Comfort Food? THE HELP by Kathryn Stockett

I realize that in my last post I forgot to mention an intermediary category of books - books that are better than fast food, which one might term "comfort food." Books that I might call "comfort food" are those into which one deliciously slides during the first three or four pages. There are characters we can ambiguously love and others we can recognize as villains. Yet, these books are not exactly fast food, either, because they have redemptive characteristics -- good writing, intriguing historical information, parts that make you think and raise questions. This is why these "comfort books" often work well for book groups. They are widely enjoyable but have enough in them to provoke a good conversation. I would place The Help by Kathryn Stockett into this category.

Many have read The Help and it is almost unanimously described as a good and captivating read. The premise of the book draws on a familiar subject - segregation in the South - but with an unfamiliar twist: segregation at its most intimate level, symbolized by the creation of separate bathrooms in upper-middle-class homes that employ black maids. The whole premise seems shocking - the idea that one would fear sharing a bathroom with the woman who diapered and bathed your own baby. Or is it just social pressure that causes them to do so? There is a courageous and noble African-American maid whose name is Aibileen, and she is easily recognizable as a figure who is both generous and open-hearted toward the white child she helps to raise, while angry at the segregation and humiliation she endures. Then there is an open-minded university graduate who becomes increasingly outraged at the inhumanity she witnesses. Of course, there is a really nasty villain of the upper-class society lady variety, who is determined that African-Americans are to be treated as no less than animals. But the part that draws us in the most is when the increasingly conscious white women bond with the plight of African Americans to try to alter the system.  In other words, there is redemption for some of the white women who had previously complied with the racist establishment.

Okay - here's the deal. This book is a great read, no doubt about it. But I have questions about how comfortable a read it is. Recently, I saved up for a trip of a lifetime [had never done the whole European tour as a youngster], and a large group of extended family went with me and my family on a cruise on the Mediterranean. While there, I noticed a number of well-heeled women clutching their volumes of The Help as they lay on easy chairs in the solarium [something I also did].  But should a book like this be that relaxing?   I also found out that there has been a law suit by an African-American maid who worked for the Stockett family by the name of Abilene, who sued Stockett for stealing her story. The case is ambiguous, and there is no clear fault to be determined, but it does raise questions about the responsibility of novelists who profit from telling the stories of the disenfranchised, particularly when the material is so close to home. [See Laura Miller's article on the case in Salon: http://www.salon.com/books/laura_miller/2011/02/22/the_help_lawsuit].  The book is a comfortable read, which assures it a wide readership, but I am still left with questions as to whether that is the right emotion we should be feeling as we read this book.