Bold Spirit - Linda Hunt [70]
The burning of her manuscript recalls how close the writings of others, such as African-American author Zora Neal Hurston, came to being destroyed. Destitute and no longer acclaimed in her old age, Hurston was considered of “little worth” at her death. When county workers came to clean out her house, they started to burn the clutter. One recalled that Zora was once a respected writer and, hoping there might be something of worth to augment county expenses, hosed down the fire just in time to recover her charred papers.4 It took more than fifty years and a seismic shift in appreciating the worth of African-American women writers before her acclaimed book, Their Eyes Were Watching God, was republished. Her writings proved pivotal for inspiring the next generation of African-American women writers, such as Alice Walker. Only recently, with the growing publications of multicultural stories available in schools and libraries, are all children in America able to read about the lives of others with their same ethnic heritage.
BELIEVING ONE’S STORY IS INCOMPREHENSIBLE
When an experience seems incomprehensible to others, it can contribute to the silencing of stories. None of Helga’s neighbors could imagine what she encountered because such an endeavor existed outside their own knowledge. For women to walk unescorted in the wilderness, to sleep unprotected in railroad station houses or in strangers’ homes, to wander alone in New York, Chicago, Denver, Omaha, and Salt Lake City, and to meet with powerful political leaders was simply incomprehensible to her immigrant neighbors. Even the freedom of movement Helga knew from wearing the new bicycle skirts was something the women in Mica Creek could not imagine.
Helga had no one to talk with about nonconformist ideas concerning the possibilities for women or the injustice of entrenched roles. Although women neighbors could imagine a pregnancy before wedlock, in Norwegian communities it was far less understandable that a woman did not marry the man who was the father of the child. Helga’s conversations along the rural and urban routes of 1896 America meant she inevitably experienced the loosening of boundaries that characterized the turn of the century. “Something happens at the end of a century,” wrote one historian referring to the 1890s. “Rules are altered, boundaries are breached, and fundamental attitudes are changed.”5 Helga’s lost stories of encounters with American citizens could have shed light on this theory in lively ways.
Other experiences that often seem beyond comprehension to family members and therefore remain unheard involve war memories, early poverty, sexual identity, academic, work, and professional life. Some of the first generation of educated persons within a family speak of similar separation and silencing that occurs as they advance beyond their parent’s educational level. The experiential gaps that emerge contribute to silences within families, an unspoken acknowledgment that each other’s experiences are simply beyond understanding.
SEALING THE SHAME
Stories that family members perceive as shameful often stay silenced. Shame involves a painful feeling of having lost the respect of others, even if this is culturally bound. This can be caused by “perceptions of improper behavior or incompetence which brings dishonor or disgrace to oneself or one’s family, something perceived as regrettable, outrageous, or unfortunate.”6 Sealing the