T Geronimo Johnson’s Welcome to Braggsville.

Johnson tackles issues, and I applaud him for that. Cultural appropriation, the South’s insistence on glorifying the confederacy, protest as art/experiment, lgbt identification are all themes in WtB, making it an enormous undertaking, with a lot to juggle.  I would recommend to anyone that they read the afterword while reading the book itself, it gave me a better understanding of Johnson’s main character’s POV than I had while actually reading the book, and considering how ‘heavy’ the story is, it might be better for future editions to include it as a foreward.

D’aron is a white, rural southerner, who rebels against his home town’s culture by enrolling at Berkeley.  At first he’s quite understandably a fish out of water, until he finds some like-minded souls to conspire with.  Berkeley is famous for its liberal activism, and Johnson was a student there, so his portrayal of the mindset of privileged students looking to save the world by bringing it understanding ring very , very true (and obviously haven’t changed much since I was at Penn in the mid 80’s, where this attitude was rampant).

With the best intentions in mind the four little indians set out to subvert a traditional Civil War (confederate) reenactment in order to fulfill a classroom assignment, and enlighten the locals as to their misguided view of history.

Things, of course, go very wrong, and the various characters are left to face the consequences of the Tragedy (yes, Tragedy, as Johnson rather deftly explores).

At times Johnson is brilliant. He doesn’t shy from asking a lot of his readers as he riffs on philosophy, women’s studies, the classics, histories of all sorts in both an academic tone and with a variety of street voices. Unfortunately once the story turns dark it stays dark, and his hand is not subtle with satire, nor does he effectively use his comic as relief.

I found the story to be interesting, but I never cared, not about D’aron, or his family, Candice or even Louis.  Charles, who stood in the for the author, might have been interesting if he had been more central, but his lack of bravery is perhaps telling of Johnson’s lack of bravery to make his dark story a dark comedy.

Q: 3

E: 3

I: 3

(QxE) + I = (12)