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Holt McDougal Library, High School with Connections: Individual Reader the Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman 1998
Miss Jane Pittman. She is one of the most unforgettable heroines in American fiction, a woman whose life has come to symbolize the struggle for freedom, dignity, and justice. Ernest J. Gaines’s now-classic novel—written as an autobiography—spans one hundred years of Miss Jane’s remarkable life, from her childhood as a slave on a Louisiana plantation to the Civil Rights era of the 1960s. It is a story of courage and survival, history, bigotry, and hope—as seen through the eyes of a woman who lived through it all. A historical tour de force, a triumph of fiction, Miss Jane’s eloquent narrative brings to life an important story of race in America—and stands as a landmark work for our time.
384 pages, Paperback
First published April 1, 1971
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January 1, 2016
The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman: Ernest J. Gaines' novel of the long journey to freedom
The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman by Ernest J. Gaines
was a selection chosen by members of On the Southern Literary Trail as a group read for January, 2016. Special thanks to Trail member Jane for nominating this work.
A Note from the incomplete reader
The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman was originally published by Ernest J. Gainesthrough the Dial Press in 1971. A second printing followed in 1972.
The Second Printing
When Gaine's novel was filmed as a television movie in 1974 sales mushroomed with the issue of the mass-market Bantam Paperback tie-in edition. Cicely Tyson played the title role from approximately age 23 to 110. The production garnered nine Emmy Awards, including Best Actress for Ms. Tyson.
Cicely Tyson portrayed a century of the life of Miss Jane Pittman
I was a first year law student when "The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman" first aired. I was twenty-two years old. But it was thirty-eight years later, as a sixty year old man, before I read the novel. It was the Bantam movie tie-in edition I read, after checking it out of my local public library.
Now that check-outs and check-ins are digitized, it is no longer possible to see how often a book has been checked out, or when it was read. But you can still tell from the condition of a book when it has passed through generations of hands. The spine was loose, bowed from having been placed down many times, and the cover had a distinct curl indicating one or readers had been cover and page benders, turning what had been read to the back of the volume. Previous readers had dog-eared the pages. Others had underlined passages, some times in pencil, some times in ink. Inevitably the same passages had been marked more than once, starred, underscored in different colors, but clearly having some impact on many readers.
But I was not one of them. I was born and raised in Alabama. No book by an African-American author appeared as a part of my curriculum through high school. While I was raised by my mother and family to "Sir" and "Ma'am" any person, no matter the color of their skin, neither had they ever been exposed to African American literature of any sort. It was only in college that I was introduced to Charles W. Chestnutt,briefly, by my favorite literature professor O.B. Emerson, during his Southern Literature Course which I took in 1973.
I knew of the injustice suffered by Tom Robinson in To Kill a Mockingbird and idolized Atticus Finch because he fought for justice for an innocent man. I read The Confessions of Nat Turner, was furious at the thought of slavery, but wondered why the story was written by a white man, William Styron. It occurred to me to ask if I were a literary racist.
It was during my work as an Assistant District Attorney working child abuse and domestic violence cases that Alice Walkerbegan a literary awakening for me with The Color Purple. Then came Toni Morrison, Maya Angelou, and Natasha Trethewey. I began to assuage my guilt over my ignorance of an entire culture's literature.
But I wondered where were the male writers? Surely there was someone other than Chestnutt. Oh, I could read Booker T. Washington, and Frederick Douglass. I have their books. But I wanted someone more contemporary. And then, thanks to a member of our goodreads group On the Southern Literary Trail there he was. Ernest J. Gaines.
Ernest J. Gaines, an author I'm grateful to have discovered
My reading of Gaines has not followed my usual practice. I've read him as I've found him. First came A Lesson Before Dying, then A Gathering of Old Men, and now The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman. Each has affected me deeply, but I chose to share my thoughts regarding Jane Pittman because of the magnificent voice of the protagonist and the sweep of history seen through the eyes of one person, with the assistance of those who shared parts of their lives with her and lived around her.
Gaines structures his novel as a series of interviews of Jane Pittman conducted by an unseen and unnamed teacher of history. The "Teacher" emerges much as Homer does in The Odyssey, calling on Jane Pittman to tell of her personal odyssey to freedom from the final days of her life as a slave during the American Civil War up to the Civil Rights Movement of the early 1960s.
A Note From The Teacher
"I had been trying to get Miss Jane Pittman to tell me her story of her life for several years now, but each time I asked her she told me there was no story to tell. I told her she was over a hundred years old, she had been a slave in this country so there had to be a story..."
From the Interviews of Miss Jane Pittman
The Teacher told me he wouldn't take no for an answer. So I asked him when he wanted to get started. He had one of those recorders. One thing led to something else. Sometimes I wasn't able to remember. But there were all those of my people around me who were my memory when it was gone. The Teacher said it was all our story. I guess it was.
When you are born a slave like I was you don't own anything. Not even your ma'am and Pap get to name you. The Mistress named me Ticey. I didn't start out as Jane Pittman.
It was near the end of the war. The Secesh come through. Mistress told me to take water out to them. One boy said if it was up to him, he would let the niggers go, but it wasn't up to him.
Then the Yankees came on following the Secesh. It was a Yankee soldier gave me his daughter's own name, Jane Brown. He told me after the war to come see him in Ohio. When Mistress called me Ticey, I told her I wasn't Ticey anymore, I was Jane Brown. She had Master hold me down and she beat me with a cat-o-nine tales an' put me to work in the fields.
I don't even know what happened to my Pap. I barely remember my Ma'am. They killed her when I was bout five.
It was more than a year after the war Master told us we was emancipated. We could stay but he couldn't pay us nothin'. But we could work on shares. It was slavery all over again. About half of us left. Big Laura you'd call the leader. She carried her baby daughter. I watched after her boy Ned. We didn't know where we was goin' or how we was goin' to live. We only knew we were free at last.
Then one day the Patrollers found us. They was like the Ku Klux. They killed ever one of us except me n' Ned. I had been able to keep him quiet. I found big Laura. Them men had even killed Laura's girl child.
The Patrollers
I made up my mind I was gonna get to Ohio no matter what. Ned, he took two stones, flint stones from his Ma'am. He carried them with him wherever he went. I guess it was his way of remembering his Ma'am. But I think ever time he struck them rocks together what he was makin' was the spark of freedom Laura had wanted for him n' ever body else.
Each day we walked. But we was still in Luzanna. I hung on to finding freedom in Ohio until one night we came up on the house of an old white man. He had been a sailor at one point in his life. He had maps ever where in his house. He told me I'd have to cross Mississippi or up through Arkansas n' I might take my whole life gettin' to Ohio. He told me he could be Secesh or he could be a friend of my people. You know I think he was a friend of my people. He could jus' as easy told me sure you take on off for Ohio.
So I decided to stay in Luzanna n' find my freedom there some day. I took work on a plantation. Ned was in a school. I never looked on Ned as mine until his teacher had him read his lesson to me n' I was so proud of him I loved him as if he were my own.
The only good that come to my people after the war was when the Beero showed up. We were freed men and women. But it didn't last. The North made up with the South, and those northern businessmen came down South to make money with the white businessmen. It was slavery all over again.
A Branch of the Freedmen's Bureau
The years went on n' Ned went off to Kansas to find an education. I took Joe Pittman, the horse breaker on the plantation as my husband. I couldn't have chilren of my own. The doctor said I had been beat so bad when I was still a slave I had been hurt inside.
There was no horse Joe couldn't break. A big rancher hired him to come out to Texas n' made Joe, a black man, his head horse man. But there's always a horse a man can't break. I lost Joe. N' from then on I was just Miss Jane Pittman.
I went back to Luzanna. My Ned came home from Kansas. He was full of ideas. He had been down to Cuba in that Spanish American War. He talked about not holdin' with the Booker T. Washington sayin' that the black people needed to stay off from the white folks, work hard and stand on there on. He took after the ideas of Frederick Douglas n' said that this world was for all folks black n' white. He was a teacher. I still remember hearin' him talkin' to the chilren on the plantation. He said, "This earth is yours and don’t let that man out there take it from you."
Booker T. Washington
Frederick Douglass
Now there was a Cajun named Albert Cluveau. He would sit on my porch n' talk. He'd drink tea with me, n' we'd go fishin together' sometimes. Albert would talk about killin' like it was nuthin'. Albert told me if Ned didn't stop his teachin' n' leave, he'd been told to kill him. N' he said he'd do what he was told to do.
Ned wouldn't leave. Even knowin' he was going to die. One night Albert Cluveau met my Ned on the road n' shot him through the chest with a shot gun. Black people have had to fight for whatever they ever got. Ned would never quit. But I sure miss him.
There was more wars. There's always wars. I thought after all our young men fought the Germans n' Japanese things might be changin'. There was even a black man played baseball for the Dodgers. I never missed Jackie Robinson when he was playin' for the Dodgers. But things hadn't really changed.
Miss Jane's favorite ball player, Jackie Robinson
We had a young man named Jimmy. He was the son of sharecroppers on the plantation. We all thought he might be The One, who would grow up n' make a difference for our people. We wanted him to make a preacher or a teacher.
Jimmy went off to school. He got in with young Fred Shuttlesworth and that young preacher Martin Luther King, Jr. They sent him back home to us. He told us we hadn't even begun to fight in Luzanna.
Fred Shuttlesworth
Martin Luther King, Jr.
Jimmy asked us all to meet him at the Courthouse the next mornin', gonna get us some civil rights. I plan on goin'. He reminds me a lot of my Ned. But Albert Cluveau's been long dead. I'm not sure if I'm 110 or I'm a 111, but freedom's been a long time comin'.
Miss Jane at the Courthouse
The Incomplete Reader Wraps Up
Ernest J. Gaines filled The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman with so much historical content, and the voice of Jane Pittman carried such a sense of truth, that upon its original publication, many people thought the novel was non-fiction. Gaines said,
"Some people have asked me whether or not The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman is fiction or nonfiction. It is fiction. When Dial Press first sent it out, they did not put "a novel" on the galleys or on the dustjacket, so a lot of people had the feeling that it could have been real. ...I did a lot of research in books to give some facts to what Miss Jane could talk about, but these are my creations. I read quite a few interviews performed with former slaves by the WPA during the thirties and I got their rhythm and how they said certain things. But I never interviewed anybody."
Well, he could have fooled me. Ironically, as I finish this review, "The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman" is on the television. I am watching it thirty-eight years after I first saw it. It is good. However, it cannot match the power of the seamless narrative of Gaines' powerful novel.
As for that battered paperback I checked out of our library, I've bought a new trade edition to go on the shelves. It will be a clean slate for others to begin underlining the passages they love and to make their own notes. Periodically, I'll check on that book and see how things are coming along. There's still a lot of life left in the story of Jane Pittman. For us all. Thank you, Mr. Gaines.
A New Book For the Library
October 31, 2014
I met Ernest J. Gaines at the Louisiana Festival of the Book. He smiled at the first editions I handed him. "It's been a long time since I've seen one of these," he said as he opened my first edition of The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman. He smiled, looking at the original editions of his novels. I offered him my fountain pen. He carefully signed each copy, nodding, as he looked at each one. His signature was sure and strong. Gaines was a gracious man, thanking me for sharing my books with him. "No. Professor Gaines, thank you."
He handed me my pen. He extended his hand. I took his in mine. His grip was sure and steady. We shook on our exchange.
I asked if he minded if we could be photographed during our meeting. "Why, no," he said. A young woman behind me took my camera, and clicked away.
It was a very memorable day. Read Ernest J. Gaines. This book, and every one you come across. You will find, as I did, Gaines is one of America's true literary icons.
Meeting Ernest J. Gaines. A Good Day
The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman by Ernest J. Gaines
was a selection chosen by members of On the Southern Literary Trail as a group read for January, 2016. Special thanks to Trail member Jane for nominating this work.
A Note from the incomplete reader
The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman was originally published by Ernest J. Gainesthrough the Dial Press in 1971. A second printing followed in 1972.
The Second Printing
When Gaine's novel was filmed as a television movie in 1974 sales mushroomed with the issue of the mass-market Bantam Paperback tie-in edition. Cicely Tyson played the title role from approximately age 23 to 110. The production garnered nine Emmy Awards, including Best Actress for Ms. Tyson.
Cicely Tyson portrayed a century of the life of Miss Jane Pittman
I was a first year law student when "The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman" first aired. I was twenty-two years old. But it was thirty-eight years later, as a sixty year old man, before I read the novel. It was the Bantam movie tie-in edition I read, after checking it out of my local public library.
Now that check-outs and check-ins are digitized, it is no longer possible to see how often a book has been checked out, or when it was read. But you can still tell from the condition of a book when it has passed through generations of hands. The spine was loose, bowed from having been placed down many times, and the cover had a distinct curl indicating one or readers had been cover and page benders, turning what had been read to the back of the volume. Previous readers had dog-eared the pages. Others had underlined passages, some times in pencil, some times in ink. Inevitably the same passages had been marked more than once, starred, underscored in different colors, but clearly having some impact on many readers.
But I was not one of them. I was born and raised in Alabama. No book by an African-American author appeared as a part of my curriculum through high school. While I was raised by my mother and family to "Sir" and "Ma'am" any person, no matter the color of their skin, neither had they ever been exposed to African American literature of any sort. It was only in college that I was introduced to Charles W. Chestnutt,briefly, by my favorite literature professor O.B. Emerson, during his Southern Literature Course which I took in 1973.
I knew of the injustice suffered by Tom Robinson in To Kill a Mockingbird and idolized Atticus Finch because he fought for justice for an innocent man. I read The Confessions of Nat Turner, was furious at the thought of slavery, but wondered why the story was written by a white man, William Styron. It occurred to me to ask if I were a literary racist.
It was during my work as an Assistant District Attorney working child abuse and domestic violence cases that Alice Walkerbegan a literary awakening for me with The Color Purple. Then came Toni Morrison, Maya Angelou, and Natasha Trethewey. I began to assuage my guilt over my ignorance of an entire culture's literature.
But I wondered where were the male writers? Surely there was someone other than Chestnutt. Oh, I could read Booker T. Washington, and Frederick Douglass. I have their books. But I wanted someone more contemporary. And then, thanks to a member of our goodreads group On the Southern Literary Trail there he was. Ernest J. Gaines.
Ernest J. Gaines, an author I'm grateful to have discovered
My reading of Gaines has not followed my usual practice. I've read him as I've found him. First came A Lesson Before Dying, then A Gathering of Old Men, and now The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman. Each has affected me deeply, but I chose to share my thoughts regarding Jane Pittman because of the magnificent voice of the protagonist and the sweep of history seen through the eyes of one person, with the assistance of those who shared parts of their lives with her and lived around her.
Gaines structures his novel as a series of interviews of Jane Pittman conducted by an unseen and unnamed teacher of history. The "Teacher" emerges much as Homer does in The Odyssey, calling on Jane Pittman to tell of her personal odyssey to freedom from the final days of her life as a slave during the American Civil War up to the Civil Rights Movement of the early 1960s.
A Note From The Teacher
"I had been trying to get Miss Jane Pittman to tell me her story of her life for several years now, but each time I asked her she told me there was no story to tell. I told her she was over a hundred years old, she had been a slave in this country so there had to be a story..."
From the Interviews of Miss Jane Pittman
The Teacher told me he wouldn't take no for an answer. So I asked him when he wanted to get started. He had one of those recorders. One thing led to something else. Sometimes I wasn't able to remember. But there were all those of my people around me who were my memory when it was gone. The Teacher said it was all our story. I guess it was.
When you are born a slave like I was you don't own anything. Not even your ma'am and Pap get to name you. The Mistress named me Ticey. I didn't start out as Jane Pittman.
It was near the end of the war. The Secesh come through. Mistress told me to take water out to them. One boy said if it was up to him, he would let the niggers go, but it wasn't up to him.
Then the Yankees came on following the Secesh. It was a Yankee soldier gave me his daughter's own name, Jane Brown. He told me after the war to come see him in Ohio. When Mistress called me Ticey, I told her I wasn't Ticey anymore, I was Jane Brown. She had Master hold me down and she beat me with a cat-o-nine tales an' put me to work in the fields.
I don't even know what happened to my Pap. I barely remember my Ma'am. They killed her when I was bout five.
It was more than a year after the war Master told us we was emancipated. We could stay but he couldn't pay us nothin'. But we could work on shares. It was slavery all over again. About half of us left. Big Laura you'd call the leader. She carried her baby daughter. I watched after her boy Ned. We didn't know where we was goin' or how we was goin' to live. We only knew we were free at last.
Then one day the Patrollers found us. They was like the Ku Klux. They killed ever one of us except me n' Ned. I had been able to keep him quiet. I found big Laura. Them men had even killed Laura's girl child.
The Patrollers
I made up my mind I was gonna get to Ohio no matter what. Ned, he took two stones, flint stones from his Ma'am. He carried them with him wherever he went. I guess it was his way of remembering his Ma'am. But I think ever time he struck them rocks together what he was makin' was the spark of freedom Laura had wanted for him n' ever body else.
Each day we walked. But we was still in Luzanna. I hung on to finding freedom in Ohio until one night we came up on the house of an old white man. He had been a sailor at one point in his life. He had maps ever where in his house. He told me I'd have to cross Mississippi or up through Arkansas n' I might take my whole life gettin' to Ohio. He told me he could be Secesh or he could be a friend of my people. You know I think he was a friend of my people. He could jus' as easy told me sure you take on off for Ohio.
So I decided to stay in Luzanna n' find my freedom there some day. I took work on a plantation. Ned was in a school. I never looked on Ned as mine until his teacher had him read his lesson to me n' I was so proud of him I loved him as if he were my own.
The only good that come to my people after the war was when the Beero showed up. We were freed men and women. But it didn't last. The North made up with the South, and those northern businessmen came down South to make money with the white businessmen. It was slavery all over again.
A Branch of the Freedmen's Bureau
The years went on n' Ned went off to Kansas to find an education. I took Joe Pittman, the horse breaker on the plantation as my husband. I couldn't have chilren of my own. The doctor said I had been beat so bad when I was still a slave I had been hurt inside.
There was no horse Joe couldn't break. A big rancher hired him to come out to Texas n' made Joe, a black man, his head horse man. But there's always a horse a man can't break. I lost Joe. N' from then on I was just Miss Jane Pittman.
I went back to Luzanna. My Ned came home from Kansas. He was full of ideas. He had been down to Cuba in that Spanish American War. He talked about not holdin' with the Booker T. Washington sayin' that the black people needed to stay off from the white folks, work hard and stand on there on. He took after the ideas of Frederick Douglas n' said that this world was for all folks black n' white. He was a teacher. I still remember hearin' him talkin' to the chilren on the plantation. He said, "This earth is yours and don’t let that man out there take it from you."
Booker T. Washington
Frederick Douglass
Now there was a Cajun named Albert Cluveau. He would sit on my porch n' talk. He'd drink tea with me, n' we'd go fishin together' sometimes. Albert would talk about killin' like it was nuthin'. Albert told me if Ned didn't stop his teachin' n' leave, he'd been told to kill him. N' he said he'd do what he was told to do.
Ned wouldn't leave. Even knowin' he was going to die. One night Albert Cluveau met my Ned on the road n' shot him through the chest with a shot gun. Black people have had to fight for whatever they ever got. Ned would never quit. But I sure miss him.
There was more wars. There's always wars. I thought after all our young men fought the Germans n' Japanese things might be changin'. There was even a black man played baseball for the Dodgers. I never missed Jackie Robinson when he was playin' for the Dodgers. But things hadn't really changed.
Miss Jane's favorite ball player, Jackie Robinson
We had a young man named Jimmy. He was the son of sharecroppers on the plantation. We all thought he might be The One, who would grow up n' make a difference for our people. We wanted him to make a preacher or a teacher.
Jimmy went off to school. He got in with young Fred Shuttlesworth and that young preacher Martin Luther King, Jr. They sent him back home to us. He told us we hadn't even begun to fight in Luzanna.
Fred Shuttlesworth
Martin Luther King, Jr.
Jimmy asked us all to meet him at the Courthouse the next mornin', gonna get us some civil rights. I plan on goin'. He reminds me a lot of my Ned. But Albert Cluveau's been long dead. I'm not sure if I'm 110 or I'm a 111, but freedom's been a long time comin'.
Miss Jane at the Courthouse
The Incomplete Reader Wraps Up
Ernest J. Gaines filled The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman with so much historical content, and the voice of Jane Pittman carried such a sense of truth, that upon its original publication, many people thought the novel was non-fiction. Gaines said,
"Some people have asked me whether or not The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman is fiction or nonfiction. It is fiction. When Dial Press first sent it out, they did not put "a novel" on the galleys or on the dustjacket, so a lot of people had the feeling that it could have been real. ...I did a lot of research in books to give some facts to what Miss Jane could talk about, but these are my creations. I read quite a few interviews performed with former slaves by the WPA during the thirties and I got their rhythm and how they said certain things. But I never interviewed anybody."
Well, he could have fooled me. Ironically, as I finish this review, "The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman" is on the television. I am watching it thirty-eight years after I first saw it. It is good. However, it cannot match the power of the seamless narrative of Gaines' powerful novel.
As for that battered paperback I checked out of our library, I've bought a new trade edition to go on the shelves. It will be a clean slate for others to begin underlining the passages they love and to make their own notes. Periodically, I'll check on that book and see how things are coming along. There's still a lot of life left in the story of Jane Pittman. For us all. Thank you, Mr. Gaines.
A New Book For the Library
October 31, 2014
I met Ernest J. Gaines at the Louisiana Festival of the Book. He smiled at the first editions I handed him. "It's been a long time since I've seen one of these," he said as he opened my first edition of The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman. He smiled, looking at the original editions of his novels. I offered him my fountain pen. He carefully signed each copy, nodding, as he looked at each one. His signature was sure and strong. Gaines was a gracious man, thanking me for sharing my books with him. "No. Professor Gaines, thank you."
He handed me my pen. He extended his hand. I took his in mine. His grip was sure and steady. We shook on our exchange.
I asked if he minded if we could be photographed during our meeting. "Why, no," he said. A young woman behind me took my camera, and clicked away.
It was a very memorable day. Read Ernest J. Gaines. This book, and every one you come across. You will find, as I did, Gaines is one of America's true literary icons.
Meeting Ernest J. Gaines. A Good Day
May 17, 2021
Fantastic.
January 9, 2016
Ernest J. Gaines has given us a fictional autobiography of a woman who has attained legendary status in literature, and in film history as well. Miss Jane lived through black history, first as a slave in Louisiana, then as a strong, courageous woman trying to maintain her sense of worth and dignity while being treated as less than human by white southerners. The journey took her from being set free as a slave at 10 years old through 100 years, from reconstruction to the Civil Rights era, at which time she set herself free by deciding to march in a protest rally.
This is just the second Gaines book I have read. I intend to get to them all because he makes me see a side of race relations that has escaped me by forcing me to confront the reality of the issues instead of the myths. That's quite an accomplishment for an author.
I have to mention one passage that drew goosebumps. Miss Jane is describing the floods of 1927, the levees that failed because white men thought they could control the rivers by force, and the lasting damage that was done. "Now he's built his concrete spillways to control the water. But one day the water will break down his spillways just like it broke through the levee. That little Frenchman was long dead when the water broke his levee in '27, and these that built the spillways will be long dead, too, but the water will never die. That same water the Indians used to believe in will run free again. You just wait and see."
This book was written in 1971, almost 35 years before Hurricane Katrina. But Miss Jane knew, she surely did.
This is just the second Gaines book I have read. I intend to get to them all because he makes me see a side of race relations that has escaped me by forcing me to confront the reality of the issues instead of the myths. That's quite an accomplishment for an author.
I have to mention one passage that drew goosebumps. Miss Jane is describing the floods of 1927, the levees that failed because white men thought they could control the rivers by force, and the lasting damage that was done. "Now he's built his concrete spillways to control the water. But one day the water will break down his spillways just like it broke through the levee. That little Frenchman was long dead when the water broke his levee in '27, and these that built the spillways will be long dead, too, but the water will never die. That same water the Indians used to believe in will run free again. You just wait and see."
This book was written in 1971, almost 35 years before Hurricane Katrina. But Miss Jane knew, she surely did.
October 17, 2022
Written on the heels of the Civil Rights Movement and the death of Martin Luther King, The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman is a powerful, sweeping novel about the struggle from slavery to resistance. Miss Jane is a 110 year old, recounting her life to a young man with a tape recorder, and it is only a few pages in before the reader is completely lost in the life she has led.
Twelve years old when the Civil War ends, she is old enough to have endured the worst of slavery, the beginnings of freedom, and the reconstruction of the South, in which much is promised and little is realized. Uneducated herself, she sees the value of schools, as she watches the progression of her “people” from servitude to a longing for true independence.
The story culminates with the beginnings of the push for true freedom in Louisiana, that push arriving behind the progress already made in Alabama, Mississippi, and Georgia. Gaines, it seems to me, has a full grasp of what makes this struggle so difficult, and only part of that has to do with the resistance of the White population to the changes coming; so much of it has to do with lifting the veil from the eyes of an accepting and fearful Black population.
And the worst pain, Jimmy, you can inflict is what you doing now–that’s trying to make them see they good as the other man. You see, Jimmy, they been told from the cradle they wasn’t–that they wasn’t much better than the mule. You keep telling them this, over and over, for hundreds and hundreds of years, they start thinking that way.
When the Civil Rights Movement began in Georgia, I was about the same age as Miss Jane was at the end of the Civil War. Old enough, certainly, to understand what was going on around me and too young to have any impact on it. I watched it unfold on television and in the streets of my home town, and I felt the fear of both the blacks who were seeking equality and the whites who were afraid of a change to a system that had been in place long before any of them were born. This book is a reminder of that personal bravery and sacrifice. While this is my first reading of the book, I remember the effect the movie had on all of us when it was released in 1974. That power is still present in these pages.
If there is anything else we should take away from this novel, I think it is the knowledge that change is hard. It requires effort.
And for the rest of her life Mary Agnes was trying to make up for this: for what her own people had done to her own people. Trying to make up for the past–and that you cannot do.
Like Miss Mary Agnes, we will never make up for the past, but we are responsible for the future.
Twelve years old when the Civil War ends, she is old enough to have endured the worst of slavery, the beginnings of freedom, and the reconstruction of the South, in which much is promised and little is realized. Uneducated herself, she sees the value of schools, as she watches the progression of her “people” from servitude to a longing for true independence.
The story culminates with the beginnings of the push for true freedom in Louisiana, that push arriving behind the progress already made in Alabama, Mississippi, and Georgia. Gaines, it seems to me, has a full grasp of what makes this struggle so difficult, and only part of that has to do with the resistance of the White population to the changes coming; so much of it has to do with lifting the veil from the eyes of an accepting and fearful Black population.
And the worst pain, Jimmy, you can inflict is what you doing now–that’s trying to make them see they good as the other man. You see, Jimmy, they been told from the cradle they wasn’t–that they wasn’t much better than the mule. You keep telling them this, over and over, for hundreds and hundreds of years, they start thinking that way.
When the Civil Rights Movement began in Georgia, I was about the same age as Miss Jane was at the end of the Civil War. Old enough, certainly, to understand what was going on around me and too young to have any impact on it. I watched it unfold on television and in the streets of my home town, and I felt the fear of both the blacks who were seeking equality and the whites who were afraid of a change to a system that had been in place long before any of them were born. This book is a reminder of that personal bravery and sacrifice. While this is my first reading of the book, I remember the effect the movie had on all of us when it was released in 1974. That power is still present in these pages.
If there is anything else we should take away from this novel, I think it is the knowledge that change is hard. It requires effort.
And for the rest of her life Mary Agnes was trying to make up for this: for what her own people had done to her own people. Trying to make up for the past–and that you cannot do.
Like Miss Mary Agnes, we will never make up for the past, but we are responsible for the future.
May 4, 2021
The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman
by Ernest J. Gaines
This is a fictional autobiography. Regardless, it is historically correct in the social aspects.
A reporter comes to see Jane who is turning 110 years old and he asks if she would share some of her life stories. This is 1962. The book then flashes back to her life as a slave, her freedom but working like a slave, on up til present. It's a book of sorrow, pain, joy, love, and strength. A lot is happening in their town with civil rights in 1962. She has one last adventure left in her before she dies. I enjoyed it but keep tissue handy.
by Ernest J. Gaines
This is a fictional autobiography. Regardless, it is historically correct in the social aspects.
A reporter comes to see Jane who is turning 110 years old and he asks if she would share some of her life stories. This is 1962. The book then flashes back to her life as a slave, her freedom but working like a slave, on up til present. It's a book of sorrow, pain, joy, love, and strength. A lot is happening in their town with civil rights in 1962. She has one last adventure left in her before she dies. I enjoyed it but keep tissue handy.
February 11, 2016
Miss Jane Pittman is a spunky survivor, a strong black woman over 100 years old. She narrates the story of her life from her days as a slave, after emancipation, and during the 1960s Civil Rights Movement. In a Missouri Review interview in 1999, Ernest J. Gaines said that he grew up on a plantation in Louisiana around his handicapped aunt and other older people who visited her. Jane is a fictional character based on the kinds of experiences those people might have gone through, using their vocabulary and the dialects he could remember from his childhood. He also used slave narratives in researching her story.
The role of the strong black man also comes through in the book. Jane's husband, Joe Pittman, proves his manhood by breaking the toughest horses. Jane acts as a mother figure to both Ned and Jimmy, strong men who take huge personal risks in protesting against the discrimination of blacks.
As a slave Jane never learned to read and write, so the premise is that a teacher is taping her oral narrative. Jane is spirited and witty in spite of having faced many challenges and losing people she loved. The author is a master of dialogue with a warm conversational style. The reader feels like they are spending an afternoon in Louisiana talking with the wonderful Miss Jane Pittman.
Interesting interview with Ernest J. Gaines about writing his early books and teaching creative writing:
http://www.missourireview.com/archive...
The role of the strong black man also comes through in the book. Jane's husband, Joe Pittman, proves his manhood by breaking the toughest horses. Jane acts as a mother figure to both Ned and Jimmy, strong men who take huge personal risks in protesting against the discrimination of blacks.
As a slave Jane never learned to read and write, so the premise is that a teacher is taping her oral narrative. Jane is spirited and witty in spite of having faced many challenges and losing people she loved. The author is a master of dialogue with a warm conversational style. The reader feels like they are spending an afternoon in Louisiana talking with the wonderful Miss Jane Pittman.
Interesting interview with Ernest J. Gaines about writing his early books and teaching creative writing:
http://www.missourireview.com/archive...
February 7, 2021
Oh, Jane, you are an icon, unforgettable to those of us who embarked upon your life’s journey through the pages of The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman. This is a fictional account of Miss Jane’s life created by Ernest J. Gaines and has become a classic of African-American literature. Miss Jane tells her story in her own words as she remembers the events of her lifetime spanning 100 years. She begins telling about when she was a young slave girl in Louisiana at the end of the Civil War. She was a determined and spunky child who endured and overcame some of the most horrifying circumstances when the Emancipation Proclamation allowed her and a group of freed slaves to leave the plantation even though they had no idea where they were going nor of the dangers they could still face. Jane just wanted to head to Ohio not realizing how far that really was from Louisiana. She never makes it to Ohio and never leaves Louisiana.
Jane’s determination and courage are a common theme throughout her life. She spends many years during the reconstruction back on a plantation and witnessing attempts for schools for black children to open and stay running. She also saw the boy she saved, Ned, grow up to fight for rights for African-Americans. So much negativity and harsh treatment by white southerners kept this fight a very precarious situation. Life for the freed slaves was tough especially during the Jim Crow era and many of those blacks who tried to fight for their rights and against racial injustice were killed.
Her story continues on into the Civil Rights fight when she becomes convinced of the importance that she represent her generation (the older ones who were reluctant to fight) and attend a protest rally. A truly inspiring act at her age! Reading Miss Jane’s story, you want to believe that she was a real person. Gaines, however, created a very realistic portrayal of what one woman’s courageous life could have been like.
Jane’s determination and courage are a common theme throughout her life. She spends many years during the reconstruction back on a plantation and witnessing attempts for schools for black children to open and stay running. She also saw the boy she saved, Ned, grow up to fight for rights for African-Americans. So much negativity and harsh treatment by white southerners kept this fight a very precarious situation. Life for the freed slaves was tough especially during the Jim Crow era and many of those blacks who tried to fight for their rights and against racial injustice were killed.
Her story continues on into the Civil Rights fight when she becomes convinced of the importance that she represent her generation (the older ones who were reluctant to fight) and attend a protest rally. A truly inspiring act at her age! Reading Miss Jane’s story, you want to believe that she was a real person. Gaines, however, created a very realistic portrayal of what one woman’s courageous life could have been like.
December 25, 2015
How does one write a novel that encompasses the entire black experience from slavery to the Civil Rights Era? Well, if the author is Ernest J. Gaines then you tell it through the eyes of someone who lived through it all. begins with Ticey, a ten or eleven year-old slave girl who assumes a new name, Jane, at the advice of a Yankee soldier. It ends almost 100 years later when Jane, now Miss Jane Pittman, becomes witness to the birth of a new era of freedom.
This is a story that one thinks one knows, even if they haven’t read it. I had it in the back of my mind for years that I had read this book or at least seen the movie but the truth is I had not. Maybe I had seen or read similar stories but more likely I just thought I knew how such a story would go. While this may be so, Miss Jane’s narration provided quite a few insights that I had never considered before and offered a unique point of view. It is a challenge to tell 100 years of history in under 300 pages and there are places where the pace gets a little choppy but this is to be expected considering the plot device put forth in the introduction. Gaines, as the editor has compiled and put together from many hours of recordings of interviews with Jane and her friends.
4.5 stars
This is a story that one thinks one knows, even if they haven’t read it. I had it in the back of my mind for years that I had read this book or at least seen the movie but the truth is I had not. Maybe I had seen or read similar stories but more likely I just thought I knew how such a story would go. While this may be so, Miss Jane’s narration provided quite a few insights that I had never considered before and offered a unique point of view. It is a challenge to tell 100 years of history in under 300 pages and there are places where the pace gets a little choppy but this is to be expected considering the plot device put forth in the introduction. Gaines, as the editor has compiled and put together from many hours of recordings of interviews with Jane and her friends.
4.5 stars
January 15, 2016
The author using the guise of an autobiography, has Miss Jane Pittman, who lives to be around 110, telling her story and it's quite an interesting one as she lived through being a slave, to emancipation, and on through to the civil rights era. I think I read this first in Junior High-school , that's probably why it reminded me of a school assignment. It has it's dramatic moments but overall Jane comes across as a bit unemotional and the book generally lacked the detail I wanted more of. I also didn't like the 10 year skips in the dialogue. I've read lots of interesting books about this time period. This was good, but not great for me. 3 stars
April 10, 2025
الكتاب يتناول حياة " جين بتمان"، سيدة تجاوزت المائة عام قابلها الكاتب وقَصَّت عليه ما حدث لها خلال الأعوام التي شهدت إندلاع الحرب الأهلية فى أمريكا وإصدار قانون تحرير العبيد، وكيف كانت معاناتها هى وأمثالها من العبيد، وما تعرضوا له من أهوال وأفعال بشعة.
حاولت الإلمام بالأحداث على الرغم من ترجمة الكتاب السيئة، والتى تصل فى بعض الأجزاء حد المعاناة، وتدفعك للشعور بالملل والإستفزاز .
》الكتاب كان يستحق ترجمة أفضل.
حاولت الإلمام بالأحداث على الرغم من ترجمة الكتاب السيئة، والتى تصل فى بعض الأجزاء حد المعاناة، وتدفعك للشعور بالملل والإستفزاز .
》الكتاب كان يستحق ترجمة أفضل.
January 29, 2015
I love Gaines easy writing style. One the best protagonist in southern literature. Excellent!
July 21, 2020
I read this as a schoolboy and was captivated by it. I’d like to read his A Lesson Before Dying, which is said to be his master work.
February 18, 2012
I am kind of stingy with my ratings -- I would make it a 2 1/2 if I could, because it was better than "okay" but I didn't quite "like" it. I didn't DISlike it, either. After reading "The Help," I wanted to read some more historical fiction taking place during the Civil Rights Movement. This biography was suggested to me by the librarian, and it was a pretty easy read. It followed the life of Jane Pittman from her childhood as a slave through emancipation, trying to get out of Louisiana, then as an adult working on a plantation (still in Louisiana,) and ended up with her over 100 years old (still in Louisiana) becoming a civil rights activist. Jane was a "sassy" lady, and although I never fell in love with her, I do admire her ability to carry on and survive so many hardships that I can only imagine (by reading books like these.)
I wish there had been a little more emotion in this biography. There were plenty of heart-wrenching stories told (mothers being murdered, babies being murdered, sons being murdered, suicide, etc.) but yet my heart never wrenched. I'm left wondering if Jane was really devoid of too much emotion (surely a blessing) or if the writing just couldn't carry it through.
I wish there had been a little more emotion in this biography. There were plenty of heart-wrenching stories told (mothers being murdered, babies being murdered, sons being murdered, suicide, etc.) but yet my heart never wrenched. I'm left wondering if Jane was really devoid of too much emotion (surely a blessing) or if the writing just couldn't carry it through.
February 19, 2021
Gaines channels the voice of an elderly woman with such authenticity that I felt as if I were sitting on Jane’s front porch listening to her reminisce. Miss Jane, born into slavery a decade before the Emancipation Proclamation, lives to be over 100 years old, a life that sees a significant piece of American history. Rather than angry or beaten down from the discrimination and injustice she endured, she grows in confidence, the respect of others and her own sense of self-worth. I absolutely love Gaines writing and now I love Miss Jane as well.
April 30, 2025
Miss Jane Pittman was 11 or 12 when the Civil War ended; her uncertainty about her age is indicative of her past: her mother is dead, and she doesn’t know who her father was. Jane dies at the age of 110 as the Civil Rights movement, in which she plays a small part, is erupting throughout the South.
We are told in the Introduction to this novel that the story is based on a series of interviews of Miss Jane Pittman conducted by a college professor near the end of Jane’s life. He also interviewed Jane’s friends and anyone, black or white, who knew Jane and was willing to talk. The narrative is described as pieced together from these interviews.
This was my first experience with Ernest J. Gaines. I am pleased and grateful that Mr. Gaines and Miss Jane Pittman found their way into my reading plans for this year. Mr. Gaines is an excellent storyteller, and Jane Pittman is a character worth getting to know. Through her eyes we see how much has changed for black Americans and what has not changed. Mary, Jane’s friend who lives with Jane in her last years, asks the professor why, with all the history books he has available from which to teach, does he want to document Jane Pittman’s life? Because Jane’s story is not in any of those history books, the professor explains.
It is quite a story; it captivated me. My only disappointment was that just a few of the characters, Jane, Ned and perhaps Jimmy, have much depth. Most of the other characters are there for a few chapters and then gone. This may have been intentional. When Jane or any of her friends commit to God and the church, when they ‘get’ religion, they are required to stand before the congregation and talk about their ‘travels’. Life as a series of travels implies nothing is permanent; it is a process of learning, growing and changing. Miss Jane Pittman’s story is worth reading; I highly recommend it. I plan to read more by Mr. Gaines.
We are told in the Introduction to this novel that the story is based on a series of interviews of Miss Jane Pittman conducted by a college professor near the end of Jane’s life. He also interviewed Jane’s friends and anyone, black or white, who knew Jane and was willing to talk. The narrative is described as pieced together from these interviews.
This was my first experience with Ernest J. Gaines. I am pleased and grateful that Mr. Gaines and Miss Jane Pittman found their way into my reading plans for this year. Mr. Gaines is an excellent storyteller, and Jane Pittman is a character worth getting to know. Through her eyes we see how much has changed for black Americans and what has not changed. Mary, Jane’s friend who lives with Jane in her last years, asks the professor why, with all the history books he has available from which to teach, does he want to document Jane Pittman’s life? Because Jane’s story is not in any of those history books, the professor explains.
It is quite a story; it captivated me. My only disappointment was that just a few of the characters, Jane, Ned and perhaps Jimmy, have much depth. Most of the other characters are there for a few chapters and then gone. This may have been intentional. When Jane or any of her friends commit to God and the church, when they ‘get’ religion, they are required to stand before the congregation and talk about their ‘travels’. Life as a series of travels implies nothing is permanent; it is a process of learning, growing and changing. Miss Jane Pittman’s story is worth reading; I highly recommend it. I plan to read more by Mr. Gaines.
December 11, 2020
Listened to the audiobook, and the voice actor--and the story--were perfect.
February 10, 2017
This powerful autobiography was the catalyst that lead me to reading more slave narrative in the late 90's.
August 23, 2016
This is fiction, you guys! It is written in "the guise of tape-recorded recollections of a woman born as a slave in the 1850s." This line is taken directly from the book.
The book description here at GR goes on to say:
"In this woman Ernest Gaines has created a legendary figure, a woman equipped to stand beside William Faulkner's Dilsey in The Sound And The Fury."
There is one huge difference. Faulkner's writing skills are so very much better than Gaines'. The two are incomparable. Even if Faulkner purposefully confuses the reader, which annoyed me to no end, one cannot help but marvel at his creative ability and beautifully descriptive lines. Gaines writing is simplistic. There is no lyricism here.
The story told is that of one the black woman in America. It does not in detail cover the history of all Blacks in America. Such cannot be found in a fictional book of this length. It covers a very small portion of the Cvil War, the Restoration and the Civil Rights Movement. It takes a turn at the end toward religious proselyting. This did not work for me at all.
The audiobook narration by Lynne Thigpenn was fine. Good speed and clear dialogs. The Southern dialect was not hard to follow.
I wanted more historical content, better writing and more in-depth character analysis. Large swaths of time are covered summarily; other sections dragged out tediously.
The book description here at GR goes on to say:
"In this woman Ernest Gaines has created a legendary figure, a woman equipped to stand beside William Faulkner's Dilsey in The Sound And The Fury."
There is one huge difference. Faulkner's writing skills are so very much better than Gaines'. The two are incomparable. Even if Faulkner purposefully confuses the reader, which annoyed me to no end, one cannot help but marvel at his creative ability and beautifully descriptive lines. Gaines writing is simplistic. There is no lyricism here.
The story told is that of one the black woman in America. It does not in detail cover the history of all Blacks in America. Such cannot be found in a fictional book of this length. It covers a very small portion of the Cvil War, the Restoration and the Civil Rights Movement. It takes a turn at the end toward religious proselyting. This did not work for me at all.
The audiobook narration by Lynne Thigpenn was fine. Good speed and clear dialogs. The Southern dialect was not hard to follow.
I wanted more historical content, better writing and more in-depth character analysis. Large swaths of time are covered summarily; other sections dragged out tediously.
June 4, 2025
*—Did I hear that right, son?
Listen—You have got to be a real rotten-hearted sonofabitch to put down anything about the Lady Jane. I mean, one of them infidel sons a bitches that cuts the strings off puppets and best enjoys their time cozened in a satanic cabal or rolling ginger-headed kids leaving a 4-H cotillion. You—sideburns. Yeah, YOU. I’m talking to you, motherjumper—
You see, this book is the single instance of unadulterated joy in the Gaines canon. That’d be the opposite of them ‘adulterated’ books you write under the pen name Liv N. Dynasty. Surprised? Obviously I know you, leopard, and that mustard jar ain’t empty, hotshot. The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman is nothing less than Gaines’ silver medal on the dais of his Southern trinity of Mississippi (River) Goddamn. You, why you’re just a Brylcreem’d flash of greased lightnin’ river trash with the dick of a donkey smothered in tight denim and dimples. Punk.
For over half a century, Ernest Gaines wrote largely bleak but never dishonest books about the Black South, each a case study in determinism and structural bindings both inevitable and self-fulfilled. Jane Pittman seems the closest analogue to her effusive, magnanimous creator, the man known as Ernie or EJ to his confidantes. The novel works best taken in context of the small handful of books Gaines wrote in total. Its light is brightest when nestled between the dark and monolithic walls of text that flank either side of it.
—Sure, you can read that as sexual allusion if you need to, you androgen reprobate. With your Lucky’s sleeve-rolled and that infernal machine of ‘lectric guitar dangling ‘twixt your hips, you are the only one here that looks mighty foo-fool…—
—Aw, fuck it: you just look plain COOL, alright? Happy now, Jimmy Dean? You and your 501-wrapped sausage? What say you, me, and this SEG-ZY titular centenarian slip on outta this jook and get on with getting off the good foot to do the bad thing? You’re a 5, she’s a dime-piece, and together we might just find the square Root of John the Conqueror.
* [This review has been brought to you courtesy of Augmentin 875; Prednisone; dextromethorphan; and Albuterol]
Listen—You have got to be a real rotten-hearted sonofabitch to put down anything about the Lady Jane. I mean, one of them infidel sons a bitches that cuts the strings off puppets and best enjoys their time cozened in a satanic cabal or rolling ginger-headed kids leaving a 4-H cotillion. You—sideburns. Yeah, YOU. I’m talking to you, motherjumper—
You see, this book is the single instance of unadulterated joy in the Gaines canon. That’d be the opposite of them ‘adulterated’ books you write under the pen name Liv N. Dynasty. Surprised? Obviously I know you, leopard, and that mustard jar ain’t empty, hotshot. The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman is nothing less than Gaines’ silver medal on the dais of his Southern trinity of Mississippi (River) Goddamn. You, why you’re just a Brylcreem’d flash of greased lightnin’ river trash with the dick of a donkey smothered in tight denim and dimples. Punk.
For over half a century, Ernest Gaines wrote largely bleak but never dishonest books about the Black South, each a case study in determinism and structural bindings both inevitable and self-fulfilled. Jane Pittman seems the closest analogue to her effusive, magnanimous creator, the man known as Ernie or EJ to his confidantes. The novel works best taken in context of the small handful of books Gaines wrote in total. Its light is brightest when nestled between the dark and monolithic walls of text that flank either side of it.
—Sure, you can read that as sexual allusion if you need to, you androgen reprobate. With your Lucky’s sleeve-rolled and that infernal machine of ‘lectric guitar dangling ‘twixt your hips, you are the only one here that looks mighty foo-fool…—
—Aw, fuck it: you just look plain COOL, alright? Happy now, Jimmy Dean? You and your 501-wrapped sausage? What say you, me, and this SEG-ZY titular centenarian slip on outta this jook and get on with getting off the good foot to do the bad thing? You’re a 5, she’s a dime-piece, and together we might just find the square Root of John the Conqueror.
* [This review has been brought to you courtesy of Augmentin 875; Prednisone; dextromethorphan; and Albuterol]
January 6, 2016
Every since I was a little girl I have had a strange obsession with the past. 19th century black slavery is my favorite era, than 1940's, than 1960's. I love the Harlem Renaissance, I love all things civil rights, but it's something about 19th century slavery. Cabins, white women dresses with the petticoat underneath, dirt roads, the "big house," horse and buggies for cars, the dialect, the stories, and most importantly the messages. My mother's ex-boyfriend forced me to watch the entire miniseries of Roots as a punishment for something I did that I can't recollet when I was nine years old. The joke was on him when I looked forward to the next episode refusing to go outside and play with the other kids because I wanted to rewatch the whole series. I don't know what my fascination was with Roots and slavery at such a young age. It was the very first slave film I'd ever watched. It may have been the first show that wasn't a cartoon that I'd ever watched! But that began my 20 year obsession with the past.
Eager to find more films like Roots, I checked The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman out at the library on vhs. I loved it just as much as roots. Extremely fascinated, I think I may have been the only nine year old girl watching slave movies because I wanted to and not as a punishment or class assignment in February. So here it is 20 years later and I finally read the book. So disappointing. Firstly, at nine years old I knew that the word 'autobiography' meant a true story narrated by the actual person i.e Miss Jane Pittman. I accepted for years that this was a true story. How missleading of Gaines. Probably a sales tactic. Anyway, it wasn't until I read the back of the book in the synopsis and seen it refers to the story as fiction is when I felt as devestated as a child who learned the easter bunny isn't real and Mommy and Daddy has been lying to you for years! (yes, I know I was way too attached to Miss Jane Pittman).
What else I didn't like about this story, she wasn't relateable. Gaines did an awful job with developing Miss Jane Pittman's character. There was no plot line (which would be acceptable in the storytelling of a REAL autobioghrapy but not in a FICTION novel)! The writing style was so elementary and mundane. How did such a mediocre book become so famous is beyond me, even for the early 70's! This was epic fail. I couldn't even get past 100 pages once I realized I didn't really care what happened to Miss Jane or even Ned for that matter.
Eager to find more films like Roots, I checked The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman out at the library on vhs. I loved it just as much as roots. Extremely fascinated, I think I may have been the only nine year old girl watching slave movies because I wanted to and not as a punishment or class assignment in February. So here it is 20 years later and I finally read the book. So disappointing. Firstly, at nine years old I knew that the word 'autobiography' meant a true story narrated by the actual person i.e Miss Jane Pittman. I accepted for years that this was a true story. How missleading of Gaines. Probably a sales tactic. Anyway, it wasn't until I read the back of the book in the synopsis and seen it refers to the story as fiction is when I felt as devestated as a child who learned the easter bunny isn't real and Mommy and Daddy has been lying to you for years! (yes, I know I was way too attached to Miss Jane Pittman).
What else I didn't like about this story, she wasn't relateable. Gaines did an awful job with developing Miss Jane Pittman's character. There was no plot line (which would be acceptable in the storytelling of a REAL autobioghrapy but not in a FICTION novel)! The writing style was so elementary and mundane. How did such a mediocre book become so famous is beyond me, even for the early 70's! This was epic fail. I couldn't even get past 100 pages once I realized I didn't really care what happened to Miss Jane or even Ned for that matter.
June 2, 2025
While this is Ernest Gaines' best known work, I much prefer A Lesson Before Dying , maybe because he had 20 years between books to mature and develop. Still, I feel like I needed to read this classic and I'm not sorry. Jane Pittman is a voice who will live in my head and I deeply appreciate the scope and honesty of the 100-year first person narrative. Also, just loved the "abrupt" ending. I found a lot of hope in the tragedy. [a small piece of him died, the rest lives in us.]
June 17, 2020
Oh how I love this book!
A straightforward novel told by an unforgettable protagonist, the 110-year-old former slave Jane Pittman. Her story takes us through the perils of American history, from the period when slavery was ended all the way through the Civil Rights era. The most tender scenes here show her deep love for her friends, though she always talks about everyone in her life with candor and often with humor. The audiobook, narrated by the late Lynne Thigpen, brings the vernacular of Jane's voice to life; this novel shines through its dialog.
A straightforward novel told by an unforgettable protagonist, the 110-year-old former slave Jane Pittman. Her story takes us through the perils of American history, from the period when slavery was ended all the way through the Civil Rights era. The most tender scenes here show her deep love for her friends, though she always talks about everyone in her life with candor and often with humor. The audiobook, narrated by the late Lynne Thigpen, brings the vernacular of Jane's voice to life; this novel shines through its dialog.
November 20, 2023
Beautiful, fascinating and a must read. Of course I can't help but remember the amazing Cicely Tyson in her role.
February 14, 2015
February is Black History Month. I usually attempt to read a book about black history or read a book written by a black author or both. This year I decided to read a novel I read back in 1971 when the book first came out. Since then the book has become a classic. A movie was made in 1974 starring Cicely Tyson. I sort of remember the movie was good. I think I shall check to see if Amazon has the movie and will watch it after I finish the book.
The book is fiction but is written in the style of oral history. The author’s brilliantly crafted book interweaves historical references and recollections into an overall framework of the life of a woman born into slavery who survived to the point of the beginning of the civil rights movement of the 1960s. The story is told as seen through the eyes of a 110 year old woman who had lived though it all; with simplicity and immense dignity Jane Pittman speaks of the Reconstruction period in the deep South, with its struggles for black self determination and betterment. The constant terror of the Ku Klux Klan to thwart those efforts, and the legacy of racism that white Americans use right up to the present day.
Gaines’s description of the plantation is authentic and spellbinding. The story gripped my attention right from the beginning and kept it throughout the story. This is a book that I enjoyed the first time I read it and have enjoyed it even more on the second reading. Gaines was born on a Louisiana Plantation but was educated at San Francisco State and Stanford University. This is a must read book for everyone. Lynne Thigpen did an excellent job narrating the story.
The book is fiction but is written in the style of oral history. The author’s brilliantly crafted book interweaves historical references and recollections into an overall framework of the life of a woman born into slavery who survived to the point of the beginning of the civil rights movement of the 1960s. The story is told as seen through the eyes of a 110 year old woman who had lived though it all; with simplicity and immense dignity Jane Pittman speaks of the Reconstruction period in the deep South, with its struggles for black self determination and betterment. The constant terror of the Ku Klux Klan to thwart those efforts, and the legacy of racism that white Americans use right up to the present day.
Gaines’s description of the plantation is authentic and spellbinding. The story gripped my attention right from the beginning and kept it throughout the story. This is a book that I enjoyed the first time I read it and have enjoyed it even more on the second reading. Gaines was born on a Louisiana Plantation but was educated at San Francisco State and Stanford University. This is a must read book for everyone. Lynne Thigpen did an excellent job narrating the story.
March 10, 2019
Finished this on election day as I observed how much has changed and how much has not changed in this country. Jane Pittman is a woman around 110 years old as she tells about her life from a slave to a protester on the cusp of the Civil Rights movement. When Jane is told that she is no longer a slave, she decides to travel to Ohio. She never makes it out of Louisiana and never really has true freedom. Life is tough during Reconstruction, but gets worse during the Jim Crow period. Almost every black person who fights against racial injustice gets killed. Yet, Jane lives on.
I found the contrast of Jane's life humorous. In the last section of the book, Jane spends much of her free time listening to baseball games on the radio, following the exploits of Jackie Robinson. She is criticized by the religious community for her love of the sport. It just seemed to me such a contrast to the many hardships she experienced in her previous 90 years on earth.
Although some people have thought this book is non-fiction, it is not. However, it is written in such a way that you almost believe that Miss Jane Pittman was real.
Reread March 2019 before teaching a class about the Reconstruction. It is still a 5 star read. In fact, it is even better the second time because I picked up several nuances that I missed about Reconstruction and the Jim Crow eras. Jane Pittman feels like a real person because she gives the feelings and emotions of a woman who sees men who fight the system get killed and is willing, at 110, to be killed at a demonstration. Her voice also changes as she gets older. She also explains the reluctance of the older generation to fight for Civil Rights.
I found the contrast of Jane's life humorous. In the last section of the book, Jane spends much of her free time listening to baseball games on the radio, following the exploits of Jackie Robinson. She is criticized by the religious community for her love of the sport. It just seemed to me such a contrast to the many hardships she experienced in her previous 90 years on earth.
Although some people have thought this book is non-fiction, it is not. However, it is written in such a way that you almost believe that Miss Jane Pittman was real.
Reread March 2019 before teaching a class about the Reconstruction. It is still a 5 star read. In fact, it is even better the second time because I picked up several nuances that I missed about Reconstruction and the Jim Crow eras. Jane Pittman feels like a real person because she gives the feelings and emotions of a woman who sees men who fight the system get killed and is willing, at 110, to be killed at a demonstration. Her voice also changes as she gets older. She also explains the reluctance of the older generation to fight for Civil Rights.
March 24, 2008
I read this book in two sittings. It wasn't easy at first, but once you got introduced to Miss Jane Pittman the rest was easy. How could you not love a character, a woman, so enduring? How could you not weep at the loss of her only "son". This story is written richly, and with so much emotion that you can't help but to pull for her. Though, the subject matter was dark, the book itself wasn't dark. There were times when you heart ached because of all the suffering, and despair. When they were hopeful, you were hopeful. When Miss Pittman was hurt, you too, were hurt somewhere deep in your soul. It was such a great read, This review simply cannot do this book justice. It was like a cold drink of lemonade after a sweltering hot day - satisfying in every way.
April 11, 2023
Jane. Jane, Jane, Jane. I think I first read this a lifetime ago, in high school. Jane was a determined, feisty, newly freed slave at 11/12, then became an old determined, feisty 111/112 year old woman. She will make you laugh, cry, and cheer for a messed up world that has, and sadly, has not, changed.
4.5 stars rounded up.
4.5 stars rounded up.
March 17, 2016
I'm a little salty about that ending! Miss Jane Pittman was a hoot though.
April 7, 2025
One of my favorite books. Please read it.
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