Mourner's Bench : A Novel / Sanderia Faye.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Faye, Sanderia, author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Arkansas--Fiction.

Arkansas.

Genre:

Electronic books.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (384 p.)

Place of Publication:

Fayetteville, [Arkansas] : The University of Arkansas Press, 2015.

Language Note:

English

Summary:

At the First Baptist Church of Maeby, Arkansas, the sins of the child belonged to the parents until the child turned thirteen. Sarah Jones was only eight years old in the summer of 1964, but with her mother Esther Mae on eight prayer lists and flipping around town with the generally mistrusted civil rights organizers, Sarah believed it was time to get baptized and take responsibility for her own sins. That would mean sitting on the mourner's bench come revival, waiting for her sign, and then testifying in front of the whole church. But first, Sarah would need to navigate the growing tensions of small-town Arkansas in the 1960s. Both smarter and more serious than her years (a "fifty-year-old mind in an eight-year-old body," according to Esther), Sarah was torn between the traditions, religion, and work ethic of her community and the progressive civil rights and feminist politics of her mother, who had recently returned from art school in Chicago. When organizers from the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) came to town just as the revival was beginning, Sarah couldn't help but be caught up in the turmoil. Most folks just wanted to keep the peace, and Reverend Jefferson called the SNCC organizers "the evil among us." But her mother, along with local civil rights activist Carrie Dilworth, the SNCC organizers, Daisy Bates, attorney John Walker, and indeed most of the country, seemed determined to push Maeby toward integration. With characters as vibrant and evocative as their setting, Mourner's Bench is the story of a young girl coming to terms with religion, racism, and feminism while also navigating the terrain of early adolescence and trying to settle into her place in her family and community.

Contents:

Acknowledgments; Chapter One. We've Got to Move; Chapter Two. I'll Come See You; Chapter Three. Your Mama Called Last Night; Chapter Four. We're Going to Make a Mosaic; Chapter Five. I Want Permission to Sit; Chapter Six. They Called It an Anxious Seat; Chapter Seven. Visitors with the Commodities; Chapter Eight. The Devil Is Busy; Chapter Nine. The Hand Is Quicker Than the Eye; Chapter Ten. In Remembrance of Me; Chapter Eleven. I Flunked It; Chapter Twelve. I Need Thee Every Hour; Chapter Thirteen. I Know What's Best; Chapter Fourteen. Four Generations of Women Live in My House

Chapter Fifteen. That's BlasphemousChapter Sixteen. This Ain't My Fight; Chapter Seventeen. I'll Be There for You; Chapter Eighteen. One Day You Will Be Ready; Chapter Nineteen. Give Me My Money; Chapter Twenty. A Whiff of Freedom; Chapter Twenty-One. Colored School Is Good Enough; Chapter Twenty-Two. We're Getting Married; Chapter Twenty-Three. Miss Ora Bea Is Preaching; Chapter Twenty-Four. Power to the People; Chapter Twenty-Five. We Demand Equality; Chapter Twenty-Six. Speak the King's English; Chapter Twenty-Seven. We Must Continue to Push Forward

Chapter Twenty-Eight. Run as Fast as You CanChapter Twenty-Nine. It's a Ritual, a Rite of Passage; Chapter Thirty. Bye, Mama

Notes:

Description based upon print version of record.

Description based on print version record.

ISBN:

9781610755672

1610755677

OCLC:

914706410