Percival Everett’s James is being marketed as a retelling of The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, but—in keeping with Everett’s history as a jazz musician—it’s more like an improvisation on Twain’s theme. In the original, considered by many to be the great American novel, Jim is the enslaved man with whom Huck travels down the Mississippi. In Everett’s novel, he sheds the diminutive nickname for a more substantial first name, but when Huck asks him what surname he’d choose for himself, he picks “Golightly”—which is either a very out-of-left-field Truman Capote reference or a sign that this novel is not as heavy or straightforward an exercise as it first might appear.
Read Full Article »
