A Lesson Before Dying by Ernest J. Gaines

A Lesson Before Dying is set in a small Louisiana parrish where the people live on the same plantations that they had lived as slaves one hundred years before. The setting is 1948. The main characters are Jefferson, who gets sentenced to the electric chair, Grant Wiggins, the teacher who wishes he could escape from the parish, Reverend Ambrose, Grant's Aunt (Tante Lou), and Jefferson's godmother (Miss Emma), who convinces Grant to visit her godson in jail and to make a man out of him before he dies. Another character in the book is Vivian, a married (but working on a divorce) teacher who Grant loves.


The Urban Life Experience Book Discussion Series continued on Saturday Feb. 22 with a discussion of this work by Ernest J. Gaines. We began the meeting by watching an eight minute video segment of Mr. Gaines being interviewed for the National Endowment for the Arts. There were sixteen of us, men and women, Black and white. A Lesson Before Dying was published in 1993 and won the National Book Circle Award for that year.

Ernest J. Gaines Jan. 15, 1933 - Nov. 5, 2019

 After the video segment, I started the discussion by pointing out that in the interview, the author said he was trying to portray Rev. Ambrose as the stronger of the two men, but I thought the teacher was stronger.

One of our participants agreed with me that the teacher was the strongest and that if the author was trying to portray otherwise, it didn't come across that way. In the text, the teacher does concede that on the day of Jefferson's execution he thought the minister was stronger, saying,

 (p.249) "But who was with him? Who is with you Jefferson? Is He with you, Jefferson? He is with Reverend Ambrose, because Reverend Ambrose believes. Do you believe, Jefferson? Have I done anything to make you not believe? If I have, please forgive me for being a fool. For at this moment, what else is there?"

Another book club member, Nancy, said that both the reverend and Grant were essential. The reverend would have never thought about getting him a radio. Grant was the one who could reach him.

Stacy pointed out that the story speaks to what is to be a man. All of us have a different idea as to what a man is. Grant is self-centered and brash, not realizing the sacrifice that was made for him.

Marilyn said, "It's about all of us growing into our humanity. Barbara added to this by mentioning the white guard making his step toward humanity.

Shelara said "It's your community that gives you your manhood. Jefferson said that no one ever helped him until he was dying. Jefferson expresses this idea on page 224:

"Who ever car'd my cross, Mr. Wiggins? My mama? my daddy? They dropped me when I wasn't nothing. Still don't know where they at this minute. I went in the field when I was six, driving the old water cart. I done pulled that cotton sack, I done cut cane, load cane swung that ax, chop ditch banks, since I was six... Yes, I'm youman (human) , Mr. Wiggins. But nobody didn't know that 'fore now..."

Surely, even those fortunate enough to go to school in this parish, only went a few months out of the year. They were needed in the fields. The school was held in a church. All students from first grade to fifth (most dropped out completely after the fifth grade,) were in one room, sitting on the church pews. The older children helped to teach the younger children. The protagonist Grant Wiggins feels that he's not even doing anything for these children. He's supposed to teach them reading, writing, and arithmetic, knowing all the while their futures are bleak.

I pointed out to the group that I thought that the children's Christmas pageant was so touching, and that Grant should have felt so proud but instead, he was so dejected at the end. Michael told us that I was only seeing the moment, Grant's view was transcendent.

p.151 "I had heard the same carols all my life, seen the same little play, with the same mistakes in grammar. The minister had offered the same prayer as always, Christmas or Sunday. The same people wore the same old clothes and sat in the same places. Next year it would be the same, and the year after that, the same again. Vivian said things were changing. But where were they changing?"

I mentioned that Jefferson's godmother and Grant's aunt called Vivian a woman of "quality" and wondered why they said that. Barbara L. said it was because of her light complexion and her good manners. Michael said he thought they were being sarcastic. Barbara M. strongly disagreed with Michael, saying "I don't see them (the aunt and godmother) as women who would do that (speak with sarcasm.) This was a point of great contention. Most of us agreed that Vivian's light complexion enabled her to carry on an affair while she was still married and keep her teaching job. What we didn't agree on was whether the aunt and godmother would see her as morally good. Would her complexion trump any ethical mistakes in their eyes?

Shelara called our attention to the use of Christ's crucifixion in how Jefferson's execution date was set: p. 156 "Easter," he said. He did not want to go on, but he felt he should. After all, a man was going to be put to death. "It had to be before or after Easter. It couldn't happen during Lent."

p.158 "And on Friday too. Always on Friday. Same time as He died, between twelve and three. But they can't take this one's life too soon after the recognition of His death, because it might upset the sensitive few. It can happen less than two weeks later, though, because even the sensitive few will have forgotten about their Savior's death by then."