Literature Forum: Water Dancer, by Ta-Nehisi Coates

Water Dancer, by Ta-Nehisi Coates
Thursday, March 3  |  2:00pm  |  Houghton Room
Presented by Charles Clarke

This ambitious debut novel from a leading cultural analyst is a fantastical love story set deep in the morass of antebellum Virginia.  It follows its enslaved protagonist, Hiram Walker, on his urgent and perilous odyssey towards freedom in the North. The author infuses Hiram’s tale of escape with an air of magic; like the mother he cannot remember, the young man discovers he has a water-driven power which enables him to traverse great distances.  Although the novel is a slave narrative that vividly depicts the horrors of family separation, it also portrays a tender romance.