Wendy Glenn

History Flows Beneath the Fiction: Two Roads Chosen in Redemption and A Northern Light

istory is a version of events, a story that sexual favors from her mother, and is befriended by features a cast of characters much like you the baron’s son, Ethan. Upon landing, Lily and Ethan Hand me. In any age, people laugh, hurt, are separated from their shipmates. Together, the two stumble, and endure, emerging sometimes unaffected, young people set out to find Lily’s mother and are sometimes scathed, always representative of a human saved when members of an Indian tribe find them condition that the alteration of time and place can hungry and in enemy territory. Lily is overjoyed to never erase. Julie Chibbaro and Jennifer Donnelly, two find that her father is among the natives but wonders new voices in the world of adolescent fiction, have how he could have taken up with another woman crafted tales that allow readers to serve as witnesses to when he remains married to her mother. Members of events of the past, to see themselves in the people the tribe volunteer to continue the search for Lily’s who lived lives far removed from their own. Through mother, only to find her dead. There is hope, however, the creation of well-developed characters situated in a as Lily undergoes a process of mourning and reflection given time and place, a refusal to water down histori­ and begins to find her place among the tribe. cal facts, and the skilled use of literary techniques, Chibbaro’s story is based upon the often unwilling both authors provide a glimpse into the past that few, journey to the New World of English colonists aligned if any, history textbooks can provide. with Martin Luther. In her research, Chibbaro came upon the story of a group of nobles who had an idea When Fact and Fiction Meet to colonize a part of America and claim it for England. Redemption After a disastrous first try that resulted in the death of Julie Chibbaro’s novel, Redemption (2004), is set the colonists, they sent another group to give it a try. in early sixteenth-century England and the New When the nobles returned to check the progress of this World. At the novel’s outset, readers are introduced to batch of colonists, they found no trace of them and twelve-year-old Lily and learn that she lost her father returned home to Europe. Around the time when when the baron’s men took him during the night. His Jamestown and the other colonies were being settled, disappearance is surrounded by accusations regarding the new colonists encountered a group of white- his involvement with Frere Lanther, a man excommu­ skinned Indians. As a result of uncovering this nicated from the Church due to his questioning of the intriguing tidbit, Chibbaro says, “My curiosity about practice of indulgences. Unable to defend rights to these White Indians was set aflame. I began to create their land, Lily and her mother flee England with a story around them, to place myself in their skin and fellow religious protesters and voyage to the New imagine who they were, where they came from, and World. During the trip, Lily goes without adequate how their fate could have occurred” (Author’s Note food and supplies, suffers when the baron demands 258). Chibbaro based her research upon old ledgers,

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j52_58TAR_Summer05 52 6/4/05, 10:33 AM badly kept account books, and found was capsized and floating unreliable, boasting journals of Chibbaro based her re- amongst water lilies in a secluded nobles, as well as myths, art, and bay. Her companion, a young man written memories and oral histories search upon old ledgers, who rented the boat under the created by native peoples (Author’s name of Carl Grahm, was nowhere Note 257-59). badly kept account books, to be found and believed dead by and unreliable, boasting drowning. It was learned that Grace A Northern Light Brown was single and pregnant and Jennifer Donnelly’s A Northern journals of nobles, as well that the man who had taken her Light (2003) is set in the boating was the father of her child. Adirondack Mountains in the year as myths, art, and written Chester Gillette, the real name of 1906. The protagonist, sixteen-year- memories and oral histo­ her companion, was ultimately old Mattie Gokey, feels trapped. Her tried, convicted, and executed for mother has died, her elder brother ries created by native Grace’s murder. Grace’s letters has fled, her father is emotionally begging Gillette to rescue her distant, and she is now responsible peoples. before it became obvious that she for the domestic work on the farm, was with child served as key pieces including taking care of her younger sisters. These of evidence in the case. Donnelly casts her judgment responsibilities interfere with Mattie’s desire to write. in the claim, “Chester Gillette hoped to improve his Her liberal-minded teacher, Miss Wilcox, encourages social standing by courting a wealthy girl and marry- her to apply to Barnard College. Mattie fears, however, ing her. To do so, he first needed to rid himself of the that even if she is admitted on scholarship, she will factory girl he had once seduced, a girl he once loved not have the money to go and, more importantly, will but later came to regard as an obstacle” (Author’s not have the courage to leave her father and sisters Note 381-82). In her research, Donnelly utilized when she thinks they need her most. Mattie’s di- transcripts of the Gillette murder trial; diaries of lemma is further complicated by Royal Loomis’ Lucilla Arvilla Mills Clark; exhibits from the romantic interest in her. She appreciates his charms Adirondack Museum library and the Farmer’s Musuem but fears losing sight of her goals. When money gets (Cooperstown, NY); photos, oral histories, census and tight, Mattie convinces her father to allow her to tax records, and information on early Inlet businesses spend the summer working at Glenmore, a resort a and the Inlet Common School via the Town of Webb few miles up the road from her rural community in Historical Association; out-of-print Adirondack titles the Adirondacks. While there, Mattie and her cowork- from the Port Leyden Community Library; and visits to ers learn of the death of one of the patrons, a young the Waldheim and Glenmore hotel sites (Acknowledg­ woman who drowned while in a boat with her male ments 383-84). companion, Carl. Just prior to her death, the woman, Grace, gives Mattie a bundle of letters and begs her to A Young Person’s Perspective dispose of them. Overtaken by curiosity, Mattie reads the letters and learns the truth behind Grace’s relation- In these two novels, Chibbaro and Donnelly have ship with Carl and the murder that ended Grace’s life. created engaging characters through whose lives we This truth drives her to make a difficult decision can see a side of history that research documents regarding her own future. alone cannot convey. Although the adult characters in Donnelly’s novel is based upon the sensationalis- these novels are well-developed and complex, both tic murder of a young woman named Grace Brown authors share a young person’s perspective not often whose body was discovered in the waters of Big included in history books. Upon reading these stories, Moose, a lake on the edge of the Adirondacks (inter- as told through the eyes of teenage protagonists, estingly enough, also the inspiration for Theodore young readers are afforded both distance and connec­ Dreiser’s An American Tragedy and the film, A Place tion. They can imagine an existence that does not in the Sun). The boat in which Grace Brown had been include, for example, the search for a prom date, the

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j52_58TAR_Summer05 53 6/4/05, 10:33 AM quest for a car of one’s own, or the pressure to one moment, the mother is protective and defensive, succeed on Friday’s math quiz. But they can also telling Lily to remain by her side, that Lily is her sole participate in an exploration of themes inherent in the confidant (82). At other times, she frightens Lily with human condition—love, friendship, the conflict her talk of suicide and disbelief in the Bible and words between both needing and needing to reject one’s of Frere Lanther (76-77). At all times, she is dependent parents—that comprise a part of life for teenagers in upon her child to help her endure. As a child, Lily all times and places. needs her mother’s nurturing care; as a young adult, In writing about the Lily is forced to nurture and care for her mother. process of developing the In the development of the character of Mattie, In these two novels, protagonist in the novel, Donnelly has created a narrator whose love of lan­ Chibbaro says, “For years I guage and literature and contemplative nature reveal a Chibbaro and Donnelly tried to look beyond the talented young girl who feels she is a victim of social have created engaging basic American history convention. Mattie is bright and witty, surely capable dates we all memorized in of attaining her dream to become a writer. Yet, she characters through whose school, such as 1492 and finds herself wondering if this dream is worth pursu­ 1776, to dig deeper and ing given the expected norms for women of her day. lives we can see a side of ascertain what really went She wonders if, perhaps, she is foolish for going after history that research into the formation of what so many women before her have deemed less America. . . . I wanted to important than the traditional choice to marry and documents alone cannot feel and understand have children. Mattie describes her admiration for America from its inception, Louisa May Alcott, Emily Dickinson, Jane Austen, and convey. Although the through characters who Charlotte Bronte, who refused to marry and give up adult characters in these might have been there” their writing. Emily Dickinson, she argues, was “a (Author’s Note 257). damned sneaky genius” who “fought by not fighting novels are well-developed Chibbaro’s portrayal of Lily . . . . Maybe she was lonely at times, and cowed by reflects an honesty that her pa, but I bet at midnight, when the lights were out and complex, both au- encourages readers to and her father was asleep, she went sliding down the empathize with her banister and swinging from the chandelier. I bet she thors share a young situation, to work through was just dizzy with freedom” (274). Yet, despite this person’s perspective not her confusions just as she realization, Mattie feels safe and secure when she does as a character. Lily finds herself in Royal’s arms. Mattie wants to be loved often included in history does not have all the and fears the loneliness that will accompany her answers. She is confused freedom, but she longs for the freedom gained in the books. by the words of Frere pursuit of her real love—writing. Ultimately, she must Lanther, wanting to believe learn “that she cannot live her life for others” in the message of faith he advocates, but knowing that (Prolman). this message resulted in the disappearance of her father. Her first words read, “I saw a bird dead once. It Nitty, Gritty History looked perfect, just lying on the ground on its side, its Despite the differing inspirations and origins for little claws curled up, one eye slightly ajar, the inside their novels, both Chibbaro and Donnelly refuse to white. I ran my finger over its fat, puffed wing and make history easy or simplistic as they craft their tried not to disturb it. It seemed the bird might wake fictional stories around events of the past. They do at any time. I picture my father this way” (1). She is more than rely on history to tell a compelling story; jaded, feeling hurt and alone in her struggles to make they reveal historical truths in the presentation of their sense of her loss. It is Lily’s “spiritual battle with her fiction. In both novels, the authors address issues of own guilt and with God that draws readers along” power and equity among participants in a community, (Rochman). Lily wishes to confide in her mother but portray life as lived reality rather than perceived finds her unable to offer the guidance she craves. At fantasy, and choose to compose endings that may be

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j52_58TAR_Summer05 54 6/4/05, 10:33 AM hopeful but remain true to the time and place in hurl insults their way. One which the story is set. such farmer, Royal’s They do more than rely on father, forces the mother, Emmie, to have sex with history to tell a compel- Power and Manipulation him in return for the ling story; they reveal Chibbaro and Donnelly understand the power generosity he shows the differential that exists in the societies they describe family. These class issues historical truths in the and the subsequent victimization of those who do not are compounded by the hold this power. In Redemption, Chibbaro is true to summer arrival of the presentation of their the setting about which she writes. Power resides with wealthy resort-goers those who possess religious ties to the Catholic whose free-flowing cash fiction. In both novels, the Church or large holdings of land. In the middle of the serves to support the authors address issues of night, men in dark capes invade Lily’s home and take working class community her father away as a result of his refusal, on recom­ for just a few months power and equity among mendation of Frere Lanther, to participate in the before they head off after drunken festivals held by the church and designed to Labor Day, leaving the participants in a commu- pacify the locals. Her father is denied the right to workers to scrimp and nity, portray life as lived express his views freely in a society run by those who save until the next travel wish to suppress free thinking. Although he is a good season arrives. There is a reality rather than per- citizen, a choir leader in the local church, in fact, he is hierarchy of power aligned punished for questioning the beliefs of those in with the possession of ceived fantasy, and control. Several leaders in this community abuse their wealth. choose to compose end- power in their relationships with Lily’s mother, as In terms of gender, well. After the disappearance of the father, the prefect, Donnelly explores the ings that may be hopeful beadle, and others of the baron’s men visit Lily’s choices provided to men mother on several occasions. They not only demand and women in a world in but remain true to the that she give up her land now that her husband no which gender roles are time and place in which longer resides there; they use oppressive tactics to securely intact. Mattie persuade her to give in, at times hitting and sexually feels held to gender the story is set. abusing her to get their way. Once the mother and Lily expectations that she is are aboard the ship headed to the New World, the certain will result in the baron himself takes advantage of Lily’s mother and denial of her dream to become a writer. Mark Twain, rapes her repeatedly, using her as a sexual toy and Charles Dickens, and John Milton did not have to manipulating her faith in Frere Lanther in hopes of make a choice between family and career. Why should financial gain. she? she wonders. Mattie’s teacher, Miss Wilcox, In A Northern Light, Donnelly explores issues in pushes Mattie to pursue her writing. When she reveals the complex world in which Mattie lives. “In an that she is not only “Miss Wilcox, teacher” but “Emily intelligent, colloquial voice that speaks with a writer’s Baxter, author of a controversial book of poems love of language and an observant eye, Mattie details regarding women and freedom,” Mattie is inspired. the physical particulars of people’s loves as well as This inspiration is called into question, however, when deeper issues of race, class, and gender as she strains Mattie learns that Miss Wilcox’s husband has the against family and societal limitations” (Engberg). power to cut her off financially and have her placed in Power in this novel resides in the hands of white men a mental institution. Even Grace Brown, the young with money, at least a few dollars more than their woman whose death inspired the story, is victim, victims. Members of the fatherless Hubbard family, for literally and figuratively, to gender discrimination. As example, serve as representatives of the lowest class. a young girl who finds herself pregnant and unwed in As a result of their status (or lack thereof), even the this time and place, her choices are limited. She does farmers who earn just pennies more feel entitled to all in her power to convince the father to take respon­

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j52_58TAR_Summer05 55 6/4/05, 10:33 AM sibility for her actions, realities of the described times and places to temper In terms of gender, knowing, if he doesn’t and our fantasy-based imaginings. Their use of language likely won’t, that she will draws us into settings that are messy and mired in Donnelly explores the be the one to suffer complexity, much like our own. We experience life recrimination and abuse alongside the characters, entering their world and choices provided to men while he continues life as mindset through the crafting of vivid images represen­ and women in a world in an eligible bachelor. tative of the places in which the characters inhabit. In terms of race, In Redemption, Chibbaro “vivifies the book with which gender roles are Donnelly traces the inspired descriptions” (Booklist). She takes us to the discrimination of blacks port with its masses of people; honking and snorting securely intact. Mattie even in the free lands of the pigeons, pheasants, and rabbits; baskets of herbs and feels held to gender ex- North decades after the wild fruits and vegetables; men shouting and spitting; Civil War. Mattie’s best and Lily clutching her mother’s hand (15-16). Among pectations that she is friend, Weaver, is a young the lowly passengers on board the ship sailing to the black man whose father is New World, we experience the “smell of piss and certain will result in the attacked and killed by dung in the room, of people rotting in their stew” denial of her dream to white men when he refuses (74), providing a stark contrast to the baron’s quarters to move off of the sidewalk decorated with gilt-framed paintings and a red velvet become a writer. Mark when they pass by. Like couch that “feels like rabbit fur, so soft” (91). As the Mattie, Weaver is an boat sets sail, we are privy to the passengers’ fears Twain, Charles Dickens, intelligent, word-loving that their lives will soon end as they sail over the end and John Milton did not student who plans to of the earth into a pit of fire (20-21). Arrival in the attend Columbia and New World offers no reprieve. There, Lily and the have to make a choice become a lawyer. The remaining passengers encounter hunger, fatigue, and faulty perceptions of others, violence committed by rival bands of natives. between family and ca- however, deny Weaver the Chibbaro’s tale is “harsh, violent, gruesome—not for place in society he has anyone wanting to view history through a rosy haze. reer. Why should she? she earned and that he right­ Yet the book is also vibrant, riveting and beautifully wonders. fully demands even when it written” (Shannon). brings trouble upon him. In A Northern Light, Mattie’s frank voice gives When, for example, a group readers “a taste of how bitter—and how sweet— of racist white men call Weaver a nigger, he refuses to ordinary life in the early 1900s could be” (Lindsay). back down and takes them on, three to one. When She describes the fleas that infest the house, the these men are fined for their inappropriate behavior, cornmeal mush that serves as dinner for weeks on Weaver feels as though all is right with the world. In end, the endless chores necessary in the maintenance his unfair world, however, these men use this punish­ of the farm, and the power of illness to potentially ment as inspiration to burn down his mother’s house decimate a family. She talks of madness being nothing and steal Weaver’s college fund. The men head for the like that which is portrayed in books. When Emmie border, free and satisfied that their form of justice has Hubbard experiences one of her difficult days, Mattie been served. describes her illness:

The Language of Reality It isn’t Miss Havisham sitting in the ruins of her mansion, all vicious and majestic. And it isn’t like in Jane Eyre, ei­ In these novels, Chibbaro and Donnelly also ther, with Rochester’s wife banging around in the attic, succeed in teaching readers about history by portray­ shrieking and carrying on and frightening the help. When ing an existence that is neither glamorized nor glori­ your mind goes, it’s not castles and cobwebs and silver candelabra. It’s dirty sheets and sour milk and dog shit on fied. Although readers might appreciate the slower the floor. It’s Emmie cowering under her bed, crying and pace and easier lives associated with these perceived singing while her kids try to make soup from seed potatoes. happier days of yore, these authors remind us of the (17)

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j52_58TAR_Summer05 56 6/4/05, 10:33 AM Mattie tells, too, of labor and childbirth under­ Form and Function and the Author’s gone without the safety of hospital facilities and Craft trained doctors, again railing against authors like Dickens and Bronte who fail to tell the truth and write Both Chibbaro and Donnelly are, plainly put, good instead of “no blood, no sweat, no pain, no fear, no writers whose stories reflect their understandings of heat, no stink” (94). Life here can be good, too, historical fiction. Chibbaro knows her history, but however, as when Mattie witnesses an interaction “historical detail informs her storytelling without between her best friend (who has just given birth) and overwhelming it” (Krawitz). She utilizes flashbacks, her shocked husband. She relates, “Minnie tried to say memories, dreams, and visions in the construction of something but couldn’t. She just lifted one of the her tale, drawing readers backward and forward in babies up for him to take. The emotion on his face, time to learn key details necessary for understanding and then between him and Minnie, was so strong, so the history that flows beneath the fiction. Specific facts about Frere Lanther’s naked, that I had to look away” (97). beliefs and behaviors are Honest (But Not Always Happy) Endings interspersed throughout Thought-provoking and the narrative. His opposi­ To remain true to history, neither Chibbaro nor tion to indulgences and mind-numbing, beautiful Donnelly composes an ending that is unrealistic or drunken feasts honoring and disturbing, these unlikely given the setting of the novel. Each author the saints, use of a secret respects historical context and creates a conclusion printing press to spread novels conjure up images that is hopeful but not hokey. In Redemption, Lily does his ideas, and dependence indeed find her father alive in the New World. Her upon personal reading of and ideas that are sure to search is successful, but it is not as fruitful as she has Biblical text, for example, hoped in that her father has taken up with another become key in under­ spark controversy, provid­ woman, a member of the indigenous Nooh tribe standing the role of Lily’s ing rich evidence to sup- whose members willingly adopt whites into their father as religious pro­ culture. Lily also manages to find her mother after tester and the underlying port the claim that histori­ being separated from her upon arrival to the New reasons behind his exile. World. When she locates her, however, she is in a pit Likewise, Donnelly uses cal fiction can serve as of corpses left to decompose after being killed by a an historical event to political statement. group of sea dogs, or pirates. As a result of these spark and shape an findings and losses, Lily is disillusioned. With no intricate story that is large immediate opportunities to return to England, she in scope and powerful in design. The organizational must succumb to her plight and become accustomed structure of the novel is innovative and effective, as to life among the natives, a life that ultimately brings two mutually dependent plot lines work together to her a sense of belonging and well-being. In A Northern create a seamless story. Mattie’s account of the one Light, Mattie does eventually decide to jump the train night she spends by the laid-out body of Grace, to New York to pursue her dream of becoming a reading her words and learning about life and love, is writer. We have great faith that she will make it. She intertwined with first-person flashbacks of Mattie’s life has left much behind, however. Weaver remains on the farm and at the hotel prior to Grace’s death. disillusioned and penniless, his mother without her The two plot lines eventually come together in time, own home and the men who burned it down roaming with the murder mystery serving as “a cautionary tale free. Miss Wilcox remains in hiding, having fled from for Mattie” (Publisher’s Weekly). Through Grace’s her vengeful husband. Mattie’s mother remains dead, story, as contained within her letters, Mattie learns unable to see her daughter off on her grand adventure. that her own story must not become mired in the And Grace Brown remains “stiff and cold in a room in wishes of others. She must give voice to Grace’s lost the Glenmore with a tiny life that will never be, inside life in order to live her own. her” (379).

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j52_58TAR_Summer05 57 6/4/05, 10:34 AM A Discussion of Lenses Works Cited Chibbaro, Julie. Redemption. New York: Atheneum, 2004. Thought-provoking and mind-numbing, beautiful Donnelly, Jennifer. A Northern Light. San Diego: Harcourt, 2003. and disturbing, these novels conjure up images and Dreiser, Theodore. An American Tragedy. 1925. ideas that are sure to spark controversy, providing rich Engberg, Gillian. Rev. of A Northern Light, by Jennifer Donnelly. evidence to support the claim that historical fiction Booklist. Krawitz, Susan. Rev. of Redemption, by Julie Chibbaro. can serve as political statement. These authors have Chronogram. www.chronogram.com/2004/07/bookshelf. looked upon events of the past and retold them Lindsay, Jennifer. Rev. of A Northern Light, by Jennifer Donnelly. through a lens shaped not only by the years that have Amazon.com. passed but by their own experiences as women, as A Place in the Sun. Dir. George Stevens. Paramount Pictures, white women, as educated white women, etc. With 1951. Dir. Eric von Sternberg. Paramount Pictures, 1931. Prolman, Lisa. Rev. of A Northern Light, by Jennifer Donnelly. this gift of hindsight, Chibbaro and Donnelly impose a School Library Journal. critical eye on worlds that, then, seemed perhaps more Rev. of A Northern Light, by Jennifer Donnelly. Publisher’s just than they do now. From a 21st-century perspective, Weekly. Lily’s mother and Grace are, without question, Rev. of Redemption, by Julie Chibbaro. The Horn Book. victimized as a result of their gender. Lily is a pawn in Rochman, Hazel. Rev. of Redemption, by Julie Chibbaro. a larger conflict of religion. Weaver is punished as a Booklist. Shannon, Terry Miller. Rev. of Redemption, by Julie Chibbaro. result of the color of his skin. Mattie is denied oppor­ TeenReads.com. tunity just for being a girl. The choices these authors make in their treatment of history reveal much about their own prejudices. Therein lies the power of historical fiction. These stories are both real and unreal. They are drawn from events of the past and shaped by writers living in present history that will soon pass; interpretations remain forever in flux. Yet, these stories transcend setting in their persistent reminder that the human experience is timeless. That these writers write (and we readers read) these novels attests to the human spirit to question, to explore, to understand the connections that bind us—regardless of the time and place in which we live.

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j52_58TAR_Summer05 58 6/4/05, 10:34 AM