Spellbinding read, stimulating discussion

First-year science student Crislana Rafael offers her thoughts on The Book of Negroes. (Nick Pearce Photo)

The thinking started early at Dalhousie with the launch of Dal Reads, held a day before classes started for the fall term.

Dal Reads is an initiative that invited people all over campus to read and discuss a single book—The Book of Negroes by Lawrence Hill. Started as an orientation event for first years, it garnered some attention from the wider population, and was expanded to include students, staff and faculty.

Participants met yesterday in several small groups led by faculty members who take a special interest in some area related to the book.

One such group convened in the pub downstairs from the faculty club. “The book for me was so, so powerful,” said facilitator Wanda Thomas Bernard, director of the School of Social Work, as she opened the discussion. “I’m really interested in hearing your reactions.”

Those reactions ranged from admiration for the resilience and spunk of the book’s heroine to shock, dismay and rage at the events portrayed. Although a work of fiction, The Book of Negroes is based on the true history of the slave trade. It is inspired by a fascinating historical document called the Book of Negroes, a hand-written list of black passengers leaving New York on British ships in 1783. (The Nova Scotia Archives has a digital copy.)

Author Lawrence Hill writes from the perspective of heroine Aminata Diallo, who at the age of 11 is abducted from her village in West Africa and forced into slavery in the U.S.

“It’s so refreshing to see this perspective, through the eyes of a woman,” said Kewoba Carter, who is studying International Development and English.

For some of the students, it was a revelation that black loyalists and black slavery existed in Canada. “For me, it’s a big shock to realize this is part of our heritage in Canada,” said Crislana Rafael, a first-year science student from Vancouver, B.C. “You wonder, why aren’t we taught about this?”

Dal Reads blogger Melanie Parlette (See: http://blogs.dal.ca/dalreads/) says the hope is to build on the program for next year and continue it as part of orientation week events. She is interested in gathering feedback from Dal Reads participants and getting suggestions for other discussion-generating books.

“It adds a nice dimension to frosh week; it’s a little more intellectual than the traditional-let’s-play-games side of the week,” she said.

And for those who got a taste of stimulating book-club discussion and would like to continue with a group, the Faculty of Medicine has a book club called Page Turners which welcomes new members.

Around since 2003, the club meets the second Wednesday of each month at 1 p.m. in the Clinical Research Centre, 5849 University Ave.

Books coming up for discussion include Midnight’s Children by Salman Rushdie (Oct. 14), Through Black Spruce by Joseph Boyden (Nov. 11) and The Time Traveller’s Wife by Audrey Niffenegger (Dec. 9). For information, please call 494-1846.