The Prophets by Robert Jones Jr.
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

In my mind as I was finishing “The Prophets” was the idea that the Derek Chauvin trial (for the murder of George Floyd) was also in its first day – and thinking, wondering, how far have we really come from the world presented in this poetic novel (antebellum Mississippi)?

What if not only there were enslaved Africans in same-sex relationships, but also the peoples they came from had long traditions of both same-sex relations and differing gender roles, both of which are at play here in “The Prophets?”

The story is of a Mississippi plantation, the Elizabeth Plantation, or as it’s called, merely “Empty.” An apt name for this hell on earth, this not-Tara. Isaiah and Samuel are the lovers here, who make the barn they work and live in much more because of their love for each other. Among the other enslaved people are both allies and enemies, and curiously, it’s the sexual orientation that opens up that rift when it does occur.

The family that owns both the slaves and plantation is small – the Halifaxes, Paul and Ruth, and their one surviving son, Timothy, who is an artist who, we come to find out, is also gay. And he’s interested in both Samuel and Isaiah, a set up for the plot of the novel – which I won’t detail because of spoilers.

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The language is poetic and invites scrutiny, which I think is a strength. After all, it’s about strangers in a strange land, and by the use of the world of spirits, dreams, visions, memories, etc., it’s always reinforced that it’s a story about a people displaced, who were stolen from a very different place with its own culture, mystery and magic.

I’ve been to old plantation tours in Louisiana (and maybe one in the Florida panhandle) and there’s always a veneer of the old grace, the Old South, in the quiet, spotless mansions, even if they do also give you a “slave quarters” explanation and tour. Sanitized. “The Prophets” is anything but sanitized.

It seems timely, too, to revisit America’s other original sin (the first being the displacement and genocide of the Indigenous Peoples who lived on this land) in times where we see the re-emergence of white supremacy and new Jim Crow laws, in the year of Black Lives Matter.

It’s a dream of what a queer life might have been like in the days before the Civil War, and that’s a dream worth having.

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