Thursday 28 November 2013

A Touchy Subject and The Right Author


The novel 'The Help' is based around 'colored' women who are maids to white as snow, high society women. The book is set in the early 1960's in Jackson, Mississippi. We see the maids talk to each other in their free time about gossip, funny stories and anything in between. Most of it based around their bosses. They are discriminated against, treated poorly and we really feel for them. Eventually someone hears their story, not just another maid, but someone higher up in society, the person gets their story out and we see a change in treatment of these women. It's a feel good story and the author seems to have a firm grasp on their personal lives of colored maids back in the 1960's, all the gossip and whatnot. So what would you expect a women with such an inside on these maids lives to look like?

Like this?








        A majority of people would expect her to be a darker skinned woman, who was there. And when presented with her face and told she is the author, people don't like to accept it. Like a friend of mine said ¨How would SHE know? She's just another blonde haired woman trying to get famous!¨ How WOULD she know? Well, Kathryn Stockett was born in Jackson Mississippi in the 1960's, she lived through it, she witnessed it. Kathryn was no stranger to the 'slavery' of that day and age. Kathryn WAS there. She felt compassion towards these people and had the knowledge to make a book outlining their lives. Kathryn was The Right Author for a Touchy Subject.