Writing Blackness: John Edgar Wideman's Art and Experimentation

Index

187 Achebe, Chinua: Things Fall Apart, 9 “Across the Wide Missouri” (Wideman). See under Damballah All Stories Are True (Wideman), 65 Andrade, Heather, 1, 65, 119–20, 169n8, 170n9; “Mosaic Memory,” 175n3 Austen, Jane, 64 “Beginning of Homewood, The” (Wideman ). See under Damballah Bennion, John, 176n15 Berben, Jacqueline, 175n8 Berben-Masi, Jacqueline, 170n10 Bergevin, Gerald, 40, 172n24 Berry, Stacey, 112 Birat, Kathie, 64, 104, 170n11 black postmodernism: and complex modernist vision, 65; defined, 64–67; and fiction and facts, 65–67, 72; and Great Time, 65; and historical fact, 65–66; and human construction, 65–67; and modernism, 63–64, 173n8; opposing white stories, 71–72, 72–73; and other postmodern theory, 66; and political change, 66–67; and reader imagination, 66–67; replacing modernism in Homewood Trilogy , 64–67; and storytelling concerns, 67–68; storytelling process in, 65, 66–67; and stream of consciousness, 65; in Wideman’s later writing, 63–67. See also Homewood Trilogy (Wideman); Wideman, John Edgar Brothers and Keepers (Wideman): as auto/ biography, 1–2; brother compared to writer, 7; brother co-writing book, 4–8, 169n4; brother given story’s voice, 2, 4–6, 7–8; brother and Homewood, 7; brothers’ divergent lives, 2; brother’s story and reality, 2–5; “Doing Time,” 6–8; limitation of words, 3–4; narrator/ writer John, 2–3; “Our Time,” 4–6; postmodern writing emphasis, 169n3; story’s layers and shifts, 2–3; structure, narrative , and theme, 2; “Visits,” 2–4; writing of, 2, 5–6 Bush, George, 32 Byerman, Keith: “Queering Blackness,” 173nn5–6 Casmier, Stephen, 177n5 Cattle Killing, The (Wideman): Bishop Allen’s life and stories, 120, 123–24, 129–31; black novelist’s liberating language , 121; black storytelling, 119–20, 121, 124–25, 126, 127, 129, 130, 132–33; black writers subverting white stories, 119; blind white woman’s book, 131; book’s own narrative theory, 124; “Eye,” 83, 121–24; 129; George Stubbs, 127–28; Hottentot Venus story, 120–21, 127–28, 179n4; Liam, 123–24, 125–30; male and female identities, 125, 128; male stories to sick woman, 125–26, 129–33; multiple forms of stories, 121, 125–26, 126–27, 128; narrator/writer, 120–21, 124, 128– 30; preacher, 124–29, 179n3; readers’ reactions , ix; and Reuben and Fire, 119, 121; white power in white language, 128–33; white stories’ power over blackness, 127–28, 129–30; Wideman and character John, 122; Wideman’s most ambitious novel, 121; Wideman’s writing and INDEX 188 index Cattle Killing, The (continued) “silence,” 121; writer, son discuss, 133; writers rewriting page and imagination, 119, 121, 123–24, 126–27, 128–30; Xhosa cattle-killing story, 120–21, 122, 127, 128–29, 179nn4–5. See also Great Time “Chinaman, The” (Wideman). See under Damballah Coltrane, John, 64 Creolization: defined, 28–29, 40–41; and dream, 172n23; effect on writer and reader, 29, 40–41; examples of, 31, 33, 34–36, 39–41; and Fatheralong’s paradigm of race, 29; as form of liberation , 171n17; and human diversity, 34, 39–40; and hybridity, 29; love that heals, 29, 39–40; and oppressive history, 29, 39–40; and race, 39–40. See also Island: Martinique, The (Wideman); Wideman, John Edgar “Daddy Garbage” (Wideman). See under Damballah Damballah (Wideman): “Across the Wide Missouri,” 84; “The Beginning of Homewood ,” 74–76; “Lizabeth: The Caterpillar Story,” 77–78; “The Chinaman,” 79–80; “Daddy Garbage,” 76–77; “Damballah,” 74; “Hazel,” 84; and Hiding Place, 73–74; Homewood story’s ongoing past, 76, 176n12; John Lawson, Wideman’s surrogate , in, 73–74; narrator, 73–76; narrator/ writer implicitly John, 74; “Rashad,” 84; “Solitary,” 84; “The Songs of Reba Love Jackson,” 82–83; “Tommy,” 83–84; “The Watermelon Story,” 80–82 “Damballah” (Wideman). See under Damballah Douglas, Jennifer, 133 Drummond, Doreatha: John Edgar Wideman , 173n5 Dubey, Madhu, 112, 178n16, 179n20 Eliot, T. S., 42, 46, 64; “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock,” 49; “The Waste Land,” 48. See also Glance Away, A (Wideman); Hurry Home (Wideman) Ellison, Ralph, 64 Fanon, Frantz, 20, 36–37, 38, 170n13, 179n11, 180n12, 180n20; Black Skin, White Masks, 158, 172n22; The Wretched of the Earth, 138, 143, 146, 149, 157–58, 159, 160, 163, 180n17. See also Fanon (Wideman); Island: Martinique, The (Wideman) Fanon (Wideman): ambiguous tone of, 139–40, 141–42; and auto/biography, 179n8; black gang violence, 149–50; and Black Skin, White Masks, 158; bricolage described, 138–39, 145, 158–59, 161–62, 179n9; and “Damballah,” 157; and David Macey’s Fanon...