Product Description

When Mary-Mathilda, one of the most respected women of the island of Bimshire (also known as Barbados) calls the police to confess to a crime, the result is a shattering all-night vigil that brings together elements of the island's African past and the tragic legacy of colonialism in one epic sweep.

Set in the West Indies in the period following World War II, The Polished Hoe -- an Essence bestseller and a Washington Post Book World Most Worthy Book of 2003 -- unravels over the course of twenty-four hours but spans the collective experience of a society characterized by slavery.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #565895 in Books
• Published on: 2004-06-01
• Released on: 2004-05-25
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 480 pages

From Publishers Weekly
Clarke, considered one of Canada's finest political novelists, but less well known in the U.S. (a memoir, Pig Tails 'n Breadfruit, was published by the New Press in 2000), gets a new launching in this country with this eloquent, richly detailed novel, awarded Canada's Giller Prize. A murder takes place in the 1950s on the fictional Caribbean island of Bimshire (a stand-in for Clarke's native Barbados), where the culture of English gardens and cricket contrasts sharply with the legacy of slavery. The murderer is Mary Gertrude Mathilda, a respected elderly black matriarch. But the identity of the victim is less clear. In the 24 hours covered by Austin's tale, Mary is determined to tell the police about the lifetime of degradations that led up to her homicidal rage, and Sgt. Percy Stuart, a black member of the police force, is determined to stop her. Percy is in love with Mary, but his life has been a continual compromise with the still-lingering plantation system. Nobody represents the system better than Mr. Bellfeels, the white manager of the sugar plantation at the center of the villagers' lives. When she was 13, Mary was, in essence, bartered to Bellfeels by her mother, who was his previous mistress. For 38 years, she bore his groping and his children. Though he has helped their son, Wilberforce, become a doctor, Bellfeels has never shown Mary herself any kindness. At times, Clarke loses confidence in his characters and has them deliver forced sociological truths-for instance, when Mary gives a lecture about Christopher Columbus. Most of the story, however, unfolds through brilliantly written dialogue, a rich, dancing patois that fills out the dimensions of the island's painful history and its complex caste system. Like Texaco, by Martinique writer Patrick Chamoiseau, Clarke's novel, by harnessing the genius of Creole, shows how art can don a liberating face.
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From The New Yorker
This novel, by a Canadian writer born in Barbados, explores the brutality of plantation life, not as it was experienced in the fields but in the subtler cruelties inflicted on a worker named Mary, who, as a girl, catches the manager's eye and then becomes his favored mistress and the mother of his only son. Forced into a life of loveless "fooping" but also one of material comfort and privilege, Mary is separated both from her own people and from the white establishment, and spends decades in her "home-prison" contemplating the "ritual and arrangement of life on the Plantation." With an obvious affection for Caribbean cadence and its rum-soaked asides, Clarke unfolds Mary's story through the meandering statement she gives to the police after she has taken gruesome revenge on her "master" using the hoe of the title, the very tool that his attentions enabled her to drop.
Copyright © 2005 The New Yorker

From Booklist
Clarke was born in Barbados and immigrated to Canada in the 1950s. His new novel won Canada's prestigious Giller Prize and is certain to be met with critical acclaim in the U.S. as well. Readers will need some patience with the first few pages, but that soon turns into complete absorption in this digressive but endlessly fascinating, even charming monologue delivered by one Mary-Mathilda, an old woman living on a big plantation on a West Indian island. Real time is a matter of hours, but the time covered by Mary-Mathilda's monologue, as she confesses her guilt in a major crime to the local constable, is the 1930s and '40s. As night draws on, Mary-Mathilda reminisces about her long life on the plantation, chronicling not only the history of the plantation but also the island itself. Mary-Mathilda "graduated" from field hand to servant in the main house to mistress of the plantation manager; the fabric of her existence has been woven with colonialism, racism, servitude, and sexual exploitation. A very creatively executed novel. Brad Hooper
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Customer Reviews

Enriched with native tongues
Austin Clarke's Giller Prize winning novel THE POLISHED HOE takes place on the island of Bimshire (also known as Barbados) in the "Wessindes." During one long night of confession and reflection between Bimshire lawman, Sarge, and Miss Mary Gertrude Matilda, a kept woman on the Bellfeels plantation, Clarke's characters ruminate about the lives they have led. Mary calls the police station and tells them she must confess her crime. Sarge comes to the Great House where Miss Mary resides to record her statement, but is caught in a whirlwind of memories about the woman he grew up with, his own experiences and transgressions, and the contempt circulating the island regarding Mister Bellfeels.

Enriched with native tongues and a sort of stream of consciousness writing, this is a novel that brought to mind some of the great writers of all time. The prose was lilting, and I often found myself caught in a reverie as the characters related memories from their lives. It is not a book for the drama lovers who live for fast paced reads; rather it seems to have been written for those who love narration, historical fiction, and carefully crafted characterizations.

Reviewed by CandaceK
The RAWSISTAZ Reviewers

Rum-soaked Caribbean cadences
Almost mimicking the sense of time on a West Indian island, this mesmerizing novel begins slowly and then warms up with the Caribbean heat of noon's overhead sun. Now an old woman still living on a big-island plantation, Mary-Mathilda, in the process of confessing something having to do with the 'hoe' of the title to the local cops, reminisces about her past, chronicling the plantation's history as well as her own. The novel explores the brutality of plantation life not in the fields but in the Big House where as a girl, Mary M caught the manager's eye and became his mistress, the mother of his only son. Separated from her own people by her comforts and privilege, she is also separated from the white establishment by the barriers of racism, servitude, and sexual exploitation.

A good read albeit a circuitous one
I am always interested in Caribbean fiction. This is definitely not a quick read on the train ride home. This book brings the horror of the slavery and post-slavery era home. Up close and personal. By telling the stories of the characters in his book, Clarke forces the reader to take a bigger bite of what has already left a bad taste in the mouth. The struggles of the "heroine", Mary Matilda, her mother and grandmother as well as the other characters in the book are painstakingly painted. I must say though that I found the pace a little slow at time. Clarke shifts between time and place, stretching dialogue and story to the near breaking point.

Altogether a good read but be patient. Reminds me of "A Hundred Years Of Solitude".

Sherman
CaribbeanAbroad.com