I am a man who is cognizant of his world, who has been torn from his family, a man who can read and write, a man who will not let his story be self-related but self-written.
With my pencil, I wrote myself into being.
James, the titular character of Percival Everett’s twenty-fourth novel, writes these words using a stub of a pencil that is so precious, it has come at the price of a human life. Everett’s world’s are often built on the byzantine rules of language, the unequal exchange rate of words, and the long heritage of racism in America, but never before has the cost been so high.
On its face, James seems like an odd undertaking for Everett considering his recent work, which is mostly set in the modern day. Making matters more complicated is the plain fact that Mark Twain’s Huckleberry Finn is, without a doubt, one of the stone heads upon the Mount Rushmore of American literature. James, in that case, is Everett engaging in a knife fight on Huck’s head, à la the finale of North by Northwest: using classic iconography to enhance the sense of danger in his newest work.
Everett’s boldness is not unwarranted; he’s had a hell of a run recently. The Trees, a satirical novel that begins as a murder investigation but quickly morphs into something far more complicated, won the 2022 Booker Prize, and his follow-up, Dr. No, a gonzo slapstick spy-caper, won the PEN/Jean Stein Book Award. That same year, American Fiction, based on his 2001 novel Erasure, was nominated for Best Picture and took home Best Adapted Screenplay at the Oscars. And to top it all off, James was picked up by the powerhouse publisher Doubleday Books, in what was described as a major acquisition following a bidding war. In sum, James is Everett’s blank check; an ambitious passion project that expands the scope of everything he has attempted before with the full support of a prominent publishing house. In a very real sense, Everett successfully cashes that check and his results feel different than his previous works while maintaining the high-wire writing that’s always made his work so engrossing.
At the heart of the novel is one of Everett’s signature linguistic games. Not content to just give Jim and the black characters of Huckleberry Finn a voice, Everett has given them two. Jim and his fellow slaves speak with sophistication and wit amongst themselves and reserve an exaggerated dialect to use around their white tormentors. This dialect is treated as a second language complete with translations and tutoring:
“But what are you going to say when she asks you about it?” I asked.
Lizzie cleared her throat. “Miss Watson, dat sum conebread lak I neva before et.”
“Try ‘dat be,’” I said. “That would be the correct incorrect grammar.”
“Dat be sum of conebread lak neva I et,” she said.
“Very good,” I said.
Everett is no stranger to pushing language to its limits. Erasure is centered on a professor adopting and parodying the vernacular of books like Push: By Sapphire in an attempt to skewer what white publishers considered at the time to be “black enough” to sell. And books like Dr. No as well as I Am Not Sydney Poitier borrow a “who’s on first” joke format in order to stretch its premise across genres to the absolute breaking point. What differentiates James is that the code switching of the black characters is no mere gag, it’s a matter of life and death. But then again, everything is life or death in the world of a slave.
The plot of the novel flows like its classical counterpart. As Jim and Huck travel along the Mississippi River, they are carried through a series of tableaus that illustrate the horror of the Antebellum South. Jim is soulful, introspective, and witty, while Huck is portrayed as more childish and naive than he usually is. Jim narrates the depths of his inner life that have been hidden by Twain’s original telling, and his struggle with Huck’s adventure in a world utterly hostile to Jim’s existence is a revelation. The chapters where the events of the original work are retold are filled with new insight, and the section where the pair are separated is filled with terror both real and existential.
The danger Jim and his compatriots face is no less absurd than anything else in Everett’s modern day-set oeuvre, but the grim realities of Jim’s circumstances bring the book to a higher level. On the road and in his dreams, Jim grapples with the philosophical and hypocritical constraints around his life, often by having imagined arguments with “enlightened thinkers” and confronting their oft-ignored bigotry. In an argument with John Locke, Everett writes:
“Some might say that my views on slavery are complex and multifaceted,”
“Convuluted and multifarious.”
“Well reasoned and complicated.”
“Entangled and problematic.”
“Sophisticated and intricate.”
“Labyrinthian and Daedalean.”
“Oh well played my dark friend.”
The exchange is an encapsulation of everything that makes a Percival Everett book great: volleying dialogue, a gordian knot of racial tensions, and a good punchline. And while the self-imposed language barrier supplies much of the humor, it also reflects the internalized struggle of Jim. It is only when the wall between the interior of James and the exterior of Jim breaks does the true resolution of the novel begins:
Why on earth would you think I can’t imagine the trouble I’m in? After you’ve tortured me and eviscerated me and emasculated me and left me to burn slowly to death, is there something else you’ll do to me? Tell me Judge Thatcher, what is there that I can’t imagine?
In a way, Everett has created a Divine Comedy to Mark Twain’s Aeneid. His penchant for satire, keen eye, and moral clarity have given new depth to a work already considered a cornerstone of an entire culture. It is not often such ambitious endeavors pay off, and readers everywhere should consider it their civic duty to catch this book before someone makes a movie out of this one too.
James, by Percival Everett. New York, New York: Doubleday Books, March 2024. 320 pages. $28.00, hardcover.
Adam Camiolo (@upandadamagain) is a writer, and occasional firefighter, who lives in New York. His work can be found in the Schuylkill Valley Journal, The Daily Drunk, The Foreign Policy Book Review, Heavy Feather Review, and he contributes to Poparatus.com.
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