March 3, 2013

Fiction Podcast:

Edwidge Danticat

Reads Jamaica Kincaid

Posted by The New Yorker

On this month’s fiction podcast, Edwidge Danticat reads two stories by Jamaica Kincaid, “Girl” and “Wingless,” which were first published in The New Yorker in 1978 and 1979 respectively. “Girl,” which Danticat describes as “one of the most anthologized stories in the English-speaking world,” is a rigid and rhythmic list of dicta passed from mother to daughter. “Wingless,” on the other hand, follows a young girl’s fluid reveries about her mother, whom she both fears and aspires to be like.

Danticat’s own fiction and essays have appeared in The New Yorker since 1999. She first encountered Kincaid’s works while in college, and was struck by their “extraordinary lyricism,” understanding immediately that they “are meant to be read out loud.” She says here, “They sound so beautiful. It’s like butterfly wings, it’s the only thing I can think of. Just listen.” A mother instructs her daughter in “Girl”:

this is how you sweep a corner; this is how you sweep a whole house; this is how you sweep a yard; this is how you smile to someone you don’t like too much; this is how you smile to someone you don’t like at all; this is how you smile to someone you like completely; this is how you set a table for tea;

And a daughter looks up to her mother in “Wingless”:

I shall try to see clearly. I shall try to tell differences. I shall try to distinguish the subtle gradations of color in fine cloth, of fingernail length, of manners. That woman over there. Is she cruel? Does she love me? And if not, can I make her?

By reading them in tandem, Danticat unites them into a single narrative: after the girl is warned by her mother about the dangers of her world, she goes on to discover them for herself. The two stories play with the themes Danticat identifies throughout Kincaid’s body of work: “migration, the mother-daughter relationship,” and “the relationship with the motherland.” According to Danticat, you can trace echoes of these stories in “See Now Then,” Kincaid’s latest book.

You can hear Danticat’s readings of “Girl” and “Wingless,” along with her discussion with the New Yorker fiction editor, Deborah Treisman, by listening above or by downloading the podcast for free from iTunes.