Erna Brodber Reading
by Kristi Southern

The Readers and Writers Series was proud to present two readings on Tuesday, February 11, from Dr. Erna Brodber.  Brodber is currently a visiting professor at ECU, teaching English 5330, "Caribbean Women Writing Africa from Its Diaspora."  She received the Spring 2003 Whichard Visiting distinguished professorship in the Humanities of the College of Arts and Sciences.  The Greenville Museum of Art hosted the 7:00pm reading where the eager crowd was not let down.  After a warm introduction by Dr. Gay Wilentz, Brodber read two selections from her first novel, Jane and Louisa Will Soon Come Home (New Beacon Books, 1980), and one selection from her second novel, Myal (New Beacon Books, 1988).  She titled the grouping of selected readings "Portraits of Women."

Dr. Brodber's first selection from Jane and Louisa Will Soon Come Home introduced us to Granny Tucker.  Granny Tucker is praying for strength, for health, for rain, but not too much rain, and for the whole community.  She prays for all "her children dispersed to the ends of the world," all in order, while humming and singing the entire time.  Much faith and devotion is seen in Granny Tucker through her prayers, and this faith is passed to her orphan grandchildren who join her in prayer.  Brodber moves from Granny Tucker to a section of the novel entitled "Moving Camera."  As she reads here, we meet Great Grand Tia and get a glimpse of her family.  William was the poor white son of Albert and Elizabeth, and Madam Faith is his Nanny growing up.  After both of William's parents have died, Madam Faith is left to raise William and his ten siblings.  William and Tia, Madam Faith's God-daughter, fall in love and have children of their own.  After all the years of dealing with color in her own relationship, we see that Tia is happy when her children grow away from her culture and closer to that of William.  For Great Grand Tia, "the fewer their experiences she could share, the more progress they had made."

Brodber's final selection was a portrait of Miss Gatha from Myal.  Brodber gives a little background of the story on characters stealing and healing or replacing spirits before she began.  Here, Miss Gatha is saving the fifteen year-old Anita from the man who has been trying to steal her young spirit.  First, Miss Gatha awkwardly walks or dances down the road as a warning to the Reverend Simpson.  She then goes to her Tabernacle where a crowd has already gathered and joins her in her song and dance.  Young Anita is bothered by the noise from the Tabernacle and faints.  Miss Gatha's spell continues as her face begins to change back and forth from her own sixty some years to the face of a fifteen year-old girl.  When this transformation is finished, it is all finished.  Anita is saved and Mass Levi is found dead.

Erna Brodber was born in St. Mary, Jamaica.  She received her B.A. from the University of the West Indies and continued her studies in the United States.  She is now doing research on Marcus Garvey and his association to North Carolina.  Jane and Louisa Will Soon Come Home was the Caribbean and Canadian Regional Winner in the 1989 awards of the Commonwealth Writers Prize.  Brodber has published numerous non-fiction works, as well as another novel, Louisiana (U P of Mississippi, 1994).