Girl, Woman, Other by Bernardine Evaristo: A review

Here we have another modern writer who eschews standard English punctuation. There are no periods in her book. Sentences are delineated by an indentation as at the start of a new paragraph. There are no capitalizations at the beginnings of sentences; only proper names are capitalized. Interestingly, she does use question marks at the end of her questions and she uses commas to define clauses. But the effect is of one long, uninterrupted flow of information. It reminds one of the works of many poets. Indeed, at times it seems almost a hybrid of prose and poetry.

The quirkiness did not bother the Booker Prize committee which awarded Girl, Woman, Other this year's prize (along with co-winner Margaret Atwood's Testaments). Bernardine Evaristo thus became the first black woman to win the Booker. Pity they diluted the honor by making her a "co-winner".

After the first few pages, Evaristo's idiosyncratic punctuation choices didn't bother me either. I was lost in her big, busy narrative featuring a large cast of female characters all related in some way to roots in Africa or the Caribbean. These are mostly mixed race women with ancestors in both the black and white world and we follow them as they come to terms with what that means in our modern world.

These characters wrestle with gender issues as well. There are women who were born female, women who were born male but now identify as female, lesbians, heterosexuals, bisexuals, almost any sexual permutation you could think of is represented here. All are representatives of the human condition and are written about as such.

Moreover, women are represented at all ages, from teenagehood to old age. The oldest character is 93.

This polyphonic novel features the voices of at least a dozen primary characters and it seems utterly impossible to neatly sum up, but if there could be said to be a central character, it is probably Amma, a black lesbian 50ish playwright, who has a new play being produced at the National Theater in London called "The Last Amazon of Dahomey". Several of the other characters have relationships with Amma and others are drawn in some way to her play. On opening night, many are present for what turns out to be a great triumph.

The stories of each of the dozen characters that we come to know are told in time frames that drift back and forth between the past and present and each story is marked by its multicultural sensitivity. While Evaristo tells her characters' stories with sympathy and with grace, she also does not hold back from occasionally tweaking them for examples of hypocrisy and pretentiousness. Their full humanity is on display.

I thought this book was a remarkable accomplishment. The writing is lyrical, poetic, and it shines throughout with a wit and a vitality of spirit. The plot is loose; one might even argue that it doesn't have a plot but that doesn't really detract from the richness of the story. It is evident why the Booker Prize folks liked it so much.

My rating: 5 of 5 stars