Post 33: Lit Circle Post "Exodus"

On Friday we broke up into randomly assigned groups for a Literature circle discussion. My group mainly talked about the metaphorical value of how Leah, Adah, and Rachel were talking about Nathan's death. Having not read up to that point on Friday, I couldn't really answer this question, but what was interesting was that my other group members who had completed the reading couldn't contemplate their own metaphorical reason for mentioning Nathan's death.

After having read "Exodus", I believe that the three Price girls (well, at least formally known as Price) having visited Abomey, a desolate place where there are skulls encompassed in mud walls, among other things was very similar to Nathan's influence in Kilanga:

"We saw every one of these things- the tapestries depicting violent acts and the swords and knives and even a throne with human skulls attached to the bottoms of all four legs, plated with bronze like keepsake baby shoes!" (480).

During the course of their tour through this dank tomb, Leah and Adah break away from Rachel and the tour guide, for what Rachel presumes as wanting to experience these catacombs their own way, yet she overhears them talking about Nathan and his death. Since they told Rachel the entire story after this tour, where it was explained to them that women were forced into marriage with the King, who had multiple wives:

"They forced women into slave marriage with the King for the purpose of reproducing their babies at a high rate. One King would have, oh, fifty or a hundred wives, easy... To celebrate their occasions, he said, they'd just haul off and kill a bunch of their slaves, grind up all the blood and bones, and mix it up with mud for making more walls for their temples. And what's worse, whenever a King died, forty of his wives would have to be killed and buried with him!" (481).

To me, since this is a fictional novel, the sequence of events, or any event for that matter, having been chosen by the author, each plays a significance. Since the father's death was mentioned in the catacombs of Abomey, there must be a parallel between this King and the father. In my opinion, although Nathan's cause had good intentions as opposed to the King having self-centered intentions, both cases have similarities. Nathan, in trying to baptize children, lost them all to crocodiles, and as a result was killed because of this. Conversely, the King, when dying took many wives with him. Nathan is similar to the King because he tormented the people he was with when living: the King his wives, and Nathan his entire family.

What the underlying sense was from all three Price women was that they thought these rituals were weird. The ironic thing is, that when looking in from an impartial standpoint, parallels can be made between Nathan and the King, both influencing the lives of others yet not realizing their true detrimental impact. To me, what I can pull out of this is that customs are arbitrary to where you come from. To the Price family, these catacombs seem weird, yet to impartial, 21st century readers, their own lives seem obscure.