The Watsons Go to Birmingham-1963
Mar 23rd, 2007 by Bethany
I just finished reading my book for book club this month. It's called The Watsons Go to Birmingham-1963 and was written by Christopher Paul Curtis, who won a Newbery Medal for the book. The novel is narrated from the point of view of a little African American boy named Kenny Watson, who talks about his family's experience going on a roadtrip from Flint, Michigan, to Birrmingham, Alabama, to visit his grandmother. Actually, the roadtrip and the visit to Birmingham only comprises about a quarter of the narrative. The rest is characterization of Kenny, his family, and his friends, the leadup to the trip, then his reaction to the trip.
I want to think that the story is about Kenny, but now that I've finished the book I think it might really be about his older brother, Byron, especially now that I looked up the author and found out that his other books are about boys about Byron's age. Byron is what Kenny calls a "juvenile delinquent" and the family goes to Birmingham to drop him off for a summer with his grandmother, hoping she'll reform him. Kenny is the good kid until they get to Birmingham, when suddenly he and Byron switch roles and Kenny becomes the delinquent and Byron becomes the good kid. I'm not really clear on the reason for the switch.
Kenny's two defining characteristics, according to himself, are his lazy eye and his prodigious ability to read. I don't really understand why those characteristics are important, but I feel sure that they are supposed to lend some sort of deeper meaning to the story. There's also a spot where I think it's supposed to be foreshadowing where Byron kills a bird and feels bad about it, but I don't really understand the significance of it.
I enjoyed reading this book–it's a quick read (juvenile lit.) and funny and pleasant, though there are some swear words and for that reason I wouldn't say it's a great kid's book. I especially liked the period bits, like things about the record player and the music they listened to and such. And I liked Kenny's parents and their relationship with each other and with their kids. The point of the book for me was that voilent acts of racism (or terrorism, if you want to go there) can hurt anyone and everyone and it showed how one family could be affected deeply even though they weren't really directly involved and weren't the direct or intentional targets of the violence.