Ta-Nehesi Coates
The Water Dancer by Ta-Nehisi Coates is a first-person narrative of Hiram Walker, a slave in a Virginia tobacco plantation. His father owns the plantation; his mother is sold after she is captured while attempting to escape. Ripped away from his mother at a young age, Hiram is so traumatized by the experience that his memory of her becomes fragmented and fleeting.
Selected by his father to live in the large house to serve Maynard, his half-brother and heir to the estate, Hiram is exposed to the lifestyle of wealthy Virginia landowners. He refers to them as Quality and learns to distinguish between the different classes of Quality. He understands the fragility of the structure they have established, as well as their total reliance on slaves (the Tasked) to sustain that lifestyle. When Maynard dies in a drowning accident, Hiram experiences a Conduction—the mysterious ability to transport himself magically across land and water. Eventually Hiram makes a daring escape, only to be captured and brutally tortured. He is rescued and his services enlisted in the underground war to free slaves. His taste of freedom in Philadelphia convinces him to return to the plantation to liberate his surrogate family.
The novel has a strong opening. Hiram has a vision of his mother dancing on the bridge as he struggles to stay afloat in the water. His half-brother drowns, but Hiram survives the ordeal. The novel holds the reader’s attention until about half-way through when it begins to drag. Characters are introduced but not fully developed. They step in and out of Hiram’s life as accessories that are never fully-fleshed out. The narrative flow is frequently interrupted with pages dedicated to Hiram’s thoughts. These interruptions become repetitive, monotonous, and tedious. The use of Conduction as a plot device infused with magical realism gains prominence as the novel progresses. But the description of what occurs during a Conduction is, perhaps, intentionally confused and confusing, so one is never quite sure what has happened.
There is much to admire in the novel. At times, the language rises to the level of poetry. The graphic description of the brutality of slavery, the gut-wrenching forced separations of family members and the trauma such separation creates is extremely moving. Coates’ exploration of the psychology of the enslaved is insightful. And his exploration of the psychology and internal conflicts of the slaveowner in the shape of Hiram’s guilt-ridden, aging father is sensitively drawn. But the novel would have benefited from a tighter focus, fewer and more fully-developed characters, and less tangential side-stories that contribute little to the narrative.
Recommended.