The Homewood Trilogy: Analysis of Major Characters
The Homewood Trilogy explores the intricate lives and relationships of several key characters, each deeply connected to the themes of memory, identity, and the impact of the past on the present. Central to the narrative is John Lawson, who embodies the "blues mind" through his journey of self-discovery as he reconnects with his family's history and learns to listen to the stories around him. His grandfather, John French, is portrayed as a vibrant, morally grounded figure whose life is marked by camaraderie and loss, particularly following the destruction of his cherished music collection.
The character of Mother Bess symbolizes a struggle with the past, as she remains a hermit in her family's home while grappling with the loss of her son. Tommy Lawson, her great-great-nephew, is a fugitive confronting his own history as he learns the importance of acknowledging the past. Alongside them, Clement, an orphan, experiences alienation yet observes the evolving connections among the others.
The narrative also features Albert Wilkes, a fugitive musician whose return to Homewood is fraught with danger, and Brother Tate, whose silence and loss reflect the profound impact of tragedy on creativity. Each character's story weaves a complex tapestry that highlights the significance of storytelling and the legacies that shape their lives and identities in the context of their shared heritage.
The Homewood Trilogy: Analysis of Major Characters
Author: John Edgar Wideman
First published: 1985: Damballah, 1981; Hiding Place, 1981; Sent for You Yesterday, 1983
Genre: Novel
Locale: The Homewood section of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
Plot: Social realism
Time: From the mid-nineteenth century to the 1980's, primarily the early twentieth century to the 1980's
John Lawson, who sometimes appears in the stories in the persona of Doot Lawson. Lawson is the grandson of John French and brother of Tommy Lawson. He returns to Home-wood after teaching in Wyoming and learns many of its stories. Losing his individuation as he connects past with present and turns sadness into song, John is the “blues mind” who posits Homewood within a collectivity of ancestry and tradition. Finding a voice to tell his brother's tale, John begins Damballah as an alien from his culture. Through stories and memory, he acquires the role of witness from Sybela Owens, the escaped slave at the root of the Lawson family tree, and Aunt May. He learns to listen and discovers himself occupying the place of griot.
John French, the capricious grandfather of the narrator. French is a big, loud, gambling man who loves his family and friends. With Lionel Strayhorn and Albert Wilkes, French engages in rough camaraderie that gives him an undeviating moral sense of ritual that belies his poverty. He scavenges a large RCA Victrola and collects blues records. His records are destroyed by Carl French (his son), Lucy Tate, and their junkie friends during a drug frenzy. After his death, his family members scatter.
Bess Simpkins, the granddaughter of Sybela Owens and Charlie Bell. She lives as a hermit in the remains of the family home on top of Bruston Hill, in a figurative and literal past. Having lost an only son in World War II, Mother Bess sustains a self-indulgent presence by not listening to the accidents of the past. Tommy's dream summons familial transcendence, and Mother Bess flees Bruston Hill to tell the truth about Lizabeth's boy.
Tommy Lawson, the narrator's fugitive brother and the great-great-nephew of Mother Bess. Even though he dwells in the selfish center of himself, Tommy has a gift for talk and song. He flees the police, who seek to arrest him for a murder he did not commit. Hiding out at Mother Bess's house, Tommy is intent on denying the significance of the past. With Mother Bess as chronicler, he learns that his existence depended on May saving his mother's life. Born dead, Lizabeth (Tommy's mother) was brought to life when she was plunged into a snowbank. After dreaming about walking on a beach with his son when life was good, Tommy learns the meaning of listening and how the present is contingent on the past.
Clement, a slow-witted orphan who runs errands at Big Bob's barbershop and who makes deliveries at Bruston Hill. Like Mother Bess and Tommy, Clement is alienated, frustrated, and separated from the center of family and community. He becomes involved with Mother Bess and Tommy and watches their connection strengthen.
John Lawson, who learns how to listen. John and Brother Tate are linked by stories and music. He dances to Jimmy Rushing's “Sent for You Yesterday, and Here You Come Today” in the imagined presence of his artistic forebears, Brother Tate and Albert Wilkes. In the dance are all the voices that Lucy earlier heard in Wilkes's playing. The narrator affirms truth by learning to dance.
Albert Wilkes, who returns to Homewood seven years after becoming a fugitive from charges of murder after killing a white policeman. Despite John French's cautions, Wilkes walks around Homewood undisguised. Refusing to conceive of himself as a victim, Wilkes returns to piano playing and to the white woman with whom he had an affair; she was the policeman's wife. Lucy and Brother Tate are listening to his music when the police break down the door and kill him at the piano.
Brother Tate, a silent, scat-singing, African American albino susceptible to Wilkes's piano playing. After informing on Wilkes, Brother Tate is present when the police kill the piano player. Seven years later, Brother has a complicated dream in which he is Wilkes, returning to Homewood. Brother plays the piano for only five years. He stops both playing and talking after the death of his albino son, Junebug. As a historic continuance, Brother becomes a sort of remote maternal presence for the narrator and a substitute for Junebug. Brother Tate, Carl French (the narrator's uncle), and Lucy turn to drugs after claiming that “being a junkie was better than being nothing.”
Lucy Tate, the common-law wife of Carl. She is a witness to Wilkes's “brilliant music” and his murder. Like the unnamed boy in Damballah, Lucy is able to testify to Wilkes's music, a music that expresses the inexpressible. She tells Doot many of the Homewood stories he learns.