherford Calhoun and his development from his days as a former slave and petty crook. The book encourages reflection on the nature of the United States as well as on philosophical questions on the nature of reality. I think this 1990 National Book Award-winning novel deserves more attention that it currently receives. It is a modern American classic.
