Listening to The Help

For the past week or so, I've been listening to The Help, by Kathryn Stockett. I resisted reading the novel, a bestseller, for quite a while, thinking it might be clichéd, rather than original. I kept thinking of films such as Imitation of Life and Pinky, which explore charged relationships between the races, as does The Help. But, on the recommendation of every member of my book club, and because it was the only remotely interesting audio book available in the library, I decided to give it a try. After just a few minutes with Disk 1, I was hooked.

The plot follows 3 main characters. Skeeter is a young white woman, newly graduated from college and frustrated with the limitations and social conventions of the genteel life in Jackson, Mississippi in 1963. She is something of a misfit—as the only remaining single woman amongst her friends, with unconventional looks and a height above most of the available men in town, and she wants to be a writer. 

Aibileen and Minny are African-American maids working in white households, where they raise the children, do all the cooking and housework, and live in constant fear of being fired for even the most trivial of mistakes. Living in the pre-Civil Rights Act South, they and the rest of the African-American community face both overt and covert prejudice, which may be expressed in a myriad of ways, from verbal humiliation to physical violence, to even death in some situations.

Skeeter is stymied by her lack of options, the banality of bridge games and luncheons with her friends Hilly and Elizabeth, and is also disturbed by the way her friends treat and talk about their maids. One day she asks Aibileen if she thinks her life could be different, a tentative step into the forbidden territory of dialogue between blacks and whites; a question not well received. 

Skeeter takes the only writing job she can find in Jackson, as the household hints columnist for the local newspaper. Since she knows nothing about running a household, she turns to Aibileen for advice. Skeeter conceives the idea of writing a book about the conditions black women endure working as domestics in Jackson and enlists Aibileen's help in this area too. Aibileen is reluctant and wary, but eventually tells Skeeter her story. She also convinces her hotheaded friend Minny to participate. 

As I delve deeper and deeper into The Help, I find that I am completely caught up in the plot, which is quite complex, weaving together the relationships among the principal and supporting characters, mainly women. I wonder if I would feel the same passively reading the book, or if it is the complex and nuanced performances of the actors who bring the characters to life?

I have advanced about two-thirds of the way through the disks and the plot remains compelling. I plan to complete listening to the book early this week and take in the newly released movie by next weekend. I wonder how I will feel about that adaptation? It will be interesting!