Hush by Jacqueline Woodson
"Hush" by Jacqueline Woodson is a poignant young adult novel that explores themes of identity, loss, and resilience through the eyes of a thirteen-year-old girl named Toswiah Green, who adopts the new identity of Evie Thomas after her family enters the federal witness protection program. The story unfolds after Evie's father, a police officer, witnesses an unjust shooting of an African American youth by his colleagues. Faced with immense pressure to lie about the incident, he chooses to tell the truth, putting his family in danger and leading them to a life of anonymity.
As the family adjusts to their new identities, Evie grapples with feelings of grief for her past life and struggles to establish herself in a new school environment. The novel intricately weaves Evie's current experiences with flashbacks to her previous life, enriching the narrative with depth and context. Each family member copes differently with their upheaval; while Evie's sister finds solace in academic opportunities, their father battles depression.
Woodson's narrative offers a sensitive portrayal of the challenges of reclaiming one's identity amidst profound change, emphasizing that true identity is an internal construct that cannot be erased by external circumstances. "Hush" has received critical acclaim for its thoughtful exploration of these issues, appealing to readers dealing with their own identity crises while also representing African American experiences in a nuanced manner.
Hush by Jacqueline Woodson
First published: 2002
Type of work: Novel
Type of plot: Domestic realism
Time of work: Early twenty-first century
Locale: Denver, Colorado, and another, unspecified city
Principal Characters:
Toswiah Green/Evie Thomas , a thirteen-year-old runner who enters the witness protection program with her familyCameron Green/Anna Thomas , Toswiah’s fifteen-year-old sister, a cheerleader who wishes to run away from her family’s turmoil to find peaceJonathan Green/Evan Thomas , Toswiah’s father, a police officer who witnesses an unjust police shooting and chooses to testify against his fellow officersShirley Green/Mrs. Thomas , Toswiah’s mother, a schoolteacher who becomes a Jehovah’s Witness after the family is relocated
The Novel
Hush is narrated by Toswiah Green, a thirteen-year-old girl who was recently living happily in Denver, Colorado, with her father, mother, and sister, Cameron. When her police officer father witnessed an unjust shooting, the Green family entered the federal witness protection program.
Officer Jonathan Green was on patrol with his two partners when they encountered an African American youth. The other officers, both white men, fired at the boy while he was standing still with his hands raised in surrender. After the boy died, members of the police department instructed Officer Green to lie about what he had seen and testify that the other officers were right to open fire. He faced significant pressure, including nasty phone calls and death threats. One night, someone drove by and fired three bullets into his house. Officer Green knew it was wrong to change his story, and he refused to lie about what he had seen, even though his choice put his family at risk.
The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) placed the Green family in protective custody. Agents escorted them from their home in the middle of the night, placed them in a windowless van, and drove them to a safe house. For three months, they lived in an undisclosed location, and their whereabouts were unknown even to them. After the trial ended, the Greens moved to a new city and assumed new identities. Toswiah Green became Evie Thomas, and her older sister Cameron became Anna.
Evie narrates the novel from her family’s new location in the witness protection program. She never reveals the name of the city to which they have moved. Her present narration is intermixed with flashbacks that dramatize the events leading up to her current situation and vignettes that convey images from her past life.
In their new life, everything is different. The “Thomas” family struggles with the abruptness and permanence of the changes they have experienced. Evie’s father can no longer be a police officer, so he sits all day by the window, too sad to look for another job. His depression casts a pall over the family. The FBI stalls processing Mrs. Thomas’s paperwork for teaching, so she is also unable to obtain a new job. Instead, she devotes her energy to her new faith as a Jehovah’s Witness. Anna applies and is accepted to Simon’s Rock, a college that will allow her to start attending before she even graduates from high school.
Evie struggles to exist in her new school setting. She tells her classmates that her family is from San Francisco, but she misses her old friends and her grandmother terribly. She tries out for the track team, and she gradually begins making friends. Life at home is not easy. Her father’s depression overcomes him, and one morning in front of his family he tries to take his own life by cutting his wrist with a shard of glass. He is taken to a mental health facility, where he receives counseling and brings himself back together. Evie goes to visit him, striving to find in him the father she once knew. From his gentle reassurance, she gains hope that the worst is over. The family will go on.
The Characters
Toswiah/Evie is challenged by feelings of loss and grief for her old self and the people and places she loves. At her new school, she meets a girl also named Toswiah and struggles with the pain of seeing herself in a sort of mirror that does not truly reflect her. It takes time for her to understand that her name is not her identity. She gradually learns that the person she is at heart has not been taken from her, that identity can never be taken; it can only be given away by Evie herself. Her journey enables her to reclaim her identity, even though the need to protect the family’s secrets prevents her from telling her whole truth to the world.
Evie struggles, too, with the pain of watching the other members of her family deal with the identity issue in their own divergent ways. Her mother turns to a new faith for guidance and comfort. Anna seeks a way out, believing that freedom and distance will help her put herself right. When she gains early acceptance to Simon’s Rock, Anna’s hope returns and she finds peace within their new world. Evie, though, wonders how she will manage her own struggle without her sister. The girls’ father struggles with deep depression after the move. He sits by the window day after day, wrestling with inner demons. Never does the family doubt his decision to testify, but still he struggles. Evie is pained to see her beloved father lost inside himself and unable to be the Daddy she has known. As the surface identity of each family member changes, Evie grieves, until she learns that beneath these surface changes, her family members remain who they have always been.
Critical Context
Reading about the federal witness protection program inspired Jacqueline Woodson to write Hush; she took her fascination with the idea of such an uprooting to the page and created this critically acclaimed novel. Publishers Weekly addressed the book’s powerful theme of identity in a starred review, saying that the story should comfort readers who might be dealing with identity crises of their own, for the novel addresses these challenging issues with hope and optimism. Hush also received a starred review from School Library Journal and was a National Book Award finalist in the young people’s literature category. It was a 2003 American Library Association Best Book for Young Adults and received numerous additional honors. Hush takes its place among a growing body of books featuring African American characters in which race exists as an aspect of the characters’ lives but is not of central focus within the plot.
Bibliography
Bishop, Rudine Simms. Free Within Ourselves: The Development of African American Children’s Literature. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 2007. History and analysis of the evolution of African American writing for children and young adults; begins with the oral culture of slave narratives and moves through the twentieth century to discuss contemporary African American writers for young audiences, including Jacqueline Woodson.
Earley, Pete, and Gerald Shur. WITSEC: Inside the Federal Witness Protection Program. New York: Bantam, 2003. Discusses the witness protection program, including firsthand accounts of the psychological effects of identity change on families who enter the program.
Woodson, Jacqueline. “Jacqueline Woodson: This Year’s Edwards Award-Winner Takes on Life’s Toughest Challenges—Poverty, Prejudice, Love and Loss.” Interview by Deborah Taylor. School Library Journal, June 1, 2006. Article and interview featuring Jacqueline Woodson upon her receipt of the Margaret A. Edwards Award honoring lifetime achievement in writing literature for young adults.