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A review by raulbime
My Brother by Jamaica Kincaid
4.0
Looking back at my reading these past few months, a lot of the books I've read have dealt with death, illness, or grief, or all three in some way. Upon reflection, the simple reason for this, even though a few probably didn't get much thought when selected, is that I'm growing older and these realities are becoming more certain and there's some fear that I need to make sense of and books have been known to help with that.
So to this book which is my sixth by Kincaid and it has everything I love about her: pure honesty, the beauty of prose, a cadence accomplished by repetition, and a level of awareness of both self and that around self. It's still a tough read. Jamaica Kincaid's younger brother, Devon, died of AIDS and this book is a result of contemplating the grief and pain that loss brought.
Kincaid was already established and acclaimed when she had published this and before her brother died. As a child she had been a brilliant student but had been forced to abandon her studies and immigrate to the U.S.A. and work as an au-pair to help earn money for her family back in Antigua. Her ascension to the echelons of contemporary literature, where she's rightfully placed, resembles the fantastical and miraculous, and given the circumstances she must have endured, it is. So when she has to return home because of her brother's illness the gulf in their situations (Kincaid middle-class, American, accomplished, comfortable with a nice family of her own; Devon poor, fatally ill, suffering and dying, unaccomplished and unknown, without a family of his own and much to show for himself) confronts the circumstances she might have faced had she remained home and all the complicated emotions it brings, as well as the reality of her dying brother.
The complexity of human relationships, of situation, of life in general. Nothing is ever simple and Kincaid herself, nor her dead brother, nor her family, nor anyone for that matter, is simple. To turn all that grief and difficulty into something this beautiful is testament to her gift.
So to this book which is my sixth by Kincaid and it has everything I love about her: pure honesty, the beauty of prose, a cadence accomplished by repetition, and a level of awareness of both self and that around self. It's still a tough read. Jamaica Kincaid's younger brother, Devon, died of AIDS and this book is a result of contemplating the grief and pain that loss brought.
Kincaid was already established and acclaimed when she had published this and before her brother died. As a child she had been a brilliant student but had been forced to abandon her studies and immigrate to the U.S.A. and work as an au-pair to help earn money for her family back in Antigua. Her ascension to the echelons of contemporary literature, where she's rightfully placed, resembles the fantastical and miraculous, and given the circumstances she must have endured, it is. So when she has to return home because of her brother's illness the gulf in their situations (Kincaid middle-class, American, accomplished, comfortable with a nice family of her own; Devon poor, fatally ill, suffering and dying, unaccomplished and unknown, without a family of his own and much to show for himself) confronts the circumstances she might have faced had she remained home and all the complicated emotions it brings, as well as the reality of her dying brother.
The complexity of human relationships, of situation, of life in general. Nothing is ever simple and Kincaid herself, nor her dead brother, nor her family, nor anyone for that matter, is simple. To turn all that grief and difficulty into something this beautiful is testament to her gift.