"Becoming all we can be"

Review of A Lesson Before Dying, Ernest J. Gaines, by Kara Martin

Ernest J. Gaines was born on a plantation in Louisiana, United States, and draws heavily on his own experiences of that community in this powerful novel about racism and transformation, about community and dignity.

In the novel, set in the 1940s, Jefferson, a plantation worker is guilty of being in the wrong place at the wrong time when a white man is killed. As the only survivor on the scene, and black, he is arrested and convicted and sentenced to death; a situation that impacts his whole community.

In a final, desperate attempt to get Jefferson's sentence commuted to life imprisonment rather than "death", his lawyer mounts a defence which sounds ridiculous in the 21st Century, he argues that Jefferson is not worth killing because he is just an animal, a hog. It then becomes Jefferson's godmother's goal to ensure that her godson dies a man, not a hog; that her godson will be remembered as a human being, not an animal.

Jefferson's godmother decides that her best friend's son, Grant Wiggins, the most educated member of his community, is going to be the means of this transformation from hog to man. However, it is a long, slow, frustrating and humiliating process for Grant; as he is ridiculed by the whites and ignored by Jefferson, who becomes deeply depressed from the moment of his incarceration.

However, over time, through dialogue, respect and encouragement, Grant helps Jefferson to discover a new way of seeing himself. By the end, Jefferson realises that he can set an example for his community of maturity and dignity; that even though he has been separated from his community by prison walls, he still belongs to his community, and can still give hope to his community.

The theme of community is very strong; along with the concept that education is not just knowledge, it is about transformation; but really this book is SO rich in lessons for all of us.

Ernest J. Gaines manages to take us out of our comfortable lives and right into the prison cell with Jefferson; we feel his pain as the victimised member of an oppressed community. It is a deeply moving book because we experience all the emotions of those who are suffering. This is a sad and confronting book, but it is also uplifting, because in the end it celebrates all that is possible.

I was reading this book at the time of Kevin Rudd's apology to the stolen generation, and it challenged me to wonder how different I am to the whites in this book. How do I react to the complex situation faced by those who are marked as different in this country; whether it is the way they look or behave?

Perhaps the most important message of A Lesson Before Dying is that each of us has been created by God with the potential to be whole, and to help others to become whole. This is a poetic book which deeply resonates with truth.


KARA MARTIN is a lecturer with Macquarie Christian Studies Institute and is an avid reader and book group attendee. Kara does fiction reviews for Heart 1032's Open House (http://www.theopenhouse.net.au/).