A Respectable Trade by Philippa Gregory
|
List Price: Our Price: $4.25 You Save: $11.75 (73%) Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Buy Used: from $0.01 (click here) Category: Book See more book details and other editions |
|---|
Book Reviews of A Respectable Trade
Book Review: Race, class and Imperialism in Bristol
Summary: 4 Stars
Philippa Gregory is an enjoyable and dependable story teller. You know that you will meet well developed characters who act out unlikely plots and hold your interest, even if story lines become a bit predictable. A Respectable Trade, the story of a series of unlikely events set in Bristol toward the end of the 18th Century, follows this Gregory formula and solidly delivers.
Mehuru is a priest in the African kingdom of Yoruba and is on a quest to save his country from the ravages of slavery when he is beset upon and captured by white slavers from England. Perhaps ironically, his own slave is captured as well. Meanwhile, back in England, landless and aging Frances Scott is wearing her welcome thin under the roof of her uncle's lordly family and thus applies for a job as governess. Instead of a job, she is offered marriage by the man who interviewed her, one Josiah Cole. Cole is a struggling shipping merchant with ambition who sees ties to the Scott family as a stepping stone on his road to wealth and respect. His cold fish sister Sarah isn't too keen on Josiah's attempt to climb the social ladder. With no other options, Frances marries beneath her station and tries to make the best of it.
The charges she was originally interviewed to govern turn out to be a dozen or so African men, women and children. Sarah and Josiah believe that they can train these select slaves to be excellent house servants who speak the Queen's English and within 6 months turn a pretty profit by selling to select Bristol families. Frances, who has never considered the grisly details about how her families (new and of origin) make their money, finds herself questioning all she has known. She sure likes the comforts of upper class living... but when she suddenly realizes the "stock" have faces, names and feelings, Frances discovers new feelings of her own. Is she an accessory to a crime? A teacher? A respectalbe wife from a respectable family? Her feelings become especially new and uncomfortable when Mehuru walks into her dingy merchant dining room...
The details of the story which follow are both slightly predictable and unfathomable considering the time (Mehuru quickly becomes fluent speaking and reading English and manages to be rather mobile and unsupervised for what one might expect for a slave in Bristol during the height of the trade). However, the themes which underlie the story are well worth exploring. Is the grass really greener on the other side? Does wealth equate respectability? Does race matter? Does social class? How much risk should one take when investing? How much research? Where does wealth come from? Who really pays? Can love really over come all?
In our ever growing global capitalist economy, these are important questions to consider. Why not reflect upon social justice and responsibility while reading a solidly enjoyable novel?
Book Review: Heartbreakingly Detailed Evocation of the Slave Trade
Summary: 4 Stars
A RESPECTABLE TRADE is one of Philippa Gregory's earlier novels, first published in 1995, and re-released in 2007 now that her popularity has increased.
The novel concerns the relationships and lives of Josiah Cole, Frances Scott, and Mehuru, a trio of individuals whose lives become entangled through the desire for financial gain, dubious morality, and sheer bad luck. Mehuru was a priest in Africa, captured by slave traders on a diplomatic mission. Frances Scott is a noble-born, penniless woman living off the generosity of her uncle. Josiah Cole is a sugar- and slave-trader, eager to make a name and a fortune for himself no matter what it takes. Josiah marries Frances, hoping that her noble connections will help improve his position in life, and requests that she train a group of slaves, including Mehuru, to be house slaves.
The novel begins with a painstakingly detailed, and heartbreaking, description of the slave trade. The reader is transported, along with Mehuru, and witnesses the horrible conditions of the slave ships. Worse even than the physical horrors to which the slaves are subjected is the slow breaking down of the slaves' spirits. The reader watches as Mehuru, a well-educated, extremely intelligent leader in his own country, is stripped of all his power. However, Mehuru is a fighter at heart, and refuses to accept the degradation to which he has been subjected.
Mehuru's journey is compared with that of Frances. As a woman of that time period, Frances is also powerless. However, her experience could never be as affecting as Mehuru's because, unlike him, she accepts, and even profits, from the status quo. Slavery is a normal, unquestioned, part of life for her. She eventually does begin to question the morality of slavery, but, unlike Mehuru, she doesn't have the strength, or perhaps the desire, to fight her station in life, which ultimately makes her harder to sympathize with.
Despite the weakness in the Frances' character, the slow development of her friendship with Mehuru is interesting to behold. Their personalities are incredibly different, but because they've both been rendered powerless, they somehow understand each other intuitively.
The plot is a bit unrealistic for the time period (I won't ruin the developments here) but the portrayal of the slave trade, the position of women, and the amorality of businessmen of the time make this book a worthwhile read.
Book Review: A very insightful and compassionate look into the world of slave trade in 18th century England
Summary: 4 Stars
England, 1787. Josiah Cole is a tradesman with moderate success in the sugar and rum trade. But if he wants to be successful, he knows he has to marry a lady of quality. So he proposes to Frances -- a thirty-five-year-old governess well in her way to spinsterhood. She sees this as an opportunity to marry well, so she accepts his proposal. Does she regret it? After all, they live in a noisy, smelly warehouse in Bristol, a long way from her former gentle country life. She also sees just how vulgar tradesmen are. Josiah is obsessed with success and wealth. Her sister-in-law, a spinster, doesn't seem to like her at all. Their lives center on material gain. And on top of everything else, Josiah seems to be dealing with the slave trade. Now her job is to train slaves -- teach them how to speak English and become "respectable" and "educated" English folk -- all the while she witnesses a woman getting raped and the men getting whipped and humiliated. But that's okay. According to her husband and sister-in-law, Africans are barely human. They are wild beasts that have to be tamed. But as she spends more time with Mehuru, once a priest and gentlemen in the land of Yoruba, she is in for quite a few surprises. But will a lady and a powerless slave ever be free?
This is one of Philippa Gregory's earlier novels. The author was born in Kenya and raised in Bristol, so I see why she'd write this book. I very much enjoyed this story. The characters are well developed (although not as well developed as they would have been had this book been written when she had more experience) and the story takes some interesting turns. Josiah and Sarah (his sister) are very superficial, and I suppose they are meant to be that way. Mehuru and Frances are the most developed -- both torn between loyalty to their people and doing the right thing. I couldn't put this wonderful book down. It kind of falls apart in the last chapters though. How could Josiah and Sarah be unaware of the mayhem that goes on upstairs? Are they THAT preoccupied with material things that they fail to notice something like that? Aside from that, I very much enjoyed A Respectable Trade. I look forward to reading more books by Gregory. I am very interested in reading the stuff she's written that isn't based on one of Henry VIII's wives.
Book Review: An Endearing Love Story
Summary: 4 Stars
My Summary: Mehuru is a priest in the African nation of Yoruba who is captured by (black) African slavers and is sold to an English slave trader.
Frances is the niece of Lord Scott and is left orphaned and unmarried when her father dies. In desperation, she accepts the marriage proposal of a trader, Josiah Cole.
Circumstances bring Mehuru and Frances Cole together, for better or for worse. Philippa Gregory tells an amazing story of their relationship in this novel.
My Thoughts: I wept throughout the entire novel. When I say "wept" I'm not talking about the tears that often fall when I am touched by a story -- I'm talking about being moved so deeply by a book that I know that it will stay with me forever.
I've seen Amazing Grace and as much as the movie explored the depth of suffering on the slave ships, it didn't sink in fully until I had read about it, able to apply my own imagination to the story of Mehuru and his friends. And when Mehuru met Frances, it was all over for me.
This book would be very easy for me to spoil, and I want to be careful of what I say. I've been asked recently to give more detail in my reviews about what I enjoyed (or didn't enjoy) about a book -- specifically. In this book I have to say that what touched me the most was the relationships between the slaves, particularly Elizabeth (who's African name I don't know) and Mehuru. I also really liked the way that the author went out of her way to describe the way that black and white "saw" one another so differently from their own people, almost as though they were an entirely different species. As someone who is in her thirties in the 21st century, I find this so difficult to relate to, but it helped to bring me closer to real understanding of what it might have been like in the 18th century.
I enjoy Philippa Gregory and look forward to reading more from her!
Book Review: Not entirely convincing, but rich in detail
Summary: 4 Stars
Accepting that she doesn't have any better prospects at the age of 34, Frances Scott enters into a marriage of convenience with a Bristol trader. She is soon after presented with a shipload of African slaves and instructed to school them in English and domestic duties so that they may be sold as servants to wealthy English households. With time, Frances begins to doubt the common assertion of the time that the slaves are animals and cannot be educated. One in particular, Mehuru, challenges everything she has been taught about the slave trade.
Gregory's prose is once again breathtaking and meticulous. Unfortunately, the story itself was lacking in some areas. Frances is not much of a heroine; she isn't particularly likable and never seems to have an opinion of her own. I wasn't convinced of Frances' and Mehuru's love, having observed them seemingly going from distaste to affection with nothing in between.
Mehuru was by far the most interesting character, and I regret that we are not allowed to get to know him better. The most entertaining parts of the story involved his acclimatization to English society. Amusing are the scenes in which he is demonstrated comparing inferior aspects of English culture to those of his homeland (and the reader is forced to agree), and his descriptions of how ghastly the pale English people look. My favorite quote: "She is a white woman," he said, trying to reassure himself, discounting his insight. "They all look sick to me."