Push

a novel by Sapphire
rel. date: June 1996

The reality of this world is too harsh for most, even in our minds mostly not comprehending the clarity with which this short but powerful work takes us to.  You imagine that it’s there, the dirty apartments, the dark halls, the cooking smells, the desperate people.  But mostly we don’t want to imagine, we don’t let enter our waking consciousness the incestuous, rapist father, the 400 pound abusive mother who would actually kick her own girl while she’s having a baby on the kitchen floor, then send the baby off to live with a grandmother because it’s retarded and she only wants the welfare money.  We can imagine the school where something/someone like this would go unnoticed, and not really be educating a child like this, but we cannot imagine what it is really like to be this person, to be this child.

Sapphire’s language choice, some critics would say, “pushes” the boundary between realism and sensationalism, a kind of Maury Povitch flavor to it.  You’d think that Precious and Mama would be guests on his show.  Precious is on stage first trying to tell Maury all about her life with this woman, and occasional man named Carl, in her broken BEV, which half the audience relates to in any case, and most understand because Maury is translating and helping along by asking pointed questions.  At key moments there are the TV monitors showing Mama’s reaction back stage, and occasional boos from the audience for the woman.  Then they bring her out to meet with Precious in front of everyone, and Mama tries to explain it away, the same way she tried to explain it to the social worker, who was horrified, and saw right through the disguise.   Near the end of the show it might be one of those scenes where both people are standing and flailing accusations at each other and security guards are keeping them apart, a spectacle for TV.

Well, that’s sensational, but it’s also very real.  This voice is real, although it is one that we do not like to hear.  These situations are real, and happen every day, in many ways that we may not imagine.  

You cannot come away from reading this without a heightened sense of awareness of the plight of the poor and the inner city life of the underprivileged.  The descriptions even of simply walking through neighborhoods, the broken tenements and dives of Harlem, are haunting.  This is a voice that while difficult for us to turn our face to, we need to continue to do so.

I’d like to “rate” this book, or compare it, but I cannot at this time.  What “scale” does one use to “rate” something like this?  What criterion?  What frame of reference?  All I think I can tell you is:

Not for youth or light reading.  Please be of a mature mind and solid heart if you undertake to read this book.