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The Women of Brewster Place | Introduction

The Women of Brewster Place depicts seven courageous black women struggling to survive life's harsh realities. Since the book was first published in 1982, critics have praised Gloria Naylor's characters. They contend that her vivid portrayal of the women, their relationships, and their battles represents the same intense struggle all human beings face in their quest for long, happy lives. For example, in a review published in Freedomways, Loyle Hairston says that the characters "... throb with vitality amid the shattering of their hopes and dreams." Many commentators have noted the same deft touch with the novel's supporting characters; in fact, Hairston also notes, "Other characters are ... equally well-drawn."

Most critics consider Naylor one of America's most talented contemporary African-American authors. Her success probably stems from her exploration of the African-American experience, and her desire to "... help us celebrate voraciously that which is ours," as she tells Bellinelli in the interview series, In Black and White. She stresses that African Americans must maintain their identity in a world dominated by whites. Hairston, however, believes Naylor sidesteps the real racial issues. In his Freedomways review, he says of The Women of Brewster Place: "Naylor's first effort seems to fall in with most of the fiction being published today, which bypasses provocative social themes to play, instead, in the shallower waters of isolated personal relationships."

The Women of Brewster Place Summary

Gloria Naylor's The Women of Brewster Place is made up of seven stories of the women who live on Brewster Place, a dead end street cut off from the city by a wall.

Mattie Michael
Mattie's journey to Brewster Place begins in rural Tennessee, but when she becomes pregnant she leaves town to avoid her father's wrath. For a while she manages to earn just enough money to pay rent on the room she shares with her baby, Basil, One night a rat bites the baby while they are sleeping and Mattie begins to search for a better place to live. Just as she is about to give up, she meets Eva Turner, an old woman who lives with her granddaughter, Ciel. Eva invites Mattie in for dinner and offers her a place to stay. Years later when the old woman dies, Mattie has saved enough money to buy the house. Ciel's parents take her away, but Mattie stays on with Basil. She refuses to see any faults in him, and when he gets in trouble with the law she puts up her house to bail him out of jail. When he jumps bail, she loses the house she had worked thirty years to own, and her long journey from Tennessee finally ends in a small apartment on Brewster Place.

Etta Mae Johnson
Though Etta's journey starts in the same small town as Mattie's, the path she takes to Brewster Place is very different. Discovering early on that America is not yet ready for a bold, confident, intelligent black woman, she learns to survive by attaching herself "to any promising rising black star, and when he burnt out, she found another." She joins Mattie on Brewster Place after leaving the last in a long series of men. Attending church with Mattie, she stares enviously at the "respectable" wives of the deacons and wishes that she had taken a different path. Eyeing the attractive visiting preacher, she wonders if it is not still possible for her to change her lot in life. When Reverend Woods clearly returns her interest, Etta gladly accepts his invitation to go out for coffee, though Mattie expresses her concerns about his intentions. By the end of the evening Etta realizes that Mattie was right, and she walks up Brewster Street with a broken spirit. As she climbs the stairs to the apartment, however, she hears Mattie playing Etta's "loose life" records. With pleasure she realizes that someone is waiting up for her.

Kiswana Browne
Kiswana is a young woman from a middle-class black family.... ยป Complete The Women of Brewster Place Summary