6-08-09, 9:15 am
Like On of the Family by Alice Childress New York, Independence Publishers, 1956 [Boston: Beacon Press, 1986]
Editor's note: this review originally appeared in Masses and Mainstream, July, 1956.
In one of the nightly conversations Mildred Johnson holds with her friend Marge in Alice Childress' warm, wise and witty vignettes written from the point of view of a Black domestic worker, Mildred say: 'I don't think I'd like bein' a celebrity at all if it meant giving up my speakin' place. Nobody could give me enough swimmin' pools or champagne cocktails or motor cars to make up for that. ... As short as life is, I sure wouldn't want to go to my grave havin' missed my chance to put in a little comment about this old world.'
Through the device of Mildred's chats Miss Childress has given this old world a vigorous going over, in the forthright manner of a thorough spring-cleaning. Mildred Johnson's dismay at the filth in which we live is a spur to her healthy urge to clean things up. 'We gonna change all these laws 'till there ain't a piece or a smithereen of Jim Crow left. Yes, we're gonna go to the schools, ride the buses, eat in the restaurants, work on all kinds of jobs, sit in the railroad stations, and do all the things that free people are supposed to have this right to do. ... One of these days this land is gonna be truly beautiful. Yes, mam, every square inch of it.'
Mildred's conversations glisten with anger, warmth and humor, whether she is discussing desegregation, the perils of dating, television programs, Christmas shopping or her job. In the title piece, 'Like One of the Family,' Mildred deflates her employer's simpering comment that they do not think of her 'as a servant but just like one of the family ... after I have worked myself into a sweat cleaning the bathroom and the kitchen ... making the beds ... cooking the lunch ... washing the dishes and ironing Carol's pinafores ... I do not feel like no weekend house guest.'
Miss Childress is a talented actress and playwright, and the present works could almost all be presented unchanged as domestic monologues. Indeed, they would gain additional life and color from the personality of a gifted actress.
But if these pieces are to rest upon the magic (or lack of it) which the written word alone creates, the writer must then solve other problems. As a journalistic device, Mildred is a perfect instrument to examine lightly – but with depth of insight – many urgent current questions. Formally placed between the hard covers of a book, Mildred has been ushered to the doorstep of literature, and we let her in with the usual critical question – how real are you? Some part of her potential reality has been sacrificed to the urge to cover a wider variety of topics than might usually fall within the range of the apparently 'simple' character the author has asked us to accept.
At the same time, all of the opinions are too much of a piece. One longs for the shock (so often encountered in life) of an unexpected taste or point of view. One longs also to penetrate beyond the 'typical' view are given of Mildred to the private agony and unique courage of such a woman. Miss Childress convinces us generally, but the details, saturated in the special flavor of Mildred's life, are not always sharp.
Sometimes, the details are beautifully sharp as in the very moving description of her grandmother 'in her rockin' chair in the dark kitchen ... and that old chair would weep sawdust tears as she rocked ...' It is a pity to have spoiled the effectiveness of this piece with its final line ... 'Stop that , Marge ... If I'd known you would cry, I wouldn't of told it.' The writer may hope to move his reader to tears – but it is inept to presume such success.
Yet the fact is that Miss Childress, maintaining a light and charming tone, and the greatest readability, does move the reader – to tears and to laughter – but mostly to anger, the kind of anger which is the courage to change and fight against the ugliness surrounding us.
