The Long Song (2010) (edit title/settings)

Ridiculously Simplified Synopsis edit

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Summary edit see section history

Characters/People edit see section history

• July (Marguerite): July is born on a Jamaican Sugar Plantation in the last years of slavery. She is taken from her mother, Kitty, to work as a housemaid for Caroline Mortimer (who insists on calling her Marguerite). Our narrator and guide, July voices the events with humour, honesty and strength.
• Kitty: July's mother.
• Tam Dewar: July's father. The Overseer at the Plantation; he takes advantage of his position to get Kitty pregnant.
• John Howarth: Plantation owner. John Howarth has come from England to run the Amity Plantation.
• Caroline Mortimer: John Howarth's sister. Caroline, a recent widow, arrives from England as the book opens. Without a housemaid, she takes July from her mother to live in the Big House.
• Mr Godfrey: Head slave in the kitchen at Amity.
• Mr Nimrod: A recently-freed slave, Nimrod is one of the few men July knows who have bought their freedom.
• Molly: A fellow slave, and often a thorn in July's side.
• Byron: Houseboy at Amity
• Thomas Kinsman: Son of the narrator (and sometime narrator himself)
• Robert Goodwin: An overseer at Amity; he plays a key role in the plantation's fortunes.

Quotes edit see section history

• “And agreeing with a resolute woman is always easier.”

  July

• “Sometimes his demands upon me are as constricting as the corset they put me in to keep me as a lady.”

  July

• “So, reader, Kitty's only child is born in upon the world at last. Kitty called her daughter July, for when she was still a callow girl, Miss Martha, who did oversee the infant workers of the third gang, had once ventured to teach Kitty to write in words the months that make up the year. Although the month of her pickney's birth was December, it was only the graceful wave of Miss Martha's arm as she scratched the flowing curls of the word July in the dirt that the older Kitty could call to mind. Kitty softly whispered the word July into her pickney's ear and July her daughter became.”

• Popular Highlights from Kindle Customers

• Only with a white man, can there be guarantee that the colour of your pickney will be raised. For a mulatto who breeds with a white man will bring forth a quadroon; and the quadroon that enjoys white relations will give to this world a mustee; the mustee will beget a mustiphino; and the mustiphino . . . oh, the mustiphino’s child with a white man for a papa will find each day greets them no longer with a frown, but welcomes them with a smile, as they at last stride within this world as a cherished white person.

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• although they may not be felt like a fist or a whip, words have a power that can nevertheless cower even the largest man to gibbering tears.

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• ‘Colonial slavery died July 31, 1838, aged 276 years,’ was lowered

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• July was forsaken by her ravaged spirit and soon departed. And a withered and mournful girl stumbled in, unsteady, to take her part.

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• Robert Goodwin rapturously declared, ‘Behold, a new morning has broken. Slavery—that dreadful evil—is at an end.’

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• All of my bones have voice to speak to me. Even the smallest of them chats the language of pain.

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• quadroon. Clara’s mama was a handsome mullatto housekeeper to her papa, a naval man from Scotch Land.

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• For, like most slave fiddlers, it only amused them to play bad for white ears.

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• ‘Marguerite, Marguerite!’ That is Caroline Mortimer calling out for July.

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• That mute message was conveyed with the slight motions and tiny tics of a silent language learned from dread of white people’s intrusion—and even the fair Miss Clara still knew how to speak it.

  Highlighted by 5 Kindle customers

Setting & Locations edit see section history

• England
• Jamaica
• Florence
• Amity
• Windsor Hall
• London Town
• Scotland
• Falmouth
• Virgo
• Caribbean

First Sentence edit see section history

Themes & Symbolism edit see section history

• slavery, Jamaica: Describe this theme.

Series & Lists edit see section history

Authors & Contributors edit see section history

1. Andrea Levy (Author)

First Edition edit see section history

Awards edit see section history

• Man Booker Prize (Finalist, 2010, shortlist)

Classification edit see section history

• Library of Congress: Add the Library of Congress Classification.
• Dewey: 823.92

Subjects edit see section history

• Books › Literature & Fiction › Literary