The Narrows – Ann Petry (1953)

As I think I mentioned before I will be occasionally taking part in a series of themed reads with the Librarything Virago group. February is North American authors, so many to choose from, but I had a book, newly reissued by Virago that I was desperate to read. The Narrows by Ann Petry is an incredible novel – one I feel will be hard to do justice to in a review. I read The Street by Ann Petry at the end of 2019 – probably her best known novel – but I am stunned that The Narrows has been out of print so long – especially as it is considered her masterpiece by some. The Street (1946) was the first novel by an African-American woman to sell more than a million copies. More recently the author Tayari Jones has called for a revival of her work – she certainly deserves to be better known.

The Narrows is a longer book than The Street, a little over 500 pages, but it is definitely a novel that is worth spending a little extra time with. It is told in the third person, with the perspective shifting between characters, and some parts told in flashback. It is, overall a more complex novel than The Street, but utterly compelling.

This is a novel about so much, it’s about love, lust, class, racism, tabloid journalism, the truth and betrayal – Petry writes her story flawlessly, giving us characters we won’t easily forget. Most of the characters inhabit the area of Monmouth, Connecticut called The Narrows – a Black community within what is a largely White town.

First there is Abbie Crunch a middle aged Black woman who lives on Dumble Street and rents out rooms. She is a rigidly respectable woman. Her dead husband’s hat is still on the hat stand – she thinks of him often. Her closest friend is F K Jackson (Frances) an undertaker.

Malcolm Powther is a butler at the Treadway estate, the Treadways one of the largest employers in the town – he’s the only Black member of the household staff. He and his wife Mamie become Abbie Crunch’s new boarders – bringing with them their three children. Mamie is younger than Powther, buxom, blues singing and unfaithful. Abbie greatly disapproves of her.

“Watching her, you could almost believe it was a dance of some kind, the dance of the clothes, the wetwash dance. I don’t dance. I never could, Abbie thought, I haven’t any sense of rhythm and yet she hangs clothes and I think about dancing. I don’t believe she’s got a thing on under that dress.”

Their youngest child is J. C – his mother explains to a shocked Abbie that he can decide what the J. C stand for when he is older. J. C starts to hang around Abbie – in time becoming her little shadow. Malcolm Powther adores his wife and can’t stand the thought of losing her so puts up with her infidelities, not letting her know that he knows, but driving himself up the wall at the same time. He is proud of his work, a neat, precise little man, Mrs Treadway has told him the house was never as good before he took it over. He has an uneasy friendship with Al, the White chauffeur – but is silently wounded when he hears him using the n word.

Link Williams is Abbie’s adopted son, though the two have had a difficult relationship. He is now in his mid-twenties but when Link was eight years old Abbie’s grief over the death of her husband led her to abandon Link, who took refuge with Bill Hod at The Last Chance bar down the street. Link has been seeking refuge with Bill regularly ever since – Bill is a kind of father figure – though one not averse to dishing out violence. Bill is the complete opposite to Abbie – and Abbie hates the very sight of the man. After graduating from college and spending a few years in the army, with nothing else on the horizon Link has returned to work alongside Bill and Weak Knees the chef at The Last Chance – Abbie is appalled at this waste of his education.

One late night as thick fog rolls in across the river, Link Williams is on the dock area when he hears a woman’s footsteps running in terror. This is how he meets a young woman called Camilo – a woman who in the limited light Link mistakenly takes to be a pale skinned Black woman. The two retreat to a nearby bar – where Link realises his mistake – Camilo is a White woman. However, Camilo is not completley honest with Link about who she is – as the two begin a tempestuous love affair.

Their relationship is one of complex emotions and many misunderstandings. Camilo was as shocked by Link’s blackness as he was by her whiteness. They each bring their own assumptions and prejudices about race to this fragile relationship, in the midst of which they remain capable of great passion. Place is also a big part of Petry’s story, The Narrows is a Black area within a White town in a predominately White state – Camilo has stepped outside the divisions of both race and class in her association with Link. One of the things that is particularly interesting to note is how various characters see themselves, and see others.  Over a period of a few months these two lovers indulge in furtive meetings, often using hotels in New York, a city where they can be a little more invisible.

“People like to see a king uncrowned, like to see a thoroughbred racehorse beaten when he’s running at the top of his form and has outrun everything in sight. They wanted to see that the king, the top dog, the best man, has a flaw, can be beaten like them, is vulnerable like them, can be defeated, unfrocked, uncrowned, knocked down, and thus brought right down to their level.”

There is a lot I can’t say about this novel for fear of spoilers. Truths are unveiled, and a terrible betrayal is practised – which will have consequences for several characters. When a major scandal erupts it seems everyone from the town is drawn in. Popular opinion is seldom kind.

This is a fantastic novel – an early contender for my best of the year list.