BOOK CLUB BEAT
with Sherry Hemingway
THE BOOK
Thomas Jefferson Dreams of Sally Hemings
Author Stephen O’Connor
H
ow could our Founding Father
Thomas Jefferson write “all
men are created equal” while
maintaining nearly 600 slaves over his
lifetime, keeping a slave mistress for
nearly four decades, and fathering as
many as six slave children by her?
The controversy over Thomas Jefferson
and household slave Sally Hemings has
raged on for two centuries.
In 1802, newspaper revelations of their
relationship threatened to bring down our
third president.
In 2000, the Thomas Jefferson
Foundation acknowledged the DNA study
that verified the lineage of one of their
children.
Now in 2016, Stephen O’Connor has
created yet another furor by publishing
his highly original, historical fiction novel
exploring the Hemings liaison that will
not go away.
This book provokes extreme reactions.
In Amazon’s customer ratings, 41% give it
a top rating of five stars, while 45% slam
it with one star. Literary critics are tossing
accolades over the brilliance of O’Connor’s
writing, while reader reviews are laced
with profanity.
In 1782, Thomas Jefferson lost his
beloved wife, Martha, who left him with
two children. We are told that on her
deathbed, she made Jefferson promise he
would never remarry, a promise he kept.
Martha’s father, a slave holder, had
sired four children with Martha’s mulatto
nanny, Betty. One of those children was
Sally Hemings. Therefore, biologically,
black Sally Hemings and white Martha
Jefferson were half-sisters.
In this book, it is 16-year-old
Sally’s resemblance in appearance and
mannerisms that catches the attention
of the lonely, 46-year-old Jefferson, then
Governor of Virginia.
The two are conflicted and invisibly
together throughout the remainder
of his life. In public, Sally is never
acknowledged as any more than a slave.
O’Connor deals with virtually
unlimited points of view and conflicts
using reimagined narrative, dream
sequences, fantasy, historical documents,
Jefferson’s writings and excerpts from
Heming’s descendants’ memoirs.
Frequently they are not in chronological
order. This is no dry slog through history.
In one dream, former First Lady Dolley
Bound
By Books
Madison is showing Jefferson a Hollywood
film version of his life, one that glides past
his countless contradictions.
A recent fellow traveler, a psychologist,
wisely commented that “history is messy,
and in today’s world of black and white,
we are uncomfortable with issues that are
messy.” We agreed that it gets worse with
the historical past, especially when we are
used to scrubbed versions that clean up
the ambiguities.
We might judge Jefferson less harshly
in the historical context of the situation
250 years ago, but some things are never
right. Jefferson knew that and his writings
reflect that, but in the words of the book’s
author, he had an “unrelenting inability to
unite his words and his life.”
O’Connor said about his research,
“Eventually I came to believe that
Hemings’s feelings for Jefferson might well
have fallen somewhere along the spectrum
between love and Stockholm syndrome.”
The moral conflict of both Thomas
Jefferson and Sally Hemings is a new gut
punch on the horrors of slavery, even
more effective when told through the eyes
of people who refused to see.
Midway through the book, in one
particularly repetitive part, I questioned
whether this story was going to have
enough traction for 600 pages. Suddenly,
the story took off and I was swallowed into
an ending so intense that I periodically had
to stop reading. With no doubts, I joined
the five star brigades on Amazon.
This is a scathing indictment against
slavery, just packaged quite differently.
You may love it or hate it, but you will
not forget this book.
Celebrating 23 years of good books and memorable desserts, members of Bound by Books in Morgan Hill are (front row, l. to r.) Carol Schlegel, Cindy
Perry, Gwen Smith, Geri Rincon, Mary Ellen Peterson, Julie Denman; (back row, l. to r.) Nancy Whalen, Rhonda Harris, Wendy McCaw, Renée Fillice
and Gretchen Merrick. Missing: Jan Bear. CLUB FAVORITES: In One Person, John Irving; Personal History, Katherine Graham; Shantaram: A Novel,
Gregory David Roberts; City of Thieves: A Novel, David Benioff; The Snow Child: A Novel, Eowyn Ivey; Middlesex: A Novel, Jeffrey Eugenides; 36
Views of Mount Fuji: On Finding Myself in Japan, Cathy N. Davidson; Epitaph for a Peach: Four Seasons on My Family Farm, David Mas Masumoto.
GILROY • MORGAN HILL • SAN MARTIN
JULY / AUGUST 2016
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