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Black Lightning
An iconic novel from a rebellious and politically active author, this story follows Jack, a sculptor and blacksmith, who idolizes the Biblical Samson as a figure of man’s independence. Deciding to carve a mahogany tribute to Samson, however, becomes a more complicated affair when Jack’s wife leaves him for another man. The end result is a sculpture of a blinded Samson leaning on a young boy for support. As life imitates art, Jack is struck by lightning and left blind, forcing him to rely on his friends to survive. After leading him on a journey to discover just how reliant on humanity he really is, Jack’s blindness ultimately drives him to his final act of his own suicide.
164 pages, Paperback
First published June 1, 1983
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March 31, 2023*spoilers ahead*
Many social norms regulate and influence the way people behave toward each other, often in more or less direct conflict with what these same people feel about themselves and others. Relational dynamics between men and women and among men are highly regulated, even when not explicitly, so that social and romantic interactions result in an intricate interplay of dos and don’ts, especially when rigid and exacting conceptions of masculinity and virtue are concerned. When normativity is involved, men and women’s agency oscillates between gender conservatism and unanticipated slippages of soul and desire.
The friction created by this continuous ‘I’m tempted but I shouldn’t’ is particularly charged in Black Lightning. Indeed, the air becomes electric to a literal point: Jake is blinded by a dark lightning - a particular form of lightning which is not visible to the eyes and is generated by the interaction of electrons and other atmospheric radiations – whose energy is discharged, as it were, out of the grinding emotional build-up between Amos and himself. Indeed, moments before the odd occurrence, Jake is showing Amos, whom he’s attracted to but can’t express feelings for, the statue of Samson, the character from the Bible he’s been carving out of mahogany, whose unnatural strength he identifies with.
There is a profound tension in this scene: Jake, normally butch and self-possessed, opens up to Amos while being watchful not to uncover his feelings – a show of feelings is female stuff, not apt to a real man. The magnetic friction between Jake and Amos, this play of attractions and rejections in conjunction with the storm raging outside reaches its climax as the lightning bolt breaks out into the room and blinds Jake.
The topic of physical as well as metaphorical blindness is one of the focal points of Mais’ novel. There is a lot about seeing and not seeing in Black Lightning. In fact, only in blindness Jake is able to see clearly the nature of his feelings for Amos and to understand the quality of his engagement with Samson and his story. Isn’t there perhaps desire behind Jake’s mesmeric attraction for the biblical figure instead of uncomplicated fascination for symbolism and self-reliance? Isn’t art perhaps the unconscious pouring out of an inner life otherwise denied and repressed?
It can be said that Jake’s is a ‘classic’ blindness, one in which the lack of actual sight is replaced with the ability to see further and deeper (remember Tiresias?). What Jake is unable to fully acknowledge before the lightning bolt is consciously if not vividly felt after, to the point of causing trouble.
Mais develops his narrative with extreme obliqueness: there’s a lot of reading between the lines required to be able to ‘see’ what actually happens in Black Lightning, what kind of feelings and emotions words really mean to express. Luckily, the novel develops through a series of mirroring images and parallels that enable the reader to see one character through the lenses of the other and vice versa. Amos and Jake’s conflicting relationship, for example, can be understood through Glen’s frustrated reactions to Miriam and George’s behaviour.
As far as masculinity is concerned, Glen is arguably on the defensive, as George, the young boy who works with him, constantly picks on his weaknesses and challenges his integrity by casting doubt over his virility with Miriam. Glen and George’s low-key war of attrition is nothing other than an exercise in arm wrestling to demonstrate who’s the real top. Literally in George’s case, who has his moment of retribution as he passionately takes control of Beauty, the mare Glen regularly attends to. As it often happens among men, violence erupts to resolve the power imbalance between the two: George gets bashed as a punishment for foregrounding Glen’s vulnerability. For this reason, Beauty, who’s crassly compared to Miriam by her carer at some point in the novel, in a later scene stands in for Glen instead, who gets his symbolic comeuppance for having hurt George as the latter establishes his dominance over the horse/the rival partner. After all, homosociality is all about power and the erotics of masculine competition. Similarly, dominance is the only way Jake is capable of demonstrating affection toward his partner.
Alike Glen, Jake can’t accept ‘to be topped’, that is to lose strength in the eyes of other people. Therefore, he slowly recedes from Amos and the world as his reliance on his ‘friend’ becomes progressively more evident after the lightning bolt.
On the other hand, Amos’s storyline reaches its denouement along a more hopeful trajectory. The final realisation of homosexual feelings that disintegrate Jake – anticipated visually by the shattering of the statue – gives consistency and makes Amos whole instead, as he notices himself. Amos acquires a solidity that enables people to ‘see’ him for the first time and a confidence unexperienced before, although never to the extent of disclosing his attraction for Jake.
The closing lines of the novel are given to Miriam and Glen, finally negotiating a truce in an intimate interlude in whose respect the foreclosed romance between Amos and Jake appears like a melancholic regret. Reaching full circle, Black Lightning closes as it opens: foreboding sounds deep in the forest.
Many social norms regulate and influence the way people behave toward each other, often in more or less direct conflict with what these same people feel about themselves and others. Relational dynamics between men and women and among men are highly regulated, even when not explicitly, so that social and romantic interactions result in an intricate interplay of dos and don’ts, especially when rigid and exacting conceptions of masculinity and virtue are concerned. When normativity is involved, men and women’s agency oscillates between gender conservatism and unanticipated slippages of soul and desire.
The friction created by this continuous ‘I’m tempted but I shouldn’t’ is particularly charged in Black Lightning. Indeed, the air becomes electric to a literal point: Jake is blinded by a dark lightning - a particular form of lightning which is not visible to the eyes and is generated by the interaction of electrons and other atmospheric radiations – whose energy is discharged, as it were, out of the grinding emotional build-up between Amos and himself. Indeed, moments before the odd occurrence, Jake is showing Amos, whom he’s attracted to but can’t express feelings for, the statue of Samson, the character from the Bible he’s been carving out of mahogany, whose unnatural strength he identifies with.
There is a profound tension in this scene: Jake, normally butch and self-possessed, opens up to Amos while being watchful not to uncover his feelings – a show of feelings is female stuff, not apt to a real man. The magnetic friction between Jake and Amos, this play of attractions and rejections in conjunction with the storm raging outside reaches its climax as the lightning bolt breaks out into the room and blinds Jake.
The topic of physical as well as metaphorical blindness is one of the focal points of Mais’ novel. There is a lot about seeing and not seeing in Black Lightning. In fact, only in blindness Jake is able to see clearly the nature of his feelings for Amos and to understand the quality of his engagement with Samson and his story. Isn’t there perhaps desire behind Jake’s mesmeric attraction for the biblical figure instead of uncomplicated fascination for symbolism and self-reliance? Isn’t art perhaps the unconscious pouring out of an inner life otherwise denied and repressed?
It can be said that Jake’s is a ‘classic’ blindness, one in which the lack of actual sight is replaced with the ability to see further and deeper (remember Tiresias?). What Jake is unable to fully acknowledge before the lightning bolt is consciously if not vividly felt after, to the point of causing trouble.
Mais develops his narrative with extreme obliqueness: there’s a lot of reading between the lines required to be able to ‘see’ what actually happens in Black Lightning, what kind of feelings and emotions words really mean to express. Luckily, the novel develops through a series of mirroring images and parallels that enable the reader to see one character through the lenses of the other and vice versa. Amos and Jake’s conflicting relationship, for example, can be understood through Glen’s frustrated reactions to Miriam and George’s behaviour.
As far as masculinity is concerned, Glen is arguably on the defensive, as George, the young boy who works with him, constantly picks on his weaknesses and challenges his integrity by casting doubt over his virility with Miriam. Glen and George’s low-key war of attrition is nothing other than an exercise in arm wrestling to demonstrate who’s the real top. Literally in George’s case, who has his moment of retribution as he passionately takes control of Beauty, the mare Glen regularly attends to. As it often happens among men, violence erupts to resolve the power imbalance between the two: George gets bashed as a punishment for foregrounding Glen’s vulnerability. For this reason, Beauty, who’s crassly compared to Miriam by her carer at some point in the novel, in a later scene stands in for Glen instead, who gets his symbolic comeuppance for having hurt George as the latter establishes his dominance over the horse/the rival partner. After all, homosociality is all about power and the erotics of masculine competition. Similarly, dominance is the only way Jake is capable of demonstrating affection toward his partner.
Alike Glen, Jake can’t accept ‘to be topped’, that is to lose strength in the eyes of other people. Therefore, he slowly recedes from Amos and the world as his reliance on his ‘friend’ becomes progressively more evident after the lightning bolt.
On the other hand, Amos’s storyline reaches its denouement along a more hopeful trajectory. The final realisation of homosexual feelings that disintegrate Jake – anticipated visually by the shattering of the statue – gives consistency and makes Amos whole instead, as he notices himself. Amos acquires a solidity that enables people to ‘see’ him for the first time and a confidence unexperienced before, although never to the extent of disclosing his attraction for Jake.
The closing lines of the novel are given to Miriam and Glen, finally negotiating a truce in an intimate interlude in whose respect the foreclosed romance between Amos and Jake appears like a melancholic regret. Reaching full circle, Black Lightning closes as it opens: foreboding sounds deep in the forest.
December 1, 2025
I really enjoyed this. A story about queer desire (and the repression of the same). I'm pleasantly surprised that a mid-20th century Jamaican novel deals with these issues.
August 10, 2014
What is "Black Lightning" about? It's the story of Jake and Amos: two men who seem to know what they want although they are tormented by this. Why? The townpeople have an opinion of their own, based on religion rather than common sense. What makes "Black Lightning" a five star novel? My two favorite things: uncertainty and apprehension. A lot is left unsaid because the characters themselves are afraid to speak their minds or don't know how to express what it is that they are feeling.
"Black Lightning" is a novel to be read slowly. It is like spending a day in the forest: the only way to appreciate it is by sitting down and enjoying the moment, the silences, the wind, the creek and the singing of the birds. Some of the best dialogues in the story happen in this forest, where the people in town feel free to open up and talk about what is going on in their lives surrounded by this same wind, trees, birds and river, which Roger Mais skillfully uses to add suspense to the plot.
In adittion to This main plot, Glen and Miriam accompany Jake and Amos with their own mind games, where instincts and prejudice set the rules of their love and hate story. Finally, George adds comedy and youth while Betsy adds melancholy and age to this novel, whose only flaw is only how short it is and its main virtue is how everything that is left unsaid gets you involved in the plot.
DO NOT READ Jacqueline Bishop's introduction beforehand. For some unknown reason, she reveals the main twists and turns of the novel at the very beginning, which spoiled the intrigue that I would have felt if I had not read it. If it were not because Roger Mais had nothing to do with this, I would have taken a star away from the rating.
This is my first novel to read by Roger Mais but definitely not my last one. Uncertainty and apprehension have never been so thought-provoking.
"Black Lightning" is a novel to be read slowly. It is like spending a day in the forest: the only way to appreciate it is by sitting down and enjoying the moment, the silences, the wind, the creek and the singing of the birds. Some of the best dialogues in the story happen in this forest, where the people in town feel free to open up and talk about what is going on in their lives surrounded by this same wind, trees, birds and river, which Roger Mais skillfully uses to add suspense to the plot.
In adittion to This main plot, Glen and Miriam accompany Jake and Amos with their own mind games, where instincts and prejudice set the rules of their love and hate story. Finally, George adds comedy and youth while Betsy adds melancholy and age to this novel, whose only flaw is only how short it is and its main virtue is how everything that is left unsaid gets you involved in the plot.
DO NOT READ Jacqueline Bishop's introduction beforehand. For some unknown reason, she reveals the main twists and turns of the novel at the very beginning, which spoiled the intrigue that I would have felt if I had not read it. If it were not because Roger Mais had nothing to do with this, I would have taken a star away from the rating.
This is my first novel to read by Roger Mais but definitely not my last one. Uncertainty and apprehension have never been so thought-provoking.
March 29, 2009
Jamaican author. Read a hardback edition published in London in 1966.
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