'He has to construct his own idea of home': Esi Edugyan & Mark Tewksbury discuss Washington Black
Mark Tewksbury will defend Washington Black by Esi Edugyan on Canada Reads 2022
Esi Edugyan's novel Washington Black will be defended by Olympic champion swimmer Mark Tewksbury on Canada Reads 2022.
The 1830s-set novel follows the life of Wash, who is a field slave in Barbados until, at the age of 11,, unexpected events send him on a lifelong adventure around the world. The journey will have Wash grappling with agency, self-actualization and love for the first time.
Tewksbury interviewed Edugyan about her novel before the debates, which takes place March 28-31st. Watch their conversation in the video above, or read a transcript below.
Canada Reads will be hosted by Ali Hassan and will be broadcast on CBC Radio One, CBC TV, CBC Gem and on CBC Books.
Tewksbury: Hello, Esi, how are you doing?
Edugyan: Hi, Mark. I'm so delighted to be here.
Tewksbury: I want to tell you the reason I chose the book is because I think it's the kind of book you start reading, you know, at eight o'clock at night and you have to force yourself to turn off the light at midnight because you've got to get up the next morning and work, but you just can't stop reading. It's epic in every way. And, although it's set in 1830, I really think it can connect us with issues that still ring true in 2022.
Edugyan: Well, thank you so much. I was so thrilled to see that you'd chosen it. I remember distinctly watching your gold medal win at the Barcelona Olympics. I think back in... well, you would know better than I, like 1992?
Tewksbury: Yeah, you would have been 14.
Edugyan: Probably, yeah, thereabouts. I'm so happy to meet you and to be doing this with you.
Tewksbury: Thank you. Me too. Listen, one of my biggest challenges is Washington Black is hard to sum up in a few sentences because it's such an epic adventure. So I get to talk to the source here. How do you describe the book?
Edugyan: The book is, as you said, it's an epic adventure, but it's really about the process of self-discovery of an 11-year-old field slave, who one day gets very unexpectedly plucked out of his harsh, raw life circumstances and then transported into worlds that he could never have conceived of, or imagined when he was a field slave.
And so, it's really him finding his footing in the world, I guess, exploring new relationships, allowing himself to find love. But really him finally feeling at home within himself and coming into his sense of being, like a fully realized human being.
So it's a psychological journey as much as it's a physical journey through various landscapes. We have the Arctic, we have Barbados, we have London. But it's really about his emotional well-being and ultimately his feeling that he has to construct his own idea of home in the world.
Tewksbury: I love that. I mean, that really helps me a lot, actually, I'm going to use some of that in my defence.
OK, let me start with the writing. You know, this is Canada Reads, after all. And of course, it's beautifully written, deeply affecting, packed with feeling. That's why I really connected with this book, and I love how you start chapters: "And so we didn't die," "Oh, but the cold," and, my personal favourite, "Norfolk stank." I will never get the taste of that scene out of my memory. It was so palpable.
So in doing research for this book, I mean, you just so incredibly described so many different parts of the world in a different era. What stands out with you from doing all of the research?
Edugyan: I guess for me, one of the joys of the book was to do that research and to be able to immerse myself in different aspects of an 1830s world, different environments, different places. You wouldn't maybe always simultaneously think of, you know, Arctic exploration in the same [way] that you would think of 1830s Barbados plantation life. Just to put those two things together, I think is an interesting dichotomy.
There were points in the research that were very obviously difficult. Having to research slave life on Barbados was quite harrowing. But, you know, I just allowed myself to take breaks and to step away from that when I needed to step away from that, and then also to kind of turn towards the more joyful aspects of the book as well, which is certain scenes taking place in Nova Scotia, for instance, when Washington finally finds a kindred spirit to love.
Tewksbury: I agree it was one of the more joyful and fun parts of the book for me to read as well.
You talk about dichotomy, so I'm going to jump to this. I just love that, on one hand, there's this quest for science and data and facts. And then, on the other hand, there's kind of this quest to understand or make sense out of people or situations that we'll never be able to make sense out of. And it's the same with this idea of us all being replaceable, which we could interpret as our lives are meaningless.
At the same time, all moments are worthy of curiosity. So can you elaborate on these dichotomies and tensions in the book?
Edugyan: Yeah, I feel like — and this was a very deliberate act — Washington and Titch are kind of perfect foils of each other.
You have somebody who, at the outset of the book, Wash, who's very much steeped in a kind of, I guess, West African mythology in terms of how he confronts the world, a West African sense of spirituality that he inherits from Big Kit. You know, they believe in reincarnation, and... it basically becomes a kind of anchor because if you believe that you're going to wake up free in another world, that's probably the only thing that's kind of getting you through the hardships of this world. And so he's very much, at the outset of the novel, steeped in this kind of spirituality.
And then, you have Titch, who's very much scientifically-minded, very much steeped in what we would consider European rationality, or principles of rationality.
As the book progresses and they start to spend more time with each other and connect, by the end of the novel, they've sort of switched places a little bit. You see that Washington has really become much more preoccupied with ideas of what is rational. And then you have Titch who has moved to a more, I guess, mystical realm.
How do you move somebody from one mindset to the other? And what does that do to their relationships?- Esi Edugyan
How do you move somebody from one mindset to the other? And what does that do to their relationships? We have a sense of our relationships, a lot of the time, as being, in some sense, set, like immutable; I know how this person is going to react, especially in a marriage. You have a sense of like, this is how my partner is and this is how he or she or they will always be.
But then sometimes you get these surprises, where somebody has changed their thinking or somebody has moved from one position. And then, how do you reckon with that? Especially when you've kind of maybe moved over more to their position and then you find that they don't hold it anymore.
All of these are inherent in the book, and were so interesting to write.
Tewksbury: It's so interesting to read and so joyful to read because that tension is super interesting.
So obviously, this whole theme of freedom, or lack thereof, runs throughout the book — I would say from the opening sentence right to the closing line. For you as the author, what were some of the key things that Wash had to overcome to find freedom?
Edugyan: Yeah, I mean, initially, those obstacles to freedom were rooted in his position as being a field slave, right? You don't have any kind of freedom over your own body, even. This lack of physical freedom was something that very much governed the contours of his life.
But as he broke out of that, or was wrenched out of that situation and taken out into the greater world, and then ultimately left to find his own footing, the question then became one of an, initially, intellectual freedom, but then kind of, I guess spiritual freedom for him, like, really the sense of personally feeling at home enough in his body, but also at home enough in the world. And, not tethered by all of the darkness that he's experienced in the past. Obviously we carry with us various traumas, especially from childhood, we carry so much with us into the world. But probably the balance that we eventually strike is figuring out how much we are going to allow those traumas to define us and to confine us, really.
What limits are we going to let those past wounds place on how we live our lives?- Esi Edugyan
What limits are we going to let those past wounds place on how we live our lives? And I think, for him, this is a very difficult thing. I mean, he's been through so much. And on top of that, he's got this feeling of abandonment. And so, really I think the second half of the book is him working through this.
I mean, he's told by his partner, Tanna, "Why can't you just let this go? You're free, but clearly you're not free mentally. You're still kind of tethered to this man, who seems to represent something of your past that is obviously very unresolved for you."
So really, he has to work through this process of intellectual and spiritual freedom, even while he's physically free.
Tewksbury: I love that nuance and that subtlety of freedom is not a zero sum game, and just because you have freedom doesn't mean you are free, or feel free or can be free in your own life.
I love the markers along the way. So for me as the reader, there are moments; a huge one was in Nova Scotia, where Wash picks up his drawing instruments on his own free will for the first time. I felt like, wow, so that's a huge marker on his journey here because he was forced to draw before, really, right? And now he chose it. So just really powerful, those markers.
Edugyan: Thank you. And your reading of the book is so subtle, and I'm very excited to hear your defence.
Tewksbury: You talked about sort of the joyful part of the book. What was the most terrifying moment in the book for you?
Edugyan: For me, the moments of violence were the most terrifying aspects to write about. In particular, this is a bit of a spoiler, but just everything surrounding Cousin Philip. And it's interesting because that was one of the scenes that came out almost wholly as we see it in the book. There was very little editing that needed to be done, but I felt like psychologically, I really had to work myself up to write that scene. It was just a lot. So maybe the Cousin Philip scene.
Tewksbury: That's great — that's not my answer. I love that that's yours.
For me, it was Wash sitting in the bar having his meal, and he comes face to face with somebody that he doesn't want to. I won't do a spoiler. And, just that whole part of the book, I mean we feel the surveillance and that intensity of knowing you're being watched, and that was very unsettling.
Edugyan: I sort of hadn't thought about that in a while. But yeah, I remember writing that and those scenes in Nova Scotia were, for me, a pleasure because it's like his first friendship is developing with Medwin, and he finally has this routine that he's established. He's kind of setting up this life for himself. It's a very narrow life, but he's finding his feet, but there's always that feeling of surveillance like you're talking about.
Tewksbury: Here's the big final question: the theme of Canada Reads this year is "One Book to Connect Us." You know I'm going to be asked this a million times, so I thought I'd try it to you first. How does Washington Black connect us, Esi?
Edugyan: I mean, just hearing the pleasure that you took in the novel, and hearing you talk about it, and hearing you just very delicately picking out the themes and all of this, I mean, that is what every writer would hope for — somebody to read that passionately and that sensitively their work and then to go on and talk about it with others, who will read the book, hopefully, with the same degree of passion.
I think, you know, reading is connection, right? I think that just the excitement and the pleasure, that's very infectious.
And then we can start to look, you know, very critically at some of the themes of the book, which are themes that we're all kind of dealing with — ideas of personal freedom...
Tewksbury: Personal discovery. Meaning and value of life right now, in this time where what we knew isn't going to be what's going forward, exactly.
Edugyan: Yeah, exactly. The tension between how we perceive ourselves and what we can claim for ourselves vs these kinds of societal tethers. You know, whether it's a feeling of surveillance like you brought up. As a person of colour moving through certain spaces, these are still tensions that are with us.
Or, whether it's just, I guess, having a sense of what's possible in one's life.
Tewksbury: Oh Esi, you know I could do this all day, but I won't keep you anymore. Thank you so much. Esi, I look forward to championing your book.
Edugyan: Oh, I'm so looking forward to hearing you champion it, Mark. Delighted. Thanks. Bye.
This conversation has been edited for length and clarity.
The Canada Reads 2022 contenders
- Christian Allaire champions Five Little Indians by Michelle Good
- Malia Baker champions Scarborough by Catherine Hernandez
- Tareq Hadhad champions What Strange Paradise by Omar El Akkad
- Suzanne Simard champions Life In the City of Dirty Water by Clayton Thomas-Müller
- Mark Tewksbury champions Washington Black by Esi Edugyan
