Connections to the Past?

Junot Diaz’s short story collection Drown left me feeling like my less than easy life has been a walk in the park. Ultimately, what I identified with the most in these stories was the sense of not belonging that feels prevalent throughout the collection. Additionally, the source of the alienation, some sort of awkwardly defining quality, also really helped me to connect to these pieces and to simply fly through the readings. Finally, I was pulled into these stories primarily through the first piece “Ysrael”.

“Ysrael” contained many of the qualities that kept me reading Drown beyond what I normally would have devoted to a narrative written from the perspective of a minority. I suppose that this comment deserves explanation. Well, to put it simply, I have never really respected minority tales for the simple fact that many of them that I have read fall under one of two categories: ‘woe is me and my people’ or ‘this is how I broke free of the oppression that affects my people’. The first problem I have with these two types of narrative is the predictability of the plot. I am a reader that needs to be stimulated in some form or fashion in order to continue reading a work, creative or not. This stimulation doesn’t need to exclusively be from entertainment; for example, if a piece makes me think differently about a certain subject then I will continue reading to see what direction the author takes. In the case of “Ysrael”, in particular, I could draw parallels to my own life and, as a result, kept reading to see if I could find further parallels in other stories in the collection.

The parallels for me in “Ysrael” all center around the title character. Mainly, the parallels are centered more on representative objects than anything else. For example, the mask that Ysrael wears, and eventually loses, felt to me like the shell that I wore all throughout high school and for my first couple of years on campus. There is, of course, a very distinct difference; Ysrael was undoubtedly traumatized by the removal of his mask, whereas I was more than happy to cast aside my shell and allow the real me to finally show through. Secondly, and more directly, the relationship that the two brothers have was not altogether unlike the relationship that my little brother and I had during our younger years. There wasn’t quite as much of an age discrepancy between the two of us, and I wasn’t out sleeping with everything that moved and produced estrogen; but the basic elements of the relationship were there. If there is one area that I didn’t really like the parallels it was here. I mean, I always felt that my brother and I had a fairly stereotypical relationship until recently, and, quite frankly, if I’m going to read about a pair of brothers, I prefer to have the author do something that I haven’t seen before.

An Unusual Narrative

Slave Moth to me was a very awkward read. First of all, I don’t read poetry all that much, so adjusting to the narrative verse form of the book took some time. Second of all, I’ve never been a fan of slave narratives, so, when sitting down to write this post, it took some time for me to separate my distaste for the genre from a moderately, at least, objective look at the book. I suppose that now is also a good time to explain my somewhat juvenile reference to Slave Moth as a book, instead of a novel. Well, in my opinion, this story lands closer to the archaic epic poem than it does to a novel. Yes, it certainly has all of the elements of novel: chronology, characters, plot; but it lacks the prose that I find necessary to label a long story novel.

Now, as for the story itself, I enjoyed Slave Moth quite a lot, once I overcame the difficulties previously mentioned. Once I was able to grasp at the plot of the book then it was quite easy to plow through the story. In fact, I consumed the bulk of the story while having a homework party with my girlfriend. The plot itself is an atypical slave narrative, something that made me inwardly smile, primarily because of my previously mentioned difficulty with the genre. I particularly enjoyed the slaves that didn’t really act all that much like slaves and the “masters” that inexplicably let them enjoy what was apparently the illusion of doing whatever they wanted.

One problem that I had with the above atypicality is that the story really had no other way to end, save Varl running away, becoming Free. First off, the title leads you in that direction, probably intentionally, if you are paying enough attention to realize that moths aren’t the silly bugs that are attracted to light of all kinds right away. No, in fact, they are something much more limiting; like a slave is limited by their forced servitude. Secondly, it is plainly apparent, or it was to me anyways, by about the third to last poem, that once Peter became Master, Varl was shedding her cocoon and preparing to make a break for the North and freedom. Poetry, to me, should, at least, be mildly ambiguous in its conclusion. It is for that reason that I was bothered by the bottlenecked conclusion of Slave Moth. However, that quality of an ending only left me with a mildly sour taste in my mouth. Thankfully, that sour taste did not take away from what I felt was an otherwise enjoyable read.