One of the many things that I disliked about Kindred was the (physical) structure of the book. While flipping through the pages to find passages to reference for my response paper, I had a really hard time finding my desired passage.
One obvious reason that this book is hard to navigate is that there aren't any changes in text size or font or any pictures like Mumbo Jumbo had.
Another is that I couldn't really form a chronology of the events of the book in my head. Maybe it's just me, but with the weird slave-and-master dynamics and time traveling made the entire story a blur in my head. When did Dana try to escape? When did Alice try? What age was Rufus after Dana time traveled for the third time? (what even happened when she time traveled for the third time?)
Perhaps each page looks the same to me because Dana adds her own interpretation of anything that happens, which clogs up the page and makes "landmarks" less visible (by landmarks, I mean long dialogues, large paragraphs, short paragraphs, anything that stands out visually that leaves an impression in your mind, so that you can find it easily for response papers). I felt like someone looking across the treetops and not finding a break in the forest.
The entire book basically takes place on the Weylin plantation, and therefore the text doesn't vary much throughout. There aren't any new characters' names that pop up as "landmarks", or capitalized town names or words in all caps. Names of characters are mostly first names, no last names. The names are the same, and each time Dana time travels, the same people are at the plantation. The chapters begin at varying spots on the page, and don't always start at the tops of pages.
I guess I had a hard time searching through the novel, but maybe it was just me. I was hoping to find an online version of Kindred so that I could use the Ctrl+F feature.
One obvious reason that this book is hard to navigate is that there aren't any changes in text size or font or any pictures like Mumbo Jumbo had.
Another is that I couldn't really form a chronology of the events of the book in my head. Maybe it's just me, but with the weird slave-and-master dynamics and time traveling made the entire story a blur in my head. When did Dana try to escape? When did Alice try? What age was Rufus after Dana time traveled for the third time? (what even happened when she time traveled for the third time?)
Perhaps each page looks the same to me because Dana adds her own interpretation of anything that happens, which clogs up the page and makes "landmarks" less visible (by landmarks, I mean long dialogues, large paragraphs, short paragraphs, anything that stands out visually that leaves an impression in your mind, so that you can find it easily for response papers). I felt like someone looking across the treetops and not finding a break in the forest.
The entire book basically takes place on the Weylin plantation, and therefore the text doesn't vary much throughout. There aren't any new characters' names that pop up as "landmarks", or capitalized town names or words in all caps. Names of characters are mostly first names, no last names. The names are the same, and each time Dana time travels, the same people are at the plantation. The chapters begin at varying spots on the page, and don't always start at the tops of pages.
I guess I had a hard time searching through the novel, but maybe it was just me. I was hoping to find an online version of Kindred so that I could use the Ctrl+F feature.
I think that the time travel in particular makes the plot confusing after you have read the book. In general, we think of time in a linear way and Kindred, as well as Slaughterhouse 5 have both shaken that up--which is then hard to wrap your mind around. This semester I have sort of converted over to i-pad reading and I actually was realizing how much I rely on the word search you can do for writing the papers.
ReplyDeleteYour description of the sort of claustrophobic effects of reading _Kindred_, whether intentionally or not, seems to reflect something of Dana's experience and certainly that of the slaves: we feel *stuck* in the same place, with the same people and the same kinds of things happening over and over. The novel doesn't *move* to new places, or new experiences, but goes over the same ground again and again. Not to suggest that the reading experience is in any way "equal" to slavery or anything, but do you see any similarities? Your comments call to mind Kevin's remark about all the "really interesting" places they could have time-traveled to. This isn't an adventure for Dana, nothing about it is fun, and a big part of the slavery experience for her means being bored and claustrophobic and trying to look busy amid mind-numbing tedium. The book naturally reflects this.
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