BRADBERRY: Oh say can you see ... Canada?

By Bill Bradberry
Niagara Gazette

June 30, 2009 04:54 pm

— I was tired. My feet were killing me, my body ached all over; I was feeling a little weary so I grabbed a book from my summer stock, stretched out on the couch and promptly fell into a dream.
It had been another long dadgum day.
Sleep had come easily. The slow rush of tangled memories and suppressed angst left behind the deep relief that good naps bring.
But when I sat up wide awake a short time later I was not sure if what I had just experienced was a dream, or something else.
I had floated off into lala land where everything and nothing makes sense, where the most outrageous is common, and everything is possible.
Lost in my own imagination, bolstered by hints of absolute reality, I had been in that world where reality combines with fantasy that seems so real, so profound, I was almost convinced that everything I had just seen, heard, smelled, touched and even tasted in that dream was real.
When I stood up, the book I had been reading slipped to the floor and I realized what had happened.
“The Book of Negroes” by author Lawrence Hill, originally published in the U.S. as “Someone Knows My Name” in order to not offend anyone in February 2007 was published in Canada under the title of a very real historical document; an actual book, a list of the names and descriptions of Black Loyalists who fought in the Revolutionary War with the British in exchange for promises of freedom from slavery.
When the war ended, Loyalists were forced to flee the U.S. and many Africans wound up in Canada, some as far north as Nova Scotia where they settled, but to get there, they had to be listed in the Book of Negroes, a virtual record kept by the British in the spring and summer of 1783. Thousands made it, but many thousands more did not.
The document has been digitized and is available at: www.blackloyalist.com.
Hill’s book, a very realistic account of one of the thousands of lost stories won the prestigious Rogers Writers’ Trust Fiction Prize, and in May 2008, it won the Commonwealth Writers’ Prize for Best Overall Book. The nearly 500 word spellbinder then proceeded to win Canada Reads in March 2009 and has sold more than 250,000 copies and it tops my summer reading list.
This powerful historical fiction tells the very detailed story of the character, Aminata Diallo, daughter of Mamado Diallo and Sira Kulbali from the village of Bayo, “three moons by foot from the Grain Coast in West Africa”, she says. “I am a Bamana. And a Fula. I am both ... I suspect that I was born in 1745, or close to it. And I am writing this account. All of it.”
Second on my list is “They Poured Fire On Us From the Sky: The True Story of Three Lost Boys From Sudan” by Judy Bernstein. This page-turner tells the amazing stories of Benson Deng, Alephonsion Deng and Benjamin Ajak and how they survived and then succeeded against all odds. It is an inspiring testament of hope against what might otherwise be seen as hopeless odds.
In the Epilogue, the author writes, “The Lost Boys in the United States are scattered in approximately 30 cities, from Seattle to Jacksonville, averaging a hundred or so in each location ... Are there any Lost Girls? When the villages were attacked, many of the girls were raped, killed or taken as slaves to the north.”
Visit their site at: www.theypouredfire.com.
And finally, my third on the list of worthwhile summer 2009 reading, a children’s book: “Simply in Season Children’s Cookbook” by Elizabeth Kennedy.
In these days of video games, fast food and little or no physical exercise for kids as well as adults, this little gem offers a lifetime of good, healthy cooking skills and eating habits that could save and enrich lives.
The book itself is pleasant to look at, filled with vivid colors, bright photography and great tips for getting and staying healthy. It emphasizes the importance of freshness and the fun of growing your own in your own home gardens, an avocation I learned to appreciate as a kid with rural rooted parents.
All of the books on my list, and there are far too many to mention here, are available at the Book Corner, 1801 Main St. Just call Jeff at 285-2928 or drop him a note at www.fallsbookcorner.com and he’ll get it for you.
Whether or not you read any of these books, it is important that we all encourage our children to get to know their world community and to understand who and where they are.
The more we learn about our history, the better we will understand and appreciate our present as well as our potential.
As Lawrence Hill’s imagined accounts of actual history reveal, we can know our past, and those of us who have chosen to forget it may learn that we have connections to more than what we see before us; that unless learned, the lessons we fail to learn, will be repeated.
We are, many of us, more connected to our Canadian neighbors than we currently understand, and they, more connected to Africa than they know, and in the long run, the more we read and appreciate our past, the more we will be able to move beyond the lines that Michael Jackson and President Obama crossed, to the point where the lines may one day disappear all together.
Contact Bill at: bill.bradberry@yahoo.com.

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