By Leigh Edwards | Observer Contributor
The Help, a novel by Kathryn Stockett, was published in 2009 in the United States and has been read by millions of people across the country. Based in Jackson, Mississippi in the early 1960’s, The Help follows two maids, Aibileen and Minny, and a young Journalist, Miss Skeeter Phelan, on a journey to reveal what it’s really like being a maid for white people during segregation by publishing a book called Help. Along the way, the reader meets colorful and sometimes downright mean characters, such as Miss Hilly Hollbrook, which keeps you turning the page and rooting for the maids and Miss Skeeter the whole way.
The characters Stockett created gives the reader a good depiction of how the characters act and what they look like within the first few moments of introducing each, which leaves no room for the infamous “guessing game.” Immediately knowing and understanding the character’s foundation in the book allows the reader to instantaneously fall in love with a character or inevitably dislike them. The Help doesn’t gently ease you into the characters or what they stand for; within moments Stockett has given you the meat and potatoes of the book, or would “fried chicken and collard greens” be more appropriate?
Stockett did an excellent job doing her research for the book. The reader would never have to guess who wrote the point of view for each character because the reader automatically assumes the characters have written it themselves. For example, the character Aibileen is so well written, one would never assume it was entirely written by Stockett, a middle aged white woman originally from the South. The diction for each character is exactly on point, which is so important and crucial for this book because it is based on a very specific period of time with very specific types of women.
Ultimately the book projects the message of equality and that the color of someone’s skin does not determine their integrity and worth as a human being. Stockett did an amazing job portraying this theme, leaving the reader fulfilled and moved. The Help is a book that will leave you a better person and is certainly not a book you merely want to pass by.
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