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Loading... Caleb's Crossingby Geraldine Brooks
  
No current Talk conversations about this book. This incredible story, so enhanced by narrator Jennifer Ehle (Elizabeth Bennett in Pride and Prejudice), is set in Martha's Vineyard in the 1660s amid the conflicts between colonial settlers and the native tribespeople. Bethia Mayfield, the teenage daughter of a charismatic religious leader, meets Caleb, a Wampanoag of her age, and she shares her devotion to Christ with him, and he, the natural wonders of the island, with her. As Caleb breaks their friendship to embark on his vision quest, Bethia continues yearning to be acknowledged as a scholar by her family and her community, an impossibility due to biblical law and to the narrow, confined nature of the lives of women in this new (old) world. Tragedies befall the Mayfield family, and both Caleb and Bethia find themselves in Cambridge, at Harvard College, where she is a scullery maid who eavesdrops on the teachings of the Harvard president, and he is one of two native students, the first to attend. Their life stories, narrated by Bethia, are remarkable, and the resolutions are both heartbreaking and life-affirming. This novel is a special pleasure for Massachusetts readers and for those with a passion for early American and native histories. (  ) froxgirl | Sep 19, 2023 |  Three Strikes I tried three times to read this much heralded book. It's not that "it doesn't grab me, " right away, but rather that it actually repels me. Clearly, this isn't a book my Self wants to read! Kim.Sasso | Aug 27, 2023 | This is a fictional account of the first Native American to gain a degree from Harvard. We meet Caleb through Bethia on Martha's Vinyard. Bethis is a girl with a brain in her head and a father who edicates alongside her twin brother until he dies in an accident. That then ceases and Bethia takes to snatching what she can from Makepeace (her not academic elder brother) while heading out into the island. There she meets the boy who becomes Caleb and they learn from each other. The path their lives follow is not smooth and there are sufficient trials and tribulations along the way. The scene moves from the island to Harvard and all of this is narrated by Bethia herself, in her spare time on scraps of paper salvaged from the households in which she lives. The final portion is Bethia in her old age telling the missing years after Harvard and the lives that follow. Its engaging enough, Bethia is someone that we can root for and want to follow. She suffers for being a smart person in a woman;s body and you feel for her as she tries to reconcile what she wants and what she is going to have to settle for. We see Caleb and all the other characters through her eyes, so they are coloured by her views. These are not, I would say, necessarily of her time, but they act as a vehicle for the story. (  ) Helenliz | Jul 19, 2023 | Diverting story, but a little overwrought and YA-ish. I liked the fact that it was so concerned with local history and my museum was even mentioned in the afterword. (  ) steve02476 | Jan 3, 2023 | Really wanted to love this book, but I couldn't finish it :( It took awhile to get used to the language, but once I did, I enjoyed the first third. I lost interest from there. ( ) DebCushman | Aug 25, 2022 |
...This is a book for grown-ups written by Geraldine Brooks, who not only respects history, she loves it. So while she sets up a story that's easy to fall into, she doesn't shy away from the realities of those times. And Bethia and Caleb's lives take some unexpected turns. The result is a satisfying but sobering look at the early days of this country. This is a great pick for lovers of historical fiction...  “Caleb’s Crossing” could not be more enlightening and involving. Beautifully written from beginning to end, it reconfirms Geraldine Brooks’s reputation as one of our most supple and insightful novelists.  While no masterpiece, this work nevertheless contributes in good measure to the current and very welcome revitalization of the historical novel. Belongs to Publisher SeriesHas as a student's study guideAwardsDistinctions
Once again, the author takes a remarkable shard of history and brings it to vivid life. In 1665, a young man from Martha's Vineyard became the first Native American to graduate from Harvard College. Upon this slender factual scaffold, she has created a luminous tale of love and faith, magic and adventure. The narrator of the story is Bethia Mayfield, growing up in the tiny settlement of Great Harbor amid a small band of pioneers and Puritans. Restless and curious, she yearns after an education that is closed to her by her sex. As often as she can, she slips away to explore the island's glistening beaches and observe its native Wampanoag inhabitants. At twelve, she encounters Caleb, the young son of a chieftain, and the two forge a tentative secret friendship that draws each into the alien world of the other. Bethia's minister father tries to convert the Wampanoag, awakening the wrath of the tribe's shaman, against whose magic he must test his own beliefs. One of his projects becomes the education of Caleb, and a year later, Caleb is in Cambridge, studying Latin and Greek among the colonial elite. There, Bethia finds herself reluctantly indentured as a housekeeper and can closely observe Caleb's crossing of cultures. Like the author's beloved narrator Anna, in Year of Wonders, Bethia proves an emotionally irresistible guide to the wilds of Martha's Vineyard and the intimate spaces of the human heart. No library descriptions found. 
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 Google Books — Loading...GenresMelvil Decimal System (DDC)823.914Literature English & Old English literatures English fiction Modern Period 1901-1999 1945-1999LC ClassificationRatingAverage: (3.83)
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