The Curse of the Vicious Cycle in Marlon James', "The Book of Night Women"

Short Analysis five: Marlon James’, The Book of Night Women

Debra Moreno Blouch

The Curse of the Vicious Cycle

            In chapter thirteen of Marlon James’, The Book of Night Women, when the kitchen slaves are serving at the New Year’s ball, Homer catches Lilith watching Massa Humphrey from a hole in the kitchen door. Homer tries to warn Lilith about the vicious cycle of things that happen to blacks in slavery.

            “Me just saying that some people born under curse. Curse to do exactly what people

            before them do. Lilith stand there fidgeting, she look down at her bosom and feel like

            covering it up. – The massa say anything to you yet? Homer say and Lilith look up,

            surprised. –W-why him goin’ say nothing to me? Lilith say. – Look like you be waiting

            for somebody to say something, Homer say”(153-154).

            Homer is referring to Lilith repeating the cycle of her mother having sex with Massa Jack Wilkins and becoming pregnant, with Lilith’s infatuation with Massa Humphrey. Lilith has been trying to figure out a way to get Massa Humphrey’s attention. Once she realizes that Homer knows what she is doing, she feels like covering up her bosom which she was proudly displaying. The theme of black life being a vicious circle/curse is a theme that comes up throughout the novel. It involves the atrocities that whites commit against blacks, such as white men raping the black slave women; and the atrocities that blacks then commit to other blacks because of whites, such as the Maroons beating/raping and turning runaway slaves back to the plantation owners; and it is also seen later in the book with the terrible things that blacks do to whites during the slave rebellions.