Previous Next

The villagers called her ripe mango because she was just on the right side of spoiled, still sweet.

This quotation comes from the beginning of Esi’s chapter. Unlike Effia, who is born into abuse despite her father’s power, Esi is both treasured and privileged. The description of her being almost spoiled highlights how her privilege affects her ability to understand the power structures around her. She initially agrees with Big Man’s beating of Abronoma and spits at a captive after she notices an elder do so. However, she is undeniably sweet and has a good heart. Once Maame chides her for her treatment of Abronoma, Esi attempts to make things right with Abronoma.

And Esi knew, too, that her mother would die rather than run into the woods ever again, die before capture, die even if it meant that in her dying, Esi would inherit that unspeakable sense of loss, learn what it meant to be un-whole.

This quotation from Esi’s chapter appears when Maame refuses to escape the ambush with her. This moment marks a major loss of innocence for Esi. For most of Esi’s life, she has been insulated from her mother’s traumatic past, living in love and privilege. Although Abronoma has told her of Maame’s other daughter, Esi has not had the occasion to consider what that loss actually means in Maame’s life or what being enslaved did to her. Esi now not only realizes the silence her childhood was built on, but her happiness and sense of security are about to be shattered in ways she could have never imagined.

She remembered the stone tucked in her cloth wrapper, and when the one called Fiifi reached her to undo the knot she had tied at the top of it, she launched a long, full stream of spit into his face.

After being marched to the Castle, Esi and the other enslaved Asante people are forced to undergo an inspection in front of the British forces. Esi spitting at Fiifi recalls the time she spit at an enslaved Northern boy, imitating prejudice she learned. Instead of a weapon of privilege, Esi’s spit has now become a show of defiance and strength. Whereas spitting at the boy would have disappointed Maame, now Esi is spitting to defend Maame’s gift, protecting her mother’s memory.

Ness’s mother, called Frownie by the other slaves because she never smiled, used to tell the story of how she’d been cursed by a Little Dove long, long ago, cursed and sisterless, she would mutter as she swept, left without her mother’s stone.

This passage from Ness’s chapter gives us a glimpse of Esi as a mother. Unlike Maame, who hides her traumatic past from Esi to protect her, Esi tells Ness everything. She has seen that her privileged innocence not only caused her to participate in the destruction of her own life but also left her unprepared to deal with cruelty. Ness recognizes Esi’s sorrow and bluntness as a form of love, one that is honest about the hardships of the world.

Previous section Effia Next section Marjorie

Take a Study Break