Book 238: Anguilla (English) – Yellow Dad (Patricia J. ADAMS)

“OH! So you guh stay here till eternity-roll on a promise, a promise? Pappy say that a promise is a comfort to a fool. You wouldn’t like to get married soon?” “Yes, Jeff! Stop chattin stupidness. I aint’ no fool neither, okay? Every woman want to get married, but I ain’t guh rush him. My same father tell mi that if a man ain’t ready fuh marriage an your rush ‘im, your life will be in torment fuhever.” “An if you don’t rush him, your tink he guh rush he-self? From what Pappy tell me, men does run away like horses from marriage.”

Anguilla is an eel-shaped self-governing British Overseas Territory in the Caribbean. Here we’re in the 1960s. The story is narrated by the fairly sensible young Jeff, but is mostly about his cousin Sue and her lover Wilbert, who gets her pregnant but keeps putting off marrying her (using the pretext that the house isn’t ready yet). He seems to abandon her to go off to work in St Kitts. We’re also concerned with who is Jeff’s real father (he was taunted about this when younger). And that is pretty much the plot, apart from the resolution.

Apparently a yellow dad is dodder, a kind of parasitic plant. It must be widespread in the Caribbean, since a character from Barbados at the other end is also familiar with it. (Presumably it’s the yellow plant on the cover). It has lots of colourful names around its range, according to Wikipedia: “strangle tare, scaldweed, beggarweed, lady’s laces, fireweed, wizard’s net, devil’s guts, devil’s hair, devil’s ringlet, goldthread, hailweed, hairweed, hellbine, love vine, pull-down, strangleweed, angel hair, and witch’s hair.”, but doesn’t seem to be popular anywhere! “Yellow dad” is what Jeff’s dad’s brother-in-law, then other people, start calling Wilbert, implying that he’s a parasite. (He doesn’t seem that bad, though; before leaving Anguilla, he is always visiting Sue and the girl, obviously loving both, and helping round the house).

The story is written in Creole (in the dialogue more ‘extreme’ than in the exposition), but it wasn’t too hard to follow, mostly – it just slowed me down a bit. There are lots of great sayings and proverbs, such as “Pappy always say when frog open he mout’, croak does jump out” (meaning, “Sometimes yur gotti say what is on yur mind”). Frankly, I’m fascinated by creoles and pidgins, from a linguistic perspective.

I wouldn’t say the book is at all ‘gripping’, unlike what the blurb claims (I’m sure Dante would have allocated an appropriate corner of the Inferno for hyperbolic blurb writers!), but it was still an enjoyable feel-good read, despite or because of the Creole, and despite the simple plot – and often funny. I learned a lot about life in Anguilla (and its language).

Adams,Patricia J. (1952 – ), Yellow Dad, independently published 2019, ISBN 9781793185297