Property: A Novel
by Valerie Martin
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Book Summary Information
Author: Valerie MartinEdition: Hardcover
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 2003-02-18
ISBN: 038550408X
Number of pages: 208
Publisher: Nan A. Talese
Book Reviews of Property: A Novel
Book Review: Disturbing story of a property owner in antebellum Louisiana
Summary: 5 Stars
This is an interesting story of two antebellum women (one white, one black) in Louisiana, both of whom are "property". The main character in this story (told from her point of view), Manon Gaudet, is a young, white, married woman living on a sugar plantation in Louisiana in 1828. I think that the author does an excellent job illustrating how desensitized white property owners (of human chattel, that is) had to have been in order to justify the existence of slavery to themselves. Manon is NOT a likeable, nor even a sympathetic character. She hates her own status as "chattel", yet she never seems to make the connection that she is no different from the slave Sarah, nor any other slave on her husband's plantation, nor does she ever understand the slaves' desire to be free despite her own yearnings of freedom from the slavery of her marriage. (Women were "chattel", i.e., the property of their husbands, and had absolutely no rights of their own once they married. The money or property that a woman brought to the marriage in the form of a dowry became her husband's upon their marriage. If he gambled or drank it away, or spent it all on a mistress or prostitutes she had no legal recourse because a wife was not considered a person in the eyes of the law. She could not sue to get it back, nor could she even protect it from creditors if her husband was in debt. There was no way for her to try to change the system because women were not only not educated in the same way that men were educated, but were prohibited from the professions such as doctor or lawyer, and, even more importantly, they could not vote! Married women were not even permitted to own property until the mid-19th century, and even then, once this law was passed, subsequent legislation was passed which chipped away at this basic principle.) The status (or lack thereof) of women (married women in particular) is a secondary theme running throughout the book, and just when the readers begin to feel a bit of sympathy for Manon, the author shifts to show readers how devoid of feelings Manon truly is. She actually thinks that the white plantation owners have done a huge favor for the blacks by making them slaves! She shows again and again that she considers them inferior beings in every way (much the way men consider women inferior beings), and then wonders why slaves show resentment when their own families are torn apart by masters who sell off children, "spouses", or parents. The way she and her aunt or even her husband discuss how much another human being will bring at market is appalling. Readers could substitute "chair" or "painting" or even a "tract of land" for the slave--there was no sense that they ever understood that it was a human being they were discussing! The human being is reduced to an item, which loses value depending upon age, gender, etc. Her view of slaves and her failure to see them as other than something which exists only to meet her every need is chilling. Her husband was no better, sexually abusing the young male slaves, getting Sarah pregnant twice, and ignoring his own children.
Sarah had the fewest choices of all, and her attempt to run away failed, but not before she not only experienced freedom, dignity, and respect in the North but also learned what it was like to be a white man in the world, something that Manon and other females in her family will never experience. Even though Manon understands that these experiences have transformed Sarah, she still wonders about the madness of Northerners who are beginning to agitate about the evils of slavery, and questions why they would treat a black person with respect and dignity. None of her experiences have taught her this most important lesson.
Summary of Property: A Novel
From the acclaimed author of Mary Reilly, a groundbreaking novel that reexamines the questions of power and resistance, violence and sex, which inform all her work.Set in the surreal heat of the antebellum South during a slave rebellion, PROPERTY takes the form of a dramatic monologue, bringing to the page a voice rarely heard in American fiction: the voice of a woman slave holder. Manon Gaudet is pretty and petulant, self-absorbed and bored. She has come to a sugar plantation north of New Orleans as a bride, bringing with her a prized piece of property, the young slave Sarah, only to see Sarah become her husband?s mistress and bear his child. As the whispers of a slave rebellion grow louder and more threatening, Manon speaks to us of her past and her present, her longings and dreams ? an uncensored, pitch-perfect voice from the heart of moral darkness.
PROPERTY is riveting fiction, fast, richly plotted, shimmering with visual detail. It is also an invitation to re-examine the traditions of the Southern novel and the myth of the chivalrous South, and a haunting meditation on what Valerie Martin has called ?the fantastic and constant perversity of the oppressor to feel victimized by the oppressed.?
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