The Poisonwood Bible (Oprah's Book Club) - Hardcover

Kingsolver, Barbara

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0060175400 ISBN 13: 9780060175405

Publisher: Harper, 1998

Synopsis

"The Poisonwood Bible" is a story told by the wife and four daughters of Nathan Price, a fierce, evangelical Baptist who takes his family and mission to the Belgian Congo in 1959. They carry with them everything they believe they will need from home, but soon find that all of it-- from garden seeds to Scripture-- is calamitously transformed on African soil. What follows is a suspenseful epic of one family's tragic undoing and remarkable reconstruction over the course of three decades in postcolonial Africa.

The novel is set against one of the most dramatic political chronicles of the twentieth century: the Congo's fight for independence from Belgium, the murder of its first elected prime minister, the CIA coup to install his replacement, and the insidious progress of a world economic order that robs the fledgling African nation of its autonomy. Against this backdrop, Orleanna Price reconstructs the story of her evangelist husband's part in the Western assault on Africa, a tale indelibly darkened by her own losses and unanswerable questions about her own culpability. Also narrating the story, by turns, are her four daughters-- the self-centered, teenaged Rachel; shrewd adolescent twins Leah and Adah; and Ruth May, a prescient five-year-old. These sharply observant girls, who arrive in the Congo with racial preconceptions forged in 1950s Georgia, will be marked in surprisingly different ways by their father's intractable mission, and by Africa itself. Ultimately each must strike her own separate path to salvation. Their passionately intertwined stories become a compelling exploration of moral risk and personal responsibility.

Dancing between the dark comedy of human failings and the breathtaking possibilities of human hope, "The Poisonwood Bible" possesses all that has distinguished Barbara Kingsolver's previous work, and extends this beloved writer's vision to an entirely new level. Taking its place alongside the classic works of postcolonial literature, this ambitious novel establishes Kingsolver as one of the most thoughtful and daring of modern writers.

About this title

Review

As any reader of The Mosquito Coast knows, men who drag their families to far-off climes in pursuit of an Idea seldom come to any good, while those familiar with At Play in the Fields of the Lord or Kalimantaan understand that the minute a missionary sets foot on the fictional stage, all hell is about to break loose. So when Barbara Kingsolver sends missionary Nathan Price along with his wife and four daughters off to Africa in The Poisonwood Bible, you can be sure that salvation is the one thing they're not likely to find. The year is 1959 and the place is the Belgian Congo. Nathan, a Baptist preacher, has come to spread the Word in a remote village reachable only by airplane. To say that he and his family are woefully unprepared would be an understatement: "We came from Bethlehem, Georgia, bearing Betty Crocker cake mixes into the jungle," says Leah, one of Nathan's four daughters. But of course it isn't long before they discover that the tremendous humidity has rendered the mixes unusable, their clothes are unsuitable and they've arrived in the middle of political upheaval as the Congolese seek to wrest independence from Belgium. In addition to poisonous snakes, dangerous animals, and the hostility of the villagers to Nathan's fiery take-no-prisoners brand of Christianity, there are also rebels in the jungle and the threat of war in the air. Could things get any worse?

In fact they can and they do. The first part of The Poisonwood Bible revolves around Nathan's intransigent, bullying personality and his effect on both his family and on the village they have come to. As political instability grows in the Congo, so does the local witch doctor's animus toward the Prices, and both seem to converge with tragic consequences about halfway through the novel. From that point on, the family is dispersed and the novel follows each member's fortunes across a span of more than 30 years.

The Poisonwood Bible is arguably Barbara Kingsolver's most ambitious work, and it reveals both her great strengths and her weaknesses. As Nathan Price's wife and four daughters tell their story in alternating chapters, Kingsolver does a good job of differentiating the voices. But at times they can grate--teenaged Rachel's tendency towards precious malapropisms is particularly annoying (students practice their "French congregations"; Nathan's refusal to take his family home is a "tapestry of justice"). More problematic is Kingsolver's tendency to wear her politics on her sleeve; this is particularly evident in the second half of the novel, in which she uses her characters as mouthpieces to explicate the complicated and tragic history of the Belgian Congo.

Despite these weaknesses, Kingsolver's fully realised, three-dimensional characters make The Poisonwood Bible compelling, especially in the first half when Nathan Price is still at the centre of the action. And in her treatment of Africa and the Africans she is at her best, exhibiting the acute perception, moral engagement and lyrical prose that has made her previous novels so successful. --Alix Wilber, Amazon.com

Review

"Kingsolver's powerful new book is actually an old-fashioned 19th-century novel, a Hawthornian tale of sin and redemption and the 'dark necessity' of history." -- Michiko Kakutani, "New York Times""Haunting . . . A novel of character, a narrative shaped by keen-eyed women."-- Front page, Verlyn Klinkenborg, "New York Times Book Review" "Barbara Kingsolver has dreamed a magnificent fiction and a ferocious bill of indictment..What we have here--with this new, mature, angry, heartbroken, expansive out-of-Africa Kingsolver--is at last our very own Lessing and our very own Gordimer." -- "The Nation""A powerful new epic . . . She has with infinitely steady hands worked the prickly threads of religion, politics, race, sin and redemption into a thing of terrible beauty."-- "Los Angeles Times Book Review" "Fully realized, richly embroidered, triumphant."-- "Newsweek"Powerful . . . Kingsolver is a gifted magician of words." -- "Time""There are few ambitious, successful and beautiful novels. Lucky for us, we have one now, in Barbara Kingsolver's "The Poisonwood Bible" . . . his awed reviewer hardly knows where to begin." -- Jane Smiley, "Washington Post Book World" "Beautifully written . . . Kingsolver's tale of domestic tragedy is more than just a well-told yarn . . . Played out against the bloody backdrop of political struggles in Congo that continue to this day, it is also particularly timely." -- "People" "Tragic, and remarkable . . . A novel that blends outlandish experience with Old Testament rhythms of prophecy and doom."-- "USA Today" "The book's sheer enjoyability is given depth by Kingsolver's insight and compassion for Congo, including its people, and their language and sayings."--"Boston Globe" "Most impressive are the humor and insight with which Kingsolver describes a global epic, proving just how personal the political can be." -- "Glamour" "Compelling, lyrical and utterly believable."--" Chicago Tribune" "A triple-decker, different coming-of-age novel, but also a clever look at language and cultures." -- "San Diego Union-Tribune""A bravura performance . . . A subtle and complex creation, dealing with epic subjects with invention and courage and a great deal of heart." -- "Newsday" "A novel that brims with excitement and rings with authority." -- "Portland Oregonian""Kingsolver's work is a magnum opus, a parable encompassing a biblical structure and a bibliography, and a believable cast of African characters." -- "Atlanta Journal-Constitution""Memory believes before knowing remembers. Believes longer than recollects, longer than knowing even wonder." -- William Faulkner

About this edition

• Publisher: Harper
• Publication date: 1998
• ISBN 10: 0060175400
• ISBN 13: 9780060175405
• Binding: Hardcover
• Language: English
• Number of pages: 560