I thought that the backstory was interesting, especially because Reed kind of mixed religions/belief systems together. Let's see who we have:
1) Osiris, Set, and Isis (Thoth as well?)-- Egyptian gods
2) Dionysus -- Greek god
3) Moses -- Bible
There's probably more, but you probably get the idea. Plus there's also mention of other people in these chapters, like Thermuthis, daughter of Tutankhamen, who adopted Moses, Jesus, some more pharaohs, etc. I thought it was interesting that Reed used elements from both polytheistic and monotheistic religions to create this story. I have two ideas about why he would do so. I'm inclined to believe that doing so allows him to make a commentary on monotheistic religions, since it seems like that's what he's been doing throughout the novel, especially since he uses a lot of aspects from voodoo and loas. On the other hand, maybe he used all of these characters as a way to relate Jes Grew to everyone. The Book of Thoth and dancing isn't contained into just one religion, it's more universal, and as we've seen, it can impact everyone, so maybe this story adds to the background of Jes Grew.
I don't know, I feel like I'm getting this completely wrong, but that's just what I gathered, my first impression, whatever you want to call it. I definitely want to analyze these scenes more closely because I think there's a lot of interesting information that can reveal more about the book as a whole.
The backstory definitely gives Jes Grew a new sort of power by connecting it to this happening in Egypt thousands of years ago. I think you have a point with Jes Grew now being relatable (whether pro or con) to everyone as he brings in different theologies and different time periods. I think it's easier to see that bringing in Moses/Jesus has to do with wanting to include head-figures in monotheistic religion, but why Dionysus/the Greeks in an interesting question.
ReplyDeleteI agree that the backstory would have been a little more helpful earlier. Part of the reason I think it might be more towards the end is that it really gives that moment the feeling of the end of the Scooby Doo episode where they unmask the villain and then tell about how they figured out who the villain was. Maybe Reed wanted us to have that "ohhhh" moment.
ReplyDeleteI completely agree with you. If he had just put the backstory in the first few chapters of the book, I don't think I would have spent the last few weeks racking my brain over what I was reading. I think that the background story helped me understand the plot a bit better, but I still have questions. Now all I want to do is go back and read the story from the beginning in hopes of maybe understanding the plot better this time.
ReplyDeleteI honestly don't know how much more helpful it would have been to get the backstory earlier. I think as a class, we figured out that Jes Grew is a metaphor for overarching cultural trends pretty early on. All that the Egypt story did was explicitly state it (confirm our assumption). Perhaps the one thing it did was clarify the nuts-and-bolts, but we already understood the main idea and what was represented by the Mumbo Jumbo Kathedral, the Wallflower Order, etc.
ReplyDeleteI sort of liked how Reed places the backstory of Jes Grew later in the novel because I think that keeping Jes Grew's background hidden plays into the idea that it just grew and has no roots. With chapters 52 later in the novel, Reed uses Jes Grew's existence since ancient Egypt to support the idea that Jew Grew can never really die. Also, Reed ties the plot up in a complex and connected way in chapters 52, which he may not have been able to do as well/interestingly if he included the backstory earlier.
ReplyDeleteI think Mariam makes an interesting point that Jes Grew wouldn't have seemed to "Just Grow" if we had gotten the backstory earlier. Even so, I feel that getting the backstory earlier could have helped me better understand the Wallflower Order's relationship to the text of Jes Grew. I like your point, Marie, that through the last few chapters Reed makes Jes Grew relate to everyone. This is true also in the epilogue, where PaPa LaBas talks about Jes Grew affecting people even decades after the main narrative took place.
ReplyDeleteThe "mixing" of religious traditions we see in this narrative isn't too far from the way anthropologists and historians understand the spread of these ideas and values through myth and story: there is a chain of transmission from Egypt to Greece to Rome to Europe, with elements of the stories shifting and being altered from place to place. We see the same thing in the modern setting, with Voodoo as a syncretic religion, combining African traditions under cover of Catholic iconography--the "same" stories/gods/loas with different names. His narrative suggests what a profound role these stories play in shaping the values and self-image of these various societies.
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