CRAFT ESSAY #5 - Crossing the River

Craft Essay #5:

Crossing the River, by Caryl Phillips

Caryl Phillips’s Crossing the River offers a master class in the techniques of fractured chronology and withholding information.
The novel is made up of four separate sections, plus a prologue and epilogue. The prologue is, on its surface, a first-person recollection by an African father who has sold his three children to a slaver in 1753. “For two hundred and fifty years,” the haunted man says, “I have listened to the many-tongued chorus” (p. 1). Two hundred and fifty years? Is he Africa itself? What of the italicized lines (“Bought 2 strong man-boys, & a proud girl”)? As the novel progresses through its several sections, the many-tongued chorus swells through the voices of the characters, and these mysteries become clear.
Part I, “The Pagan Coast,” is a combination of third-person narration, mostly aligned with “benevolent” slave owner Edward Williams, and first-person letters written to Williams by his former slave, Nash Williams, from Liberia, c. 1834-42. Throughout both sections, the author lays trip wires—tidbits of information that blow up later, for maximum impact. On page 55, Edward fears that the other white men with whom he visits in Africa might be aware of “the personal tragedy that had recently enveloped his name.” The details of this tragedy—his wife Amelia’s suicide—are not revealed until the following page. The delay creates a sense of mystery and suspense. The revelation also provides long-awaited information about the fate of Nash’s many unanswered letters, which Amelia, mad with jealousy, had destroyed (until this is revealed, we don’t know why Edward was not writing back to Nash). Nash’s letters to Edward, meanwhile, are also sprinkled with trip wires, some of which are never fully explained, but they accumulate to create a palpable sense of dread. On page 33, he casually refers to his “fellow black emigrants” as being critical of “my dictatorial manner” and questioning “the moral value of my behavior.” Later, he mentions in passing that “the numbers at the mission school [have] fallen off in a dramatic manner” (p. 39) Eventually, in later letters, he slips in details of his relationships with several different local women. These dribs and drabs of information imply Nash’s slow movement away from religious missionary work—he’s “going native” without ever directly saying so. In the end, like Kurtz in Heart of Darkness, he cuts off communication with his former world and disappears upriver.
Part II, “West,” documents the journey of Martha, an escaped slave, as she heads into the U.S. western territories in the 1860s. Alternating between first and third person, Phillips again withholds information to great effect. The first-person section starting on page 81 tells of how Martha meets, falls in love with, and loses Chester, a wrangler in the frontier town of Dodge, where Martha has a laundry and food business. But the chronology of this brief (four-page) section is scrambled. It begins with three men looking for Chester at Martha’s small restaurant. Slowly, Martha reveals the pertinent information: Chester recently killed a card-cheating friend of these men; the men are out for revenge; Chester is Martha’s man, and they are in business together; the Civil War has recently ended; Martha is a free woman. The narration then circles around as Chester arrives and is killed by the three men. This structure—starting near the end, reversing to fill in gaps, then returning for the climax—is repeated several times throughout “West” (and not just in individual sections—the overall structure of “West” follows a similar pattern; e.g., we find out Martha has been abandoned in Denver [p. 73] before we read the scene where she’s actually left there [p. 93]).
Part III, “Crossing the River,” consists mainly of excerpts from the journal kept by James Hamilton, master of a British slave ship circa 1752-3, as well as letters from Hamilton to his wife. Written with a shocking “commercial detachment” (p. 113: a longboat “brought with her 5 slaves, 2 fine boys, & 3 old women whom I instructed them to dispose of”), the journal entries indirectly reveal the “deep feelings of revulsion” (p. 119) toward the slaves that Hamilton can only directly confront in his letters. The letters also reveal Hamilton’s insecurity about his position—some consider him no more than a “gentleman passenger” (p. 120)—which goes unsaid in the journal. Also, the journal entries trip the bombs set up in the prologue: the italicized passages on pages 1-2 are direct quotes from Hamilton’s log. He is the slaver who purchases the “2 strong man-boys, & a proud girl.” Thus, the information withheld on page 1 is finally revealed on page 124.
Part IV, “Somewhere in England,” is narrated entirely by an Englishwoman in brief, journal-like passages dated from 1936 to 1963. By arranging these passages out of chronological order, the author immediately creates a structure given to the withholding of information: events are obliquely referred to, but we have not yet witnessed them ourselves. For instance, toward the end the narrative leaps from World War II to 1963 (p. 223), where we infer that Joyce gave up her son, Greer, for adoption back in 1945. We also learn that she had married Greer’s father, Travis, that same year, but is now married to someone else. The story then leaps back to 1945, where we witness Joyce’s reunion with Travis and their wedding on New Year’s Day (p. 225-7). Then comes Greer’s birth and Joyce’s decision to give him up for adoption (p. 228). The next passage takes place prior to that, as Joyce is informed of Travis’s death on the battlefield (p. 229). Finally, the narrator leaps forward again to 1963, to 18-year-old Greer’s arrival at her doorstep (p. 231).
Joyce, as narrator, also withholds information with her use of pronouns. The “they” on page 129 are not revealed as American soldiers until page 134. Travis is referred to as “he” (or “the tall one”) from his introduction on page 149 until page 208, when Martha finally refers to him by name. Most dramatically, the fact that Travis is black (which we’ve surmised) is not specifically stated until page 202.
This fractured narrative structure, with its fluid approach to time and chronology, accomplishes two things. First, it creates a kind of informational void that the reader is forced to fill. This draws us in, involving us in the telling of the tale. Second, on a more metaphysical level, this technique echoes the novel’s theme of spatial and chronological diaspora. The narrator of the prologue and epilogue—the African Father—speaks from a vantage point unlimited by time. His observations span 250 years, from the mid-18th century to the present day, encompassing everything from slavery to jazz to Martin Luther King, Jr., as he follows the doomed fates of the “2 strong man-boys, & a proud girl” —Nash, Travis, and Martha—whom he sold to James Hamilton.