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<p>I agree with MomofWildChild–chocolate pie is a must! Caramel cakes are another possibility, and of course plenty of tea. And if you can’t cook at all, make butter beans! Here is the menu Minny drew up for the meal she and Celia were planning to prepare together (page 124):</p>
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<p>Mary 13…thank you! I had to google butter beans…although I now recognize them as what my mother used to serve up as Limas. My mother fried all our vegetables except Limas. Fried squash was the specialty of the house</p>
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<p>I understand where you’re coming from, Mary, especially when the issue is respect. But, I think that when the writer gets it right, it shows nothing but respect. It may, in fact, make readers whose shoes the writer has stepped into (“those who have suffered”) marvel that someone from such a different background can have “gotten it” so completely.</p>
<p>Robert Olen Butler, a white Vietnam veteran who won the Pulitzer Prize for his story collection, Good Scent from a Strange Mountain, wrote all the stories in first person, with many of the narrators/protagonists being Vietnamese. It was often noted that he showed an uncanny ability to live inside the skin of these characters, to render them wholly recognizable and authentic. One Amazon reader wrote: “I was browsing through Pulitzer Prize winning books when I came upon this book. Admittedly, being a Vietnamese immigrant, I was very skeptical that a white man can ever capture the true experiences of the hardships of coming to America. I was quickly stunned at how some of the stories jumped right out of the pages and poured back into the back of my memories. It didn’t seem like I was reading a fictional account of Vietnamese assimilation; it was more than that, it was as if I was reading into the history of my time in America…It’s no surprise that this book was a Pulitzer winner. It is that good.” This particular Asian reader was in no way unusual in his astonishment at Butler’s ability to call forth the voices of his Vietnamese characters. The best writers understand that the things that make us human are universally shared, such that all the possible voices reside inside us, if we would but reach down deep and draw them out.</p>
<p>^^ ." But, I think that when the writer gets it right, it shows nothing but respect"</p>
<p>Poetsheart thank you for this statement, and confirming that Stockert achieved this. </p>
<p>Alh,- Did you discuss “The Help” at your luncheon a couple days ago?</p>
<p>Faline-Please come back and share in detail your book club’s discussion of “The Help”. As a “northerner” I would love to be a fly on the wall, because I am more than curious, how this book is received by Southern Book club, which includes two former Junior League Members.</p>
<p>I am truly enjoying everyone’s posts, Calmom’s concerns with 60’s authenticity, Poetsheart links to other books about domestic help, and Ignatius poignant description as a kindergarten teacher. </p>
<p>There were several times when I was moved to tears, and these are two I remember.
Abileen’s attempts to bolster Mae Mobley’s self esteem, and speaking words of love to the loveless child brought me to tears.Abileen’s heartfelt attempt to try to change the course of prejudice in this one small “victimized” child, through her loving words and actions, affected me deeply.</p>
<p>And, when the fellow church members welcomed Aibileen, Minny and others with a standing ovation for having the courage to participate in Skeeter’s book, spoke to the strength and love of the African American community struggling against the caste system they endured. </p>
<p>Finally, I must ask others. Were you surprised that Southern homes had separate bathrooms for domestic workers? I didn’t know this.
So how did this work? Did homes have one extra bathroom which the homeowners never used? Did many homes actually have bathrooms built in garages? Common or uncommon?</p>
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It’s not a home but when the Pentagon (in Virginia) was built during WWII, it was constructed under Jim Crow rules with separate bathrooms for Whites and Coloreds. The up-side of this is that when women began entering the government workforce in large force after WWII, and after Jim Crow laws were declared unconstitutional, there were plenty of bathrooms for the Pentagon women.</p>
<p>I myself was fascinated with the separate bathroom thing, because I grew up in a PA home that had clearly been built with “help” in mind. Tiny bathroom at the end of a long hall off the kitchen that we never used and would not consider for guests of our own social class, since there were better options, front and back staircases, and cramped bedrooms for live-in help in the attic. I never thought of this as a racial thing but as a class distinction, and I suppose that was the difference. </p>
<p>For a number of years, my family employed an African American woman from the south as a housekeeper (that was how we referred to her), and in looking back, I realize that she always used the “help” bathroom and the back stairs, and kept a uniform at our house that she changed into for work hours. During that period, most families (including African American families) in our neighborhood employed domestic help, and most of the help were African Americans from the south.</p>
<p>Our housekeeper was a single mother whose daughters were nearly grown. We spent lots of time hanging out with her and learning to do chores and such, while our mother did volunteer work, took classes, and later worked as a teacher. (Mom was involved in the women’s movement and did not do housework or cooking during those years.) We called our housekeeper by her first name during the late fifties and early sixties, a time when children did not address adults by first names, at least not where we lived. </p>
<p>I went to school with girls whose mothers knew our housekeeper socially, and they referred to her as our cook, and did not refer to her by first name. At some point during the sixties, our housekeeper retired and was replaced by a caucasian woman who was also a single mother. We were older by then and did not develop a close relationship with this new woman, and by then it was common for young people to call adults by first names no matter their status. This housekeeper also used the “help” bathroom and back stairs.</p>
<p>After we left home, our mother took over the cooking and hired “cleaning ladies” to come in a few hours a week to clean and do laundry.</p>
<p>As a SAHM, I have done all my own housekeeping. As the parent of a child with classic autism, all childcare had to be expensive “respite” care, hard to come by until my other children were old enough to watch their brother for short periods. (Autistic child now in his twenties and in a group home.) But I suppose that’s another story for another book.(I truly wish someone would write the stories of mothers of children with the type of autism that comes with severe MR and extreme behaviors.)</p>
<p>poetsheart: Thank you so much. I have been admiring your posts in the political cafe for some time and hoped you might have read this book and would comment. Thank you for the link to the Rollin’s book which I will definitely read, no matter how dense.</p>
<p>poetsheart wrote:
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<p>Would your reaction be any different if you felt the writer hadn’t gotten it right? Or is it always:</p>
<p>my view, a writer has a right to speak in any voice they feel capable of capturing.</p>
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<p>SouthJerseyChessMom wrote:
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<p>My friends have already told me I am guilty of reverse racism and it is ridiculous to claim anyone owns any narrative. They are pretty tired of the discussion. At our lunch one woman compared my concerns to her time on a rape crisis hot-line board when the majority of members objected to a volunteer male phone operator, which she felt to be sexist behavior. After that no one was talking about The Help.</p>
<p>I am extraordinarily grateful for poetsheart’s posts and to Mary13 for hosting the book discussion. This book really got to me.</p>
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<p>frazzled2thecore wrote:
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<p>Sue Miller Family Pictures ??
Doris Lessing, The Fifth Child ??</p>
<p>alh-“This book really got to me.”
Beyond the issue of “voice”, are there other issues you have with the book? </p>
<p>Poetsheart’s links lead me to this one-a look at domestic workers from a class issue, from 1880’s-early 1900s.
[Seven</a> days a week: women and … - Google Books](<a href=“Seven Days a Week: Women and Domestic Service in Industrializing America - David M. Katzman - Google Books”>Seven Days a Week: Women and Domestic Service in Industrializing America - David M. Katzman - Google Books)</p>
<p>And, Faline’s interest in recipes made me find this. Don’t think I’ve ever had “Caramel Cake”.</p>
<p>Hi! I am from Atlanta, Ga. and have a very old southern caramel cake recipe. Everyone loves it but be warned, it is very sweet. I hope this helps (recipe below).
Allison Hanner</p>
<p>Caramel Cake, southern style</p>
<p>3 cups sugar
1.5 cups shortening
3 cups plain flour
6 eggs
1.5 tsp. baking powder
1.5 tsp. vanilla
1.5 cups milk</p>
<p>Cream sugar and shortening until smooth.
Add all other ingredients and beat for 5 minutes.
Bake at 350 degrees for 30 minutes in 3 round
cake pans that have been greased and floured.
Let cakes cool before icing.</p>
<p>Icing
1 cup white sugar
1 cup brown sugar
1 stick butter
1 14 oz. can Eagle Brand milk
1 tsp. vanilla</p>
<p>Combine all ingredients in saucepan and cook
2 minutes, stirring constantly, until thick and
bubbly. Remove from heat and let cool until fairly thick
and just warm. Pour over cakes and assemble layers.
Keep piling icing back onto cake with knife until
cooled.*</p>
<p>*Hint: Dip your knife in a glass of tepid water as you are icing cake;
this keeps the icing smooth so it won’t get “grainy” looking.</p>
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<p>poetsheart, I agree. It’s truly a gift to be able to write in those voices, isn’t it? I’m sure that a great deal of hard work and many hours of research goes into the task, but there’s a “magical” element, too, which I’ve heard authors try to describe. As William Faulkner wrote, “It begins with a character, usually, and once he stands up on his feet and begins to move, all I can do is trot along behind him with a paper and pencil trying to keep up long enough to put down what he says and does.”</p>
<p>alh - Thanks, I had forgotten about those books. I suppose I was thinking of the new stories waiting to be told (perhaps by siblings who grew up knowing lots of families and autistic individuals on an intimate basis?) now that public and professional perceptions of autism and families have changed so dramatically… </p>
<p>Back to the book - at the end, I could not help but wonder if Skeeter would employ “help” as an adult establishing a family in NYC, and what her relationship to her help would be after her experiences as a child in the Jim Crow south.</p>
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<p>Good question. I could see it going either way: Skeeter might eschew “help” as the embodiment of everything she rejected when leaving Mississippi, or she might want to recreate for her family some of the wonderful aspects of her relationship with Constantine. If she did hire help, I bet she’d bend over backward to be a fair, generous and respectful employer. One thing’s for certain: Constantine’s daughter won’t be interested in the job. :)</p>
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<p>I agree, those were deeply moving points in the book, ChessMom! I remember experiencing several times when I felt my heart welling up in my throat while reading this book. But, some of my favorite scenes were the ones between Minnie and Miss Celia. I howled with laughter when the two of them fought off the pervert that wandered into Celia’s back yard, just loving the voice of Minnie in the narration. And my heart just broke for Celia when she lost yet another baby.</p>
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<p>That’s an interesting question, Alh…I can’t say as I ever recall reading a work in which I felt the writer got it terribly wrong. I suppose I assume that the writer who attempts to reside inside the skin of someone of another race/religion/sex/background, does so because he/she truly wishes to tap into that person’s humanity and experience it for him/herself. I never think it’s a good idea to discourage that impulse. I might perhaps be a little disappointed if the voice rings false, but unless I feel the writer has actually been disrespectful (falling back on mere stereotype or heaven forbid, using a character to project his/her own prejudice), I would laud his/her attempts. I just so admire the writer’s craft, and revere the work they do of chronicling the sagas of the human heart…As Mary wrote:</p>
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<p>When well done, it is indeed a lot like magic, the whole cloth weaving of a luminous mode of transport, upon which they then take us all for a ride. I can’t help but cheer any writer on who makes the effort to give humanity that gift. Even when they don’t entirely succeed, they often managed to do something most of us can’t even begin to do.</p>
<p>I loved this book, my book club is discussing it in March. This month we read “Mud Bound” which is also a book set in the south and discussing race, class, education, etc. It was interesting having read both of them to compare and contrast them.</p>
<p>As for the question of separate bathrooms - my grandparents had a separate bathroom in “servants quarters” over the garage, and I was young, so don’t remember if their help only used them or not, but I would imagine so. </p>
<p>The “voice” seemed very real to me. I remember loving arms and laps and cooking going on in the kitchen and feeling lucky if I was allowed to help with the “floating island”. </p>
<p>Reading this made me really wonder what they thought about the relationships between the “help” and my grandparents. I always thought it was loving, but who knows how they really felt when they went to their own homes.</p>
<p>A true story though that resonates with me as to the relationship they all shared - when I was in highschool, we drove up to my 84 year old grandfather’s house and he was mowing the yard in his dress pants, shirt and tie (which he wore every day until he died), and his yard man “Cummy” was sitting on the front steps watching because he had such bad arthritis that he couldn’t push it around any more. But, there was no way in hades that my grandfather would hire someone else, because Cummy was family, and it would have been “insulting” to have someone else cut the yard. 
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<p>So, while there was absolute prejudice, in that I’m sure my grandparents felt “superior”, there was also love and loyalty, and I truly do believe that it went both ways.</p>
<p>^ I love that story. In just a couple of sentences, you painted a vivid picture of a lifelong relationship.</p>
<p>I planned to add a few comments about “voice” but am quite content with a simple “ditto” to the posts that felt Stockett got it right. </p>
<p>My grandmother employed Alice - and yes, there was a bathroom in the back of the house by the kitchen. I never really thought about it, but now I assume that Alice used that bathroom. However, so did I, running in from playing outside, and never ever felt that I couldn’t or shouldn’t. We girls called Alice by her first name, but she called us “Miss” - imagine “Miss Ignatius” age two. Never thought about it until I read The Help and then kept thinking it should be “Miss Mae Mobley” - a mouthful to be sure. Obviously the adult deserved the respect of “Miss” and not the kids.</p>
<p>Later, my mother employed first Myrtle and then Della. Vivid memory of Myrtle: she cut branches off the azalea bush to use as a switch on my legs and I cried and begged her not to whip me (about Mae Mobley’s age). I can only hope that incident’s the reason that my next vivid memory features the kind Della. Anyway, when my mother passed away a few years ago, Myrtle contacted my older sister (who really didn’t know her). My sister called me to let me know and from somewhere my inner three year old (still present after 40 years) said immediately, “I hated her; she’s mean.” So … to me, The Help resonated due to the voices of Aibileen and Minnie. Stockett obviously had respect and love for the two disparate women she created. As a reader, I respected and empathized and feared for the women - as they did for each other. Imagine the book had Stockett attempted to write using the voice of Gretchen (who berated Skeeter in her interview) or Constantine’s daughter Lulabelle. Stockett let them “speak” - just in a different way than she did Aibileen or Minnie. Loved the characters; loved the book.</p>
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<p>With re. to voice… if poetsheart is okay with the voice, I’m certainly not going to object. Overall, unlike educated and rational readers (I am an extremely uneducated reader lol) I do have a very immediate negative reaction someone taking a narrative not their own. This is a personal predjudice. For example, even as a child, I didn’t care for Pearl Buck, and am always uncomfortable with men taking a woman’s narrative. It probably was an issue with this book especially because, in spite of Calmom’s correct observations of incongruencies, this is an extremely accurate depiction imho of a particular place and time – and it is my childhood, right down to the mamas having bridge club on Wednesdays. Although I was never lacking in self-esteem 
I identify with Mae Mobley’s trying to figure out what race means in her world. I wish I could concentrate on the good stories – loved Ag54 post! – but tend to be haunted by the bad ones. I knew several Skeeters who ended up having fascinating lives because of the perceived misfortune of graduating college without an engagement ring. When I read Carolyn Heilbrun’s Writing a Woman’s Life, it was an ah ha moment. Maybe those women didn’t have that ring because they really didn’t want it? Skeeter could have taken that ring. She chose not to and in doing so really changed her whole future, her whole life story. At least that is how I see it.</p>
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<p>The Skeeters I know do not have household help, because of their childhood experiences. Even though they realize this may be a ridiculous over-reaction.</p>
<p>I did not grow up in Jackson.</p>
<p>I’ve read four of the CC book club books: The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society, The Thirteenth Tale, American Wife and now The Help. All have a “first person” narrative - wonder why? I know some readers have a hard time with a first person point of view; me, it doesn’t bother. Though I admit to some uncomfortableness reading American Wife; first person, yes, but in a way, a real first person so I read Alice’s thoughts but pictured Laura Bush. Anyway, I think the weakest chapter in The Help revolved around the benefit - written in the third person pov. I venture to guess that Stockett wrote that chapter differently since all the major -and minor - characters attended the function: Skeeter, Aibileen, Minnie, Celia, Johnny, Hilly, and so on. One person alone would not have been privy to all the drama that took place: the isolation of Skeeter, the humiliation of Celia, the cruelty of Hilly, and of course the winning of the chocolate pie and the happenings 
that took place as a result.</p>
<p>thank you Mary 13 and South Jersey Chess Mom for the recipe and the list of things Minnie was attempting to teach that character to cook. I will have to skim to come up with more ideas for what I will serve…</p>
<p>I love being served 11 months a year…so I enjoy doing it for my friends annually.</p>
<p>Faline, I hope you get a chance to finish the book before the party!</p>
<p>ignatius, I’m a sucker for a first person narrative. And I must be typical of the audience publishers are marketing to, because so many popular reads are written in the first person. In addition to the four you mentioned above, our CC book club selection Dreamers of the Day was also in the first person, as was half of *Sarah’s Key<a href=“the%20Julia%20chapters”>/i</a>. So hey, that’s all six of our CC books so far—first person narratives, all written by women. I’m thinking we may need to broaden our horizons a bit, people!…:)</p>
<p>Looking back at the reading guide:</p>
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<p>It did bother me. It seemed obvious from the start that Stuart was the wrong choice for Skeeter, but she hung in there nonetheless. I guess it was hard for her to say No to the one thing that made her more “normal”—even admired—in the eyes of both her mother and the Junior League women. (I thought Stuart’s father was an odd but interesting minor character.)</p>