Back in ’18 I mentioned that I was busy with – among other things – writing a novel. I started writing in 2015, and gave myself 10 years to complete it.
Well, it appears I may actually meet my self-imposed deadline! As someone who loves the sound deadlines make as they whiz past, I’m shocked. But I still have a year to screw it up, so all is not won.
The novel is in a genre known as historical fiction. Real people in a real time, in a fictional story.
Historical fiction
First, some history. In January, 1838, a wealthy South Carolina plantation owner, lawyer, and politician, bought an 18 year old woman, Sally, to be his concubine. She had a one year old daughter, and as far as we know they both spent the rest of their lives on his plantation, remaining even after Emancipation.
He paid about 3x the going rate for a seamstress – her designated profession – in a private sale. He later admitted he had children by her, and, by her daughter as well. It is also clear that he developed affection for her and her daughter, despite a firm belief in their inherent and unalterable inferiority.
One of the things that struck me about Sally is that she also took up with a slave man named Tom. The only slave named Tom on the plantation was the driver, who, incidentally, the owner considered his most valuable slave. Tom was exceptional. Very knowledgeable about agriculture, and also was intelligent enough to deceive his owner over a period of decades. He was so valuable that even after the master discovered Tom’s deception – and punished him for it – he kept Tom as overseer.
Sally also had children with Tom. I interpret this history to mean that Sally was operating at the very highest level of the slave community, as well as being integral to the master’s life. A woman making the best of a bad situation. leveraging her personal assets to create the best life she could for herself and her children.
The Fiction
In the novel I’m lightly fictionalizing our extensive knowledge of the planter – frim his diary, plantation manual, letters, published writings, and a scholarly biography – and the little we know about Sally’s life, to focus on her. She is the narrator of her story, which includes her love affair with Tom.
My particular interest in these people is the psychodynamics of a plantation community. There’s the relatively privileged Sally and the larger – 300 people – enslaved community. Then her life with her owner, his wife, and some of the other people she interacted with.
My goal is to create a compelling and readable story, whose historical parts are based on the best scholarship available, and whose fiction is based on human nature in a context of chattel slavery in a forced labor camp.
The StorageMojo take
Writing this has been an extended exercise in deep empathy, with many surprising twists and turns. One minor example is how the owner would treat his slave son versus his free sons.
As a committed racist his expectations for his slave son were low. And we know from his writings that he was very critical of his free sons. He cared about both, but his free sons always knew they were a disappointment, while he was easy with his slave son. How does that play out in a large family living together in a plantation mansion? To me, that’s a question worthy of some deep consideration.
I’m planning to take the novel to an east coast writer’s workshop next spring. I doubt I’ll get a publisher – a first time novelist rarely does these days – so I’m prepared to self-publish.
If this story sounds interesting to you, stay tuned. More next year. I hope!
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