Balance

        Father Price is so sure that one will be rewarded in accordance with their toils, but Kingsolver's novel The Poisonwood Bible is riddled with injustices and hardships, it almost seems as though there is no fairness in the world. Kingsolver does, however, offer an alternative type of balance in the world as an accord between all living things, humans, animals, plants, bacteria, and everything- without any holding higher power over another. 

      The Baptist belief of justice is simple and understandable, yet seems too good to be true. He tells Leah, "God created a world of work and rewards" (37), where reward or punishment is doled out in accordance with one's efforts or failures. However, though this belief is held by a religious man, it is not consistent wth the Bible; the book of Job, in attempting to explain why bad things happen to good people, comes to the conclusion that it is not because of anything they did or didn't do. Bad things just happen to good people sometimes. Father Price's view that everyone will get what they deserve in the end is just not accurate.

        Kingsolver offers another explanation for balance in the world which is that every living thing works together to keep this balance. She shows how Africa maintains this balance: multitudes of bugs carry diseases which, however unpleasant, prevent human overpopulation, humans hunting keep the animal populations in check, and so on. Nothing tries to upset nature's delicate balance. When doctors come in with vaccinations and good intentions, they cured the diseases, but gave way to overpopulation and starvation, and wrecked the natural accord. Adah, during her career as a medical professional, recognizes the system nature has to always work things out. She feels like she is upsetting the natural balance and withdraws from practice. She comes to the realization that the world maintains its own natural balance; to interfere, to vaccinate or treat diseases can lead to worse things than were cured. 

Dangerous Assumptions

        If we could pinpoint a single motif throughout all of history as if it were a novel, one of the more easily spotted would be racial misconceptions and their consequences; it is a recurring motif in Kingsolver's The Poisonwood Bible for sure. Both on the part of the white people and the Congolese people, there are consequential misunderstandings of race and culture.
        Everyone is probably well familiar with the (hopefully entirely eradicated by now) antiquated western view of nonwestern cultures. The girls note how different the Congolese people are from the nearly naked, non-inteligent barbarians with bones in their hair that they were conditioned to expect. Other than physical, another harmful misconception held by Europeans was that the Africans were incapable of living a "civilized" life, just because the African civilization was different from theirs, and that the Africans, therefore, needed their help. But what works in one part of the world can fail spectacularly in another part of the world, as Father Price quickly finds out with his farming efforts. This scene was likely included by Kingsolver to illustrate the way that Europeans have come trying to impose their way of life on a land that it is not compatible with. It could be argued that Europeans did help the Africans by bringing technology, such as the wheel, but Anatole speculates that Africa did not invent the wheel because it is not useful there, not because they are less innovative. Kingsolver dismantles the Western misconception that the African's society was lesser because it was different, and shows that the most primitive ones, the true ones with bones in their hair, were the ones who believed this.
        The Congolese people also held some misconceptions which poorly illustrated al white people based on the despicable actions of their leaders. When their only contact with white people was with the Belgians during their brutal effort to colonize their country, it appears they made a logical conclusion based on the limited information they had. Anatole shares the two beliefs the Kilangans held about white people to Leah when she is concerned that some students do not respect her: Inwardly, they believe white people are all-powerful, able to "turn the sun on and off and make the river go backward" (280), but outwardly, they disrespect those who they feel have no business being in the Congo at all. And while this attitude is understandable in the presence of the likes of Father Price, it does prevent the Kilangan schoolboys from gaining as much as they could from Leah's teachings. It is part of the reason Leah never truly feels welcome in Africa.

My Most Common Annotation

        You can really tell a book I enjoyed apart from another by sheer amount of excess black ink on the pages. Underlines, squiggly underlines, brackets, squiggly brackets, arrows, exclamation points. But the most prevalent marking, inked onto every other page, almost, of Barbara Kingsolver's novel The Poisonwood Bible was a word: sexism. Prevalent in the novel in both cultures depicted is an underlying inequality between the sexes, but also four strong women who defy them.
        It is evident in the way education is approached that women are not given the same opportunities or value as men. In Kilanga, there is simply not the option for women to go to school, as only boys up to age 12, usually, enroll and receive education. However, in America, the obstacle for girls to receive an education is the prejudices that western culture still held. Father Price well embodies these misconceptions, claiming that higher education for a woman is a "waste." Adah goes on to prove him wrong, excelling in both college and medical school ad becoming a highly successful and honored doctor. Leah, too, earns a college degree, which she puts to use helping others in Africa.
        Instead of becoming educated, women were expected to marry and be good housewives, a custom which three Price women did not honor. Orleanna Price fits most loosely into this category, herself being a wife and mother for most of her life. However, her heart was never truly present in her marriage and eventually neither was she, as she leaves her husband in the jungle and returns home. Rachel Price, who so looked forward to being the ideal wife, who made the most extravagant hope chest, also did not find her place as a wife. She married multiple times, but each lasted less time than the next. She was never a traditional housewife, either, as she married men for their money or power, or both. Oppositely, though, Adah never married, though she, too, found no happiness with a husband.
        Though Leah did marry, she found other ways to defy the restrictions placed on women in both societies. She learned to shoot an arrow as well as any man could, and fought to participate in the village hunt. The deep prejudice against women was evident by how many were so deeply enraged by this, however that did not stop Leah from overcoming it.
        Kingsolver even writes at one point that the girls of Kilanga seem to run the village.With all the boys running around playing, the girls are raising children, cooking, cleaning, going to the market every fifth day,and managing the households. It is true that without their work, the village would fail. No one seems to notice how valuable they actually are.

The Myth of Childhood

        One of the possible post prompts asked us to consider how Kingsolver's novel The Poisonwood Bible  compares to other books we've read. Immediately after reading, I was unable to establish any links to novels I have read, however, now, I realize this piece has fascinating and eye-opening connections to a work of nonfiction.
        Confession: I did not actually read this other book I'm talking about.
        I am going to, though. My dad read it, and wanted to discuss it with me, as he frequently does with interesting topics. The book is Sapiens by Yuval Noah Harari; briefly, it is about the history of human kind and how we got to where we are today, and mostly about the natural state of our species. He argues that everything outside of our natural state- everything we do not need to have or do to survive- is fiction.
        Everything else is simply an invention of our imaginations. Language is, government is, manners and customs are. Upon reading The Poisonwood Bible, I discovered, so, too, is childhood.
        Readers watch the Price girls come to the same realization when they meet the children of the Congo. They notice girls younger than them taking care of households, and, more startlingly, raising children of their own (the young boys work less and play more, but we'll save that for a later post). The children of Kilanga don't have the luxury of just being kids- of being carefree, with no responsibilities and no awareness of the hardships of life. They are forced to grow up immediately out of necessity. Childhood is not a guarantee around the world, it doesn't even exist in some places.
        Childhood is fiction. Childhood is the invention of a culture with the time, resources, and comforts to spare to allow a significant portion of the population to pass up on the responsibilities. I am 17 years old, and what do I do for my society? My parents pay for everything for me. My mom still does my laundry most of the time. A girl of my age in the Congo would probably already have had more than one child, perhaps not all surviving, would wash her family's one outfit each by hand, find and prepare meals from scratch, and more. Something so simply and universal in our culture that we don't think twice about is unfathomable in other cultures, because it is not natural, and it is not guaranteed. It is a fiction that we brought to life.

The Road to Hell is Paved With Good Intentions

     
        Father Price shoulders much of the blame for the failures experienced in Barbara Kingsolver's novel, The Poisonwood Bible, and not without good reason. He is ignorant, arrogant, stubborn, and aggressive, but those are only the most predominant of his traits. Just as it is impossible to name most anything as entirely "good" or "bad", so neither can it be sufficient to superficially decide that Father Price is an entirely bad character- overwhelmingly detestable, yes, but entirely, no. A reader must examine this man through the lens of history in order to look past the easiest of conclusions and gain a deeper understanding of his intentions and motivations.
        One interpretation is that Father Price's spectacular failures in actions stemmed from a desire to do good. We are all well aware that even the best of intentions can lead straight to hell, and Father Price was certainly not void of those. For a brief interjection of historical context, it is important to consider how little other cultures knew of each other at this point in history. Different cultures simply did not have enough interactions for them to fathom that there are valid ways of experiencing life other than their own; Europeans were particularly guilty of this, brutally imposing their own beliefs on entire cultures around the world. Christians, too, tried to force their religion on people perfectly content with their own, but with intentions more pure, attempting to "save" the people. Father Price's view that the Congolese people should be brought the gift of Christianity was not so different from that of most Christians at the time, and not as malicious as his actions would seem to suggest: he wanted to give them the salvation which he held above anything else.
        Another way to read Father Price's actions is as motivated by guilt. Orleanna Price recounts her husband's history with war, when he was injured in battle and evacuated from the Philippines where he was fighting, right before his entire unit was killed. This has scarred him with an overwhelming guilt that could contribute to his overzealous attitude about mission work; as is speculated in the novel, he could be out to save as many as were killed in his absence. It is possible that Kingsolver included this tangent to show the reader a different side to Father Price than had been previously detectable, and cause the reader to question the singularity of his character. A more cynical view of human nature could make his guilt out to be a more selfish impetus, but that is something I certainly do not have. I interpret his search for redemption to be more pitiful and less evil. Still, though, that is only referring to his motivations and not his actual actions- those make him a man very easily despised.
        Father Price does some very terrible things, at least according to today's standards. Probably in the mid 20th century, the act of subjugating, even hitting one's wife, something so abhorrent today, was seen as only recently out of style. Men at this time were still afforded plenty of leniency in their actions. Again with his family life, not only with mission work, historical context is necessary. No, his actions are not excusable or defensible, but a more complete picture of them is provided when viewed through a historically-minded perspective.
        Without a doubt, Father Price is a character to be detested, but still one who requires analysis and consideration. No good character has only one side; their actions, motivations, past, struggles, and more combine to create a whole, complete character. it would be easy to write Father Price off as solely villainous, but he is more complex than that.