The Help – Wonderful, Evocative, Authentic
The Help rang true for me as an author (Perfect Killer) and as the scion of a Mississippi Delta cotton plantation family, born in Greenwood, raised in Jackson during this book’s time period and kicked out of Ole Miss in 1967 for leading a civil rights march.
If Katheryn Stockett had added every possible thing suggested in the numerous Internet discussions, this would have been an unpublishable, 1,000-page tome. Few readers are prepared to sit down with the next “War and Peace.”
The Help is, at his core, a “coming of age” story, an introspection by Ms. Stockett of a disturbing time and a clash of cultures. I faced the same agony of cutting at least half of my own “coming of age in Mississippi” story that I wrapped up in Perfect Killer .
I would agree with some that the maids’ dialogue (as well as that of the white folk) can fall harshly on people’s ears. Both sets of language have been softened very capably — not so much dialogue that it’s hard to read, but enough to offer a flavor.
Remember too, that this is a book of impressions and memories, all of which take on rounded, vaguer lines as time passes. Quibbling with minor specifics that do not affect the overall story distracts the reader from absorbing the important impression, the point, the absolute significance of the events and the outcome.
Because I grew up between The Delta and Jackson, I do admire how Ms. Stockett managed to fuse the two very different cultures. The Delta is 2 hours north of Jackson, but The Help did a believable job of moving them so very close in the mind.
Skeeter’s mother is absolutely believable and reminded me so much of my Mama who was an unreconstructed Delta Belle, born on one of her father’s two plantations and died as one of the last of the Steel Magnolias. Her father — my grandfather John Wester Bradford was called “Daddy” by family and “The Judge” by everyone else (genuflecting hardly optional). His plantations were Mossy Island near Morgan City (still owned by my cousin) and Saints’ Rest near Indianola — which I was supposed to inherit part of, but that went away after events at Ole Miss in 1967.
In short, I loved The Help as much as my Mama would have hated it — or been perplexed by it.
There is truth in the book. And authenticity. As I read, my mind put faces from my past on every one of the characters and pulled memories from my mind that I don’t even remember ever remembering before. I am grateful this book was written.
