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bparkinson31 's review for:
The Indigo Girl
by Natasha Boyd
Content warning: birth trauma, sexual abuse
Honestly ashamed I even read this book and horrified with what I did read. The book is a whitewashed, white sympathizing romanticism of colonial-era America. The enslaved people are depicted as savage threats to landowners, and the "happy ending" is the white woman's monetary success made possible solely because of the botanic knowledge of her unpaid enslaved people.
This book could have been a story of female empowerment, the making of indigo dye, or the revolutionary trade of knowledge between enslaved people and Southern plantation owners. Instead, the last fourth of the book decided it was a poorly-concocted romance novel that completely throws out any lessons to be learned by Eliza, the main character, about the dehumanizing enslaved peoples and using their free labor for material gain.
Eliza is supposed to be a good plantation owner because she doesn't approve of the whipping post. But she approves of just about every other aspect of slavery. She certainly does not approve of enslaved people running away, nor their anger about oh, I don't know, being enslaved!
The worst example is in her treatment of her enslaved woman, Sarah. Sarah is cold towards Eliza and ruins their first attempt at making indigo. It is clear Sarah is upset because she a) is an enslaved human being who has been ripped from her home, b) has been sexually abused by her male landowner, c) has a child with this landowner for whom she has to take care and d) is not impressed with Eliza's white-savior complex waltzing in to move Sarah and her child to a different plantation so that Eliza can profit off of Sarah's knowledge of Indigo making at Sarah's expense. Sarah is rightfully furious, and all Eliza can think is why is she so mad at me? *wimpy puppy eyes*
BITCH I DON'T KNOW THINK IT THROUGH.
This relationship is never rectified. And it COULD HAVE BEEN because Boyd admits that within this historical fiction Sarah is a fictional character! Instead, Boyd's message appears to be that slaves should be nice, and if they can't be, they should be dehumanized even further. The story concludes with, in Eliza's eyes, Sarah's rightfully broken spirit as she becomes docile and accepting of her enslavement. This comes after Sarah suffers a brutal miscarriage and Eliza says "perhaps her defiance had bled out of her along with her baby" (p.267). It is fucking sick.
Their final encounter comes when a tearful Sarah apologizes to Eliza in her study. Sarah quite literally bows down to Eliza in apology, and Eliza walks out on her in anger, calling Sarah's actions "dramatic and uncomfortable" (p.295). That's it. That's how the story of their relationship ends. Eliza shows no remorse and Sarah is left a broken, saddened, enslaved woman.
At one point, Eliza has the gall to tell an enslaved man that he is taking her freedom from her. Because he is trying to gain his freedom. Out of enslavement. And at this moment, a wealthy, white, plantation-owning woman looks an enslaved man in the eyes and says "you were closer to freedom than I ever was" (p.249). I ---
Additionally, she describes those slaves who attempted rebellion as making "calls like the sounds of animals" and having "a spirit of threat and malevolence" about them (p.284). No shit baby boo, you'd be pissed too.
And finally, the climax of the plot. Could have centered around anything other than what it did. A final indigo crop. The things they make with the indigo crop. Reconciliation between Sarah and Eliza with Eliza recognizing the need to treat Sarah with respect.
Instead, THE CLIMAX OF THE BOOK IS THE RACE FOR A RUNAWAY SLAVE. And the MORAL OF THE CLIMAX is that "good" slaves don't join slave rebellions or runaway for their freedom. Eliza's enslaved person is let out of jail because of his "good" character: a lifetime of submission to his owners. Then Eliza marries her lawyer friend and they live happily ever after profiting off of enslaved lands.
Unfortunately, that's about how the ending went in real life, too. Eliza Lucas Pinkney was an impressive woman for running a business in her father's absence at a time when women didn't run businesses. But the buck stops there. She was a business owner who continued the practice of enslaving people in this country. Boyd tries to argue the benevolent legacy of Eliza's son, Charles Cotesworth Pinckney, who "did much to shape the educational and cultural institutions within South Carolina," including his role at the Constitutional Convention of 1787 as a representative of South Carolina.
What Boyd doesn't write is that Charles was integral to the preservation of fugitive slave laws in this country as well as defending states' "needs" to import enslaved people and utilize them for state profits. THAT was his role in federal and South Carolinian politics.
Absolutely not. Nope. I'm done.
Honestly ashamed I even read this book and horrified with what I did read. The book is a whitewashed, white sympathizing romanticism of colonial-era America. The enslaved people are depicted as savage threats to landowners, and the "happy ending" is the white woman's monetary success made possible solely because of the botanic knowledge of her unpaid enslaved people.
This book could have been a story of female empowerment, the making of indigo dye, or the revolutionary trade of knowledge between enslaved people and Southern plantation owners. Instead, the last fourth of the book decided it was a poorly-concocted romance novel that completely throws out any lessons to be learned by Eliza, the main character, about the dehumanizing enslaved peoples and using their free labor for material gain.
Eliza is supposed to be a good plantation owner because she doesn't approve of the whipping post. But she approves of just about every other aspect of slavery. She certainly does not approve of enslaved people running away, nor their anger about oh, I don't know, being enslaved!
The worst example is in her treatment of her enslaved woman, Sarah. Sarah is cold towards Eliza and ruins their first attempt at making indigo. It is clear Sarah is upset because she a) is an enslaved human being who has been ripped from her home, b) has been sexually abused by her male landowner, c) has a child with this landowner for whom she has to take care and d) is not impressed with Eliza's white-savior complex waltzing in to move Sarah and her child to a different plantation so that Eliza can profit off of Sarah's knowledge of Indigo making at Sarah's expense. Sarah is rightfully furious, and all Eliza can think is why is she so mad at me? *wimpy puppy eyes*
BITCH I DON'T KNOW THINK IT THROUGH.
This relationship is never rectified. And it COULD HAVE BEEN because Boyd admits that within this historical fiction Sarah is a fictional character! Instead, Boyd's message appears to be that slaves should be nice, and if they can't be, they should be dehumanized even further. The story concludes with, in Eliza's eyes, Sarah's rightfully broken spirit as she becomes docile and accepting of her enslavement. This comes after Sarah suffers a brutal miscarriage and Eliza says "perhaps her defiance had bled out of her along with her baby" (p.267). It is fucking sick.
Their final encounter comes when a tearful Sarah apologizes to Eliza in her study. Sarah quite literally bows down to Eliza in apology, and Eliza walks out on her in anger, calling Sarah's actions "dramatic and uncomfortable" (p.295). That's it. That's how the story of their relationship ends. Eliza shows no remorse and Sarah is left a broken, saddened, enslaved woman.
At one point, Eliza has the gall to tell an enslaved man that he is taking her freedom from her. Because he is trying to gain his freedom. Out of enslavement. And at this moment, a wealthy, white, plantation-owning woman looks an enslaved man in the eyes and says "you were closer to freedom than I ever was" (p.249). I ---
Additionally, she describes those slaves who attempted rebellion as making "calls like the sounds of animals" and having "a spirit of threat and malevolence" about them (p.284). No shit baby boo, you'd be pissed too.
And finally, the climax of the plot. Could have centered around anything other than what it did. A final indigo crop. The things they make with the indigo crop. Reconciliation between Sarah and Eliza with Eliza recognizing the need to treat Sarah with respect.
Instead, THE CLIMAX OF THE BOOK IS THE RACE FOR A RUNAWAY SLAVE. And the MORAL OF THE CLIMAX is that "good" slaves don't join slave rebellions or runaway for their freedom. Eliza's enslaved person is let out of jail because of his "good" character: a lifetime of submission to his owners. Then Eliza marries her lawyer friend and they live happily ever after profiting off of enslaved lands.
Unfortunately, that's about how the ending went in real life, too. Eliza Lucas Pinkney was an impressive woman for running a business in her father's absence at a time when women didn't run businesses. But the buck stops there. She was a business owner who continued the practice of enslaving people in this country. Boyd tries to argue the benevolent legacy of Eliza's son, Charles Cotesworth Pinckney, who "did much to shape the educational and cultural institutions within South Carolina," including his role at the Constitutional Convention of 1787 as a representative of South Carolina.
What Boyd doesn't write is that Charles was integral to the preservation of fugitive slave laws in this country as well as defending states' "needs" to import enslaved people and utilize them for state profits. THAT was his role in federal and South Carolinian politics.
Absolutely not. Nope. I'm done.