The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver
Barbara Kingsolver is a magnificent storyteller. I first read this lush novel in the eighth grade, and while I enjoyed the story then, I take something new away after reading it as an adult. The depth and scope of this story is huge, and it can mean different things to different people. It has meant different things to me at different stages in my life.
The Poisonwood Bible is the story of a family told through the memories of its women. Nathan Price, a Baptist minister in Bethlehem, Georgia, decided to move his family to the middle of the Belgian Congo on a mission to save the souls of the Africans and turn them away from their false idolatry and on to Jesus Christ. The five women he brought along with him narrate a spectacular tale of love, hate, life and death in Africa.
Orleanna, the mother, opens each of the book’s sections. She is said to be writing from her retirement spot at Sanderling Island, Georgia. She is still haunted by Africa, it seems. But she should be, considering what all she left there. Each of the book’s sections contains several journal entries from each of the Prices’ daughters: Rachel, the oldest at fifteen, an archetype of the American consumer and impossibly obsessed with the more shallow side of life; Leah and Adah, the twins who couldn’t be more different — Leah a rule-follower who idolized her father and Adah a silent rebel who walked with a limp from birth; and the baby of the family, Ruth May, who befriended every child in the village.
We follow the Prices to the Congo for the first time, and their entire mission there is documented. We then follow its characters into adulthood, and see what becomes of each of their lives because of Africa. Filled with factual information about the political climate of the Congo during its struggle for independence, side-by-side with the a tale of a struggle not all that different between husband and wife, this book speaks volumes about morality, loyalty, a mother’s love, cultural relativism, racism, gender equality… just to name a few of its themes.
I have nothing but great things to say about this book! Read it immediately- you won’t regret it!
