Abstract
The expression womanism has its origins in a unique black American women’s cultural, ethical and socio-political stance. In 1983 Alice Walker introduced womanism in a collection of essays entitled In Search of Our Mothers’ Gardens. She regarded this concept as a more vital and accurate description of black American women’s ethos in contrast to feminism, which was and is a predominantly white middle-class women’s perspective. Alice Walker realizes this objective in her novel Now Is the Time to Open Your Heart (2004). The main character, Kate Talkingtree, a middle-aged woman, sets off on a spiritual sojourn, on which she discovers the medicinal and aesthetic quality of nature, the significance of human bonds, and the power of ancestor connectedness. Kate rejects institutionalized religion, materialism and the evils of violence and “uncivilized” civilization. Her self-discovery is within the paradigm of womanist ethics.
The initial stage of black womanist self-development that empowers black women spiritually and renders them courageous enough to resist injustice is the positive assertion of their humanity against the onslaught of hostile forces. Black women’s “struggle emanates from a deepening of self-knowledge and love” (Christian 82). Fittingly, the main character in Alice Walker’s novel undergoes self-discovery before discerning the paradoxes and dilemmas in the lives of others. Kate needs a change in her life although she is a widely published writer. Discomfort and pain draw Kate’s attention to her self. Aging initiates a need for transformation. She dismantles her altar of religious paraphernalia and devalues money, burning several hundred-dollar bills “to demonstrate to herself that these items were not the God/Goddess of her life” (14).
Kate also questions Christianity and ceases to attend organized Buddhist meditation sessions. She seeks to find and define the source and the essence of her life. In her endeavor to do so, she mirrors womanists, who “have fashioned value patterns and ethical procedures in their own terms” (Cannon, Black 76).
This spiritual closeness with Nature constitutes one of the predominant themes in Now Is the Time to Open Your Heart. Kate begins to dream about a dry river, which her friends interpret as an otherworldly call for her to search for a wet river. The trip to Colorado does not complete Kate’s spiritual journey. It continues with a further sojourn to the Amazon river, on which ritual participants drink a sacred medicinal plant yage, known as “Grandmother.”
The womanist character in Walker’s novel is conscious of the socio-political status of black people in America. Kate was a former activist in the Black Freedom Movement of the 1960’s. She is an advocate of reconciliation between black and white communities in the struggle for social and economic justice in America.
Womanists also emphasize the multidimensional quality of life that manifests itself in an ability to appreciate and enjoy the experience of one’s immediate surroundings. Kate Talkingtree observes that, in the main, technological advancement and oppressive civilization work against the development of people’s humanity.
Womanists’ connections with their tradition and past are exemplified also by their bonds with ancestors. Kate Talkingtree encounters her forebears in dreams. She also realizes the importance of remembering the painful experience of her ancestors.
In conclusion, Now is the Time to Open Your Heart presents womanist ethics through the characters’ self-discovery, spirituality, relation to nature and ancestors as well as involvement in the struggle for social and economic justice. Alice Walker stands firmly within the womanist literary tradition.
Works Cited
- Bell, Bernard W. The Contemporary African American Novel. Amherst and Boston. 2004.
- Cannon, Katie G. Black Womanist Ethics. Atlanta, Scholars Press, 1988.
- ---. Katie’s Canon: Womanism and the Soul of the Black Community. New York: Continuum, 2003.
- Christian, Barbara. Black Feminist Criticism: Perspectives on Black Women Writers. New York: Pergamon Press, 1985.
- Grant, Jacquelyn. White Women’s Christ and Black Women’s Jesus: Feminist Christology and Womanist Response. Georgia: Scholars Press, 1989.
- Walker, Alice. Anything We Love Can Be Saved: A Writer’s Activism. New York: The Ballantine Publishing Group, 1997.
- ---. In Search of Our Mothers’ Gardens: A Womanist Prose. U.S.A: Harvest/HBJ Book, 1983.
- ---. Now Is the Time to Open Your Heart. New York: Random House, 2004.