The Salt Roads
| Author | Nalo Hopkinson |
|---|---|
| Cover artist | Christian Clayton |
| Genre | historical fiction, folk tale |
| Publisher | Warner Books |
Publication date | 2003 |
| Publication place | Canada |
| Pages | 394 |
| ISBN | ISBN 0-446-53302-5 Parameter error in {{ISBNT}}: invalid character |
The Salt Roads is a folk tale of historical fiction by Nalo Hopkinson.
[Nalo Hopkinson] was born in Jamaica and lived in the Caribbean until she was about 16 years old, when her family moved to Toronto, Canada. She has written many short stories, two novels, and also has editing credit to her name. Identifying with the LGBT community, Nalo (NAH-lo) considers herself a writer of all sorts- Caribbean, Canadian, black, queer, and feminist.
Plot Introduction
Against the restrictions of time, a Ginen Goddess travels through and lives the lives of three women. Each on their own journeys, the goddess interweaves the women's sexual, personal, and religious experiences.
Explanation of the Novel's Title
When Mer, Tipingee, and Georgine go by the river to bury the stillborn child, their cries call forth Lasiren. Lasiren speaks to Mer, and asks her to find out why her salt roads are blocked up.
"The sea roads, they're drying up."
"The sea is drying up?"
"Not this sea, Stupid child!" Her tail slapped, sent up a fountain, exploding and drenching me. "The sea in the minds of my Ginen. The sea roads, the salt roads. And the sweet ones, too; the rivers. Can't follow them to their sources any more. You must fix it, Mer" (pg. 65).
Plot Summary
"The Salt Roads" is a novel that tells the story of the Ginen fertility god, Lasirén. As she moves through the bodies of female characters, inhabiting them for short and long periods of time, Lasirén helps women find their place in the world and give them the confidence to make decisions that they otherwise would not possess. The novel intertwines the stories of three major characters while illustrating the mysterious ways of Lasirén and her healing, life-giving powers.
The novel begins by introducing the character of Mer, who is a healer in the slave community of a Caribbean plantation. In the beginning scene, she is seen delivering a mixed baby that is stillborn. As she, her helper and lover, Tipingee, and the baby's mother, Georgine, go to bury the baby at the river's edge, their mixed prayers to three different deities delivers Lasirén into being, launching her into the lives of the three main characters. She appears to Mer, subsequently, to inform her that it is her duty to pave the sea roads clear. And as her story progresses, her duty becomes clear. As the slaves around her are rallied by the demagogue, Makandal, to rebel against their white slave owners, or bakra, Mer must watch as they risk their lives to pursue a dream that one iconoclastic human being is misleadingly placing in their minds. The slaves working in the homes of plantations across San Domingue are encouraged to inject poison into the food and water of their white owners. As Makandal incites more people, Mer's story comes to a climax as he orchestrates the arson of the home of Seigneur Simenon, the plantation owner. Her body finally inhabited by Lasirén's presence, Mer attempts to save the white folk and in essence the wrath they will ensue on her fellow slaves. However, Makandal and the slaves pin her down and cut off her tongue. As turmoil dies down with the burning of Makandal and his absence, the slaves return to their old ways. And Mer, given the chance to escape and be free of her enslavement, declines, knowing that her place is with the slaves on the plantation, healing those in pain and paving the roads clean for Lasirén.
Another story that Hopkinson weaves into the story is that of Jeanne Duval. She is an actress and singer in Paris, France, that becomes the mistress of the author and poet, Charles Baudelaire. As he sets her up in her own apartment with her mother, Baudelaire eventually gets his inheritance taken away from him to be managed by a finance manager. As his wealth dwindles, so does the balance of power in his relationship with Jeanne. Scraping by, both Jeanne and Baudelaire must find ways of obtaining their needs. Baudelaire needs to support his mistress and Jeanne needs to help her ailing mother. However, Jeanne's mother dies and soon thereafter, Jeanne becomes infected with syphilis, and suffers a stroke that leaves her right side paralyzed. As she moves from her apartment to the sanatorium and back again, she is visited by her stepbrother, Joel, who ultimately causes a falling-out between her and Baudelaire and later, the selling of her furniture while she is away at the sanatorium. Alone and at an utter loss at her abandonment, Jeanne is confronted by, Moustique, her brother's friend. He takes her in, and in her sadness and loss of beauty and youth, Jeanne finally comes to find herself loved and content.
The third character that Lasirén inhabits is Thais, a Nubian prostitute living in Alexandria, Egypt. Thais' journey begins when she and her slave friend, Judah, gather their scarce belongings and even scarcer money and escape their enslavement to Aelia Capitolina, or present-day Jerusalem. However, finally reaching their destination, they find themselves in a foreign place with no money, but what their bodies can offer. As they approach the famous Christian church that Thais desired to see, she finds that she has been carrying a baby, but miscarries it in the church's courtyard. Soon after, she finds herself wandering the desert for months, on little water and barely any food. As she contemplates her surroundings and finds herself trying to listen deeply and intently to nature, her thoughts, and even the thoughts of others, she comes to a revelation. Speaking with Lasirén and learning about the goddess' origins and place in the world.
Setting
The story takes place in multiple settings, switching from story to story as well as place to place. Mer's story takes place in Saint-Domingue, during the late 17th century. It is a time when French colonization was taking place and slaves were used on plantations to harvest crops for trade.
Jeanne's story takes place in Paris and Neuilly, France during the 1840s.
Thais' story is set in Alexandria, Egypt and Aelia Capitolina, or Jerusalem, during 345 C.E..
Structure
The novel is broken up into pseudo-chapters with the headings below:
BEAT...,
BREAK/
BEAT!
ONE-
...
DROP
BLUES
SISTER
SOUL
THROWING
WORD
SLIDE
SLIP
RATTLE
CHAIN
BREAK
RATTLE
PROPPING
SORROW
BLOOD
SING
RIP
TIDE
EBB
BEAT
BREAK/
RATTLE
DRINK
SAW
JIZZ
JAZZ
ROCK
DOWN
SEE
BLOW
HOLE
RIFF
The structure and arrangement of these titles mirror three poems that are present in the ROCK chapter.
Point of View
The novel moves from first person point of view to third person point of view throughout the whole novel. When telling the stories of each of the three main characters, Mer, Jeanne, and Thais, the point of view is in first person, as each protagonist narrates the story as she sees it. It is also limited, for the characters do not appear to know every thought and detail about other characters, but what is generally accepted as true.
Also, the goddess Lasiren speaks from a first person point of view. When she speaks, the text in the novel appears differently, highlighting her other-worldliness.
There are also times when the story is told from a third person point of view. And those are times that tell the story from another's perspective, usually a lesser character, but they do not adopt a first person point of view.
Characters in "The Salt Roads"
Lasirén
A great Power of Africa, an lwa, is the fertility god of the Ginen. She is the power of all the waters, and gives gifts of the sea. She is called forth by the mourning of three women after Georgine’s stillborn was taken to be buried properly. “I’m born from song and prayer. A small life, never begun, lends me its unused vitality. I’m born from mourning and sorrow and three women’s tearful voices” (pg. 40). The novel takes us on her journey as she gets possessed by the main characters Mer, Jeanne, and Thais.
Mer describes the goddess as “young, smooth; she was fat and well-fed. The bush of her hair tumbled bout her round, brown, beautiful face in plaits and dreadknots, tied with twists of seaweed” (pg. 64).
Mer
Also referred to as "Matant Mer" (Aunt Mer) and "Maman" (Mother). She is a medicine woman to her enslaved Ginen people of Saint Domingue. As one of the older surviving slaves on the plantation, the sick and needy look up to her for guidance and herbal cures. She knows her place, and feels that if she “denied to help [her] people, then [her] spirit wouldn’t fly home” (pg. 63). She is the first to be possessed by Lasirén, and is given the duty of finding out why the god’s salt roads are blocked. She has a sexual relationship with Tipingee, mother of the house-slave Marie-Claire. She is a hard-worker and listens to the spirits, and awaits the day she can join them and no longer be a slave.
“I stick to my work. I do what I’m told. Each day I live is another day I can help my people” (Pg. 67).
“Mer always had a strange way of talking about death…about how it was good to leave life and flee away from this place where the colourless dead tormented them daily” (pg. 14).
Jeanne
Also referred to as "Lemer" and "Prosper." She is an Ethiopian entertainer in Paris. She constantly struggles with her self-worth because of the color of her skin, and often dresses elaborately to make up for its darkness. She has a sexual relationship with another dancer, Lisette, and one with a rich white writer, Charles. She possesses Lasirén after singing old songs of her grandmother. For one who makes a living based on her beauty and desirability, it is only after having a stroke, losing all mobility in her right side and her lost glamour that she finds true love and self worth. Lasirén leaves her body after Jeanne dies a happy and loved woman.
“I should be beautiful. Always I am an entertainer” (pg. 172).
“You’re dancing well, My Jeanne. Dancing in the groove I’ve laid for you, dancing a new story to your life” (pg. 354). (Lasirén to Jeanne.)
“I am a woman, and I am loved” (pg. 355).
Thais
Also referred to as "Pretty Pearl" and "Meritet." She is a young girl sold into prostitution paying her way to freedom in Alexandria, Egypt, 345 C.E. To her customers she is goes by the name Pretty Pearl, and it is through such an encounter that Lasirén enters her body as she reaches the peak of a sexual encounter. Despite her way of living, she is pure. On a whim, she boards a ship to Aelia Capitolina (now present-day Jerusalem) with her best friend Judah, an identifier with the LGBT community and fellow slave prostitute. In Greece, Thais gets extremely ill. Lasirén pushes and motivates her to continue her journey so she can go to a church and find help. On the floor of the church, Thais has a miscarriage, losing her baby, child-like innocence, and Lasirén altogether. However, during Thais' pilgramage to the deserts of Israel and month-long fasting, Lasirén returns to her body and speaks to Thais about the origins of the Water Goddess being.
“she is dark skinned, this beauty, and ruddy like copper. No salt-pucker of bitterness in her” (pg. 265).
“this is our life…we’ll work till Tausiris decides to release us” (pg. 277).
“I am determined that we keep going. Something is wrong with this Thais…I nudge her to keep walking” (pg. 299). (Lasirén to Thais.)
Minor Characters
Tipingee - Slave on the Saint Domingue plantation that belongs to Seigneur Simenon. Wife to Patrice, mother of Marie-Claire, and lover of Mer. She is emotionally and physically attached to Mer, whom she also helps with delivering babies and healing the sick on the plantation. When choosing between the freedom her husband Patrice can provide by marronage and the enslavement she must remain in with Mer, she chooses her sister, lover, and enslavement.
Georgine- A young slave girl who gets pregnant by a white carpenter man a few months after she comes of age. It is because of her stillborn child that she, Mer, and Tipingee mourn and conjure up the Ginen Goddess. Later, she gets pregnant again and gives birth to a healthy baby boy.
"Good, strong girl, Georgine. I didn't think she would be. And silent too, like a grown woman should be...She's just a whore, though" (pg. 26). (Mer's thoughts on Georgine during the birth of her child.)
Makandal - Slave on the Saint Domingue plantation. Leader of the slave uprising who refuses to eat salt, giving himself the powers of the gods, which include morphing his body into animals. He has a gimp hand, and every animal he turns into shares this trait. He is burned at the stake for setting the house of Seigneur Simenon on fire.
"There is another power; this Ogu. Not a fractal reflection of me, but something else. New. Male" (pg. 322). (Lasiren about the spirit that overpowers Makandal.)
Patrice - Slave on the Saint Domingue plantation. Husband to Tipingee and father of Marie-Claire. He escaped the plantation a year before on Christmas, but returns exactly a year later to support Makandal and his rebellion. During his marronage, or flight, he was free and had established a family of his own separate from the plantation to whom he returns later.
"Few more days, and you realise you're walking different. your back is straighter. You feel tall, tall. You're tired when you settle down to sleep at night, just like here on the plantation, but you fall asleep thinking of all the things your labour will bring for you. Not for you master. For you. That's what it's like" (pg. 372). (His description of life in the bush, away from the plantation and free from enslavement.)
Ti-Bois - Child slave on the Saint Domingue plantation. Learns from Mer the ways of healing and will ultimately become the healer of the plantation when Mer retires to another manor. "Poor little one. Never enough to eat, not the kind of food that would make him grow strong... Sweet child" (pg. 136).
Charles Baudelaire - Lover of Jeanne Duval. He is fascinated by her dark skin and often corrects her poor grammar. He supports her for over a decade with money, shelter, and clothing. He loses control of his inheritance to a finance manager and must make ends meet for himself and his mistress. He attempts suicide at a restaurant, leaving in a will all his estate to Jeanne, but is rescued. Even after Jeanne's paralysis and unfaithful actions, he still watches out for her and takes care of her. He eventually dies at home in his mother's home.
Lisette - Entertainer and prostitute. Lover of Jeanne. She and Jeanne have dreams of marrying wealthy, well-off men and they both do so in the end.
"Yes, I suppose it is. It's what we dreamed of, you and I. Fine men and fine fortunes" (pg. 362). (Both Lisette and Jeanne's view on success and happiness.)
Joël - Stepbrother of Jeanne. He comes back for her during her paralysis and cares for her. However, he soon falls deep in debt because of his gambling habits and asks his sister for money from Baudelaire. During one of her stays at the sanatorium, he takes all her furniture and sells it without her knowledge. He is then sent to jail by his friend Moustique. After serving his time, he is set up in his own plantation in the Caribbean the same friend.
Moustique - Chef and owner of restaurant. Friend of Joël. He puts Joël in jail after he learns of his illegal actions. He then comes back to Jeanne's apartment to care for her and tell her about her brother. He and Jeanne fall in love and they live together.
"Why, the smooth-tongued charmer! I found myself smiling and inclining my head to him, like I was some grand lady" (pg. 252). Jeanne's words about Moustique when she first met him.
Judah - Slave and prostitute of tavern owner Tausiris. Friend of Thais. Together they travel to Aelia Capitolina. They also stay together as they wander the desert.
Antoniou - Frequent patron of Thais. He gives her the idea to travel to Aelia Capitolina, but then abandons her when they arrive, seeking another brothel.
Priest Zosimus - Priest who finds Thais and Judah in the desert. He believes that Thais is a prophet or saint who speaks the word of Mary.
Major themes
Enslavement - The three main characters are essentially the victims of enslavement in many forms. Mer is a slave on a plantation, to live out the rest of her days harvesting sugar cane off the farm of Seigneur Simenon. Her fellow Genen turn to seditious, violent measures to change their position; however, Mer maintains a fatalistic view of her station and what rebellion could offer. Instead of rising up, she obtains freedom through death. She believes that the only way they can escape enslavement and prevent more slaves from taking their place by keeping their place and doing what is told, eventually seeking the escape they so wish by passing on to the next life. She learns to attain satisfaction through her enslavement through a sense of duty. She fulfills Lasirén's request by helping those in need on the plantation, seeking release through her position and her healing in the name of her gods.
Jeanne is a prostitute, enslaved by the restrictions of her skin color and the limited opportunities they offer. She is constantly reminded of her inadequacy and low social status, rendering her helpless in many ways. Her bonds are her biracial heritage, and her labor, being mistress to a wealthy man. She is also a slave, in a sense, to her lover, Charles Baudelaire. Their relationship is run by money and security. She initially accepts his advances because of her need to support her ailing mother.
Thais is a slave to Tausiris, a tavern owner, and is forced into prostitution and entertainment by her master. She uses her body as currency, trading it to buy her way away from Alexandria to Aelia Capitolina and essentially everything from food to transportation as well. However, she doesn't view this as her downfall or her African heritage as a problem, but instead finds ways of finding worth in them. She is not ashamed, even after her revelation with Lasirén, in her prostitution, but revels in her own independence and decision to partake in it.
Loss of Identity - Jeanne, in an attempt to escape the lifestyle that so embodied lower-class, African women of her time, tries to cover her sense of shame with ornate clothing, fancy hair, and powdered faces. However, her mistrust and denouncement of her own culture and identity lead to her own sense of dissatisfaction and lack of self-worth. She believes her life would have been better and happier if she had lighter skin. However, it is when Jeanne is reduced to her unglamorous, natural self that she can truly understand her life.
Feminism - Mer, Jeanne, and Thais all break the typical roles bounded to a woman. Mer, respected by all enslaved on her plantation, is the closest thing the Ginen have to a doctor. She is strong and responsible, and proudly serves as a leader. She is often depicted as stronger and wiser than the men in the field; breaking away from the stereotypical slave woman.
Jeanne counters the dominance often associated with males in literature. When loving Charles, she takes the upper hand and has full control. "I will show you how to prepare a woman--nay, even a man, should you come to that--so that they are eager and ready for your embrace" (pg. 149).
Thais has a wild and free spirit, and she follows it on a long journey across the sea. Unlike the other female prostitutes who feel bound for life, Thais demonstrates risk-taking by having the courage to quickly pack and leave. She does not choose to stay and have her life lived under someone else, but instead takes control.
Major Formal Strategies
Symbols
Water- Water is where Lasiren lives. She is the Goddess of water and bears its gifts. Throughout the novel, water is associated with comfort. Mer and other slaves on the plantation often go to the river for peace and quiet, to wash, and to fish. It can representing a personal cleansing as well. When Thais prepares for customers, she washes herself with water and does the same once she has finished. The novel ends with Thais wishing to be in water; "We can wash in the Jordan. That'll be good enough" (pg. 389).
"The muffled sounds and damp dripping for some reason soothed me. Being near water always had" (pg. 151).
Salt- Salt is a unifying element of the women in the novel. They all shed salt tears and taste/smell the bitterness of salty sweat during sexual encounters. Lasiren is called forth by these heavily salted moments, and that is how she travels from woman to woman.
"Salt tears sprang from my eyes, I could feel them" (Mer- pg. 64).
"At the binding taste of salt, I begin to fall once more" (Lasiren- pg. 46).
"Georgine let the salt water run freely from her eyes" (pg. 33).
"I wriggled up beside her and held her until she was still again. I licked my lips, sucking salt" (Jeanne, pg. 16).
"I was born in brackish water, salty as tears. Jeanne cries often. We have salt in common" (Lasiren about Jeanne, pg. 157).
For the Ginen people, salt is a way to humble yourself to the gods.
"If you only eat unsalted food, fresh food, we believe you make Lasiren vexed, for salt is the creatures of the sea, and good for the Ginen to eat, but fresh-fresh is the flesh of Lasiren, and if you eat that, it's pride" (pg. 68).
"I humbled myself and ate salt" (Mer, pg. 100).
Style
Hopkinson employs a simple yet dramatic style through fragmented, bolded, and first-person sentences. Utilizing colloquialism, she draws the reader into her complex characters. Her sentences are detailed and extremely blunt, especially when pertaining to sexual pleasures, leaving little room for any misinterpretation.
"The warmth of the drug spread al through my body, bringing blissful ease to my cramping belly" (pg. 19).
"Simenon's demon's eyes of sky glittered" (pg. 84).
"Do you wish to climb aboard me, straddle my waist, slip your cremorne into my mouth?" (pg. 74)
Wise Words from The Salt Roads
"Lie down with the dog, get up with fleas." pg. 2
"People only see what they see." pg. 24
"Money' seems to also be a kind of food, and the woman wants for it often." pg. 57
"They sometimes say that the maddest fools have been touched by God." pg. 86
"Desire makes us all babies again." pg. 180
"Do not ask your future, or you will forget to live in your present." pg. 184
"Sometimes the machete slips in your hand and cuts you. It's not the machete at fault then, it's your carelessness." pg. 201
"Every act of love, of healing, strikes a blow to the evil we fight." pg. 306
"There is a time to fight, fierce as a cornered dog, for your freedom... It is ugly in this world, and when the killing starts, the same stick will beat the black dog and the white." pg. 376
Literary Significance and Reception
"A book of wonder, courage, and magic... an electrifying bravura performance by one of our most important writers" -Junot Diaz, author of Drown
"THE SALT ROADS is a story we all should know." -Nikki Giovani, author of Quilting the Black-Eyed Pea
"Hopkinson's storytelling voice is compelling and unique." -Lalita Tademy, author of Cane River
A diverse ensemble of powerful and unforgettable women...The tale sings with verve and authenticity. A major achievement." -Herb Boyd, editor, The Harlem Reader
Allusions to Actual History, Geography and Current Science
This book is a work of historical fiction. In order to give a sense of the times, some names or real people or places have been included.
Excerpts from the poem "The Balcony" are reprinted from The Poems and Prose Poems of Charles Baudelaire, ed. James Huneker. New York: Bretanos, 1919.
Excerpts from the letters of Charles Baudelaire an Apollonie Sabatier adapted from The Letters of Baudelaire, translated by Arthur Symons. New York: Albert and Charles Boni, 1927.
Translation of Le Serpent qui danse, The Snake That Dances, by Patrick Barnard, 2003, Canada.
There are also references to the following:
1. women of Caribbean area- fiction
2. Saint Mary of Egypt- fiction
3. spirit possession- fiction
4. Caribbean Area- fiction
5. Jeanne Duval- fiction
6. time travel- fiction
7. goddesses- fiction
8. prostitutes- fiction
9. France- fiction
10. Egypt- fiction
11. Jules Verne- fiction
Awards and Nominations
Won the Gaylactic Spectrum Award at the Gaylaxicon of 2005.
Was a finalist at the Nebula Awards of 2004.
Publication History
- 2003, Canada, Warner Books, ISBN 0-446-53302-5, hard-cover