mp_sf_list: a:5:{i:0;s:15:"mp_sf_list_item";i:1;s:15:"mp_sf_list_item";i:2;s:15:"mp_sf_list_item";i:3;s:15:"mp_sf_list_item";i:4;s:15:"mp_sf_list_item";} July is a mulatto, the daughter of Scottish overseer Tam Dewar, who raped Kitty, her slave mother. July enjoys giving us alternative accounts of her arrival in the world and Levy revels in storytelling itself, its sheer pliability. The memoir comes to its climax during the 10-day Baptist war in 1831 and the slave uprisings that followed. She makes you understand how chaotic and punitive this moment in history was, as well as liberating. Levy has researched the novel meticulously, but July has no desire to weigh herself down with any historical burden. Instead, she cheekily recommends that we do some homework ourselves but warns against a publication called Conflict and change. A view from the great house of slaves, slavery and the British Empire, observing: "… if you do read it and find your head nodding in agreement at this man's bluster, then away with you – for I no longer wish you as my reader."

Reading guide: The Long Song by Andrea Levy - Booker Prize

Which brings me to the next concern, frankly, I didn't connect with any of the characters in the story. I truly wanted to do so. Though July tries to make lemonade out her life's worth of lemons. Her spin doesn't feel true. She has suffered greatly, yet, she doesn't seem impacted.The opening episode of last night’s three-part adaptation, to be screened over consecutive nights, manages the same feat, thanks to a finely whetted script from Sarah Williams (who also adapted Levy’s Small Island for television in 2009) and some outstanding work from a first-class cast. Central to this is rising star Tamara Lawrance, who captures all of July’s ebullience and intelligence, fiercely restrained in the capricious, violent mistress’s presence but forever straining at its bounds. Over the years she learns to handle Caroline (a pitch-perfect performance from Hayley Atwell, who takes her right up to the line of real monstrousness without crossing into caricature), make a good life within its awful and motherless constraints – and then, gleefully at first, embraces the upending of that life when the Christmas Rebellion begins. I have to start by saying Andrea Levy is one of my favourite authors. Her writing is always so beautiful and I wasn't surprised to learn that The Long Song was.a Man Booker finalist in 2010. A well-researched book that wears its scholarship lightly… An immensely readable and well-paced book.”

The Long Song by Andrea Levy | Fiction | The Guardian

The Long Song is told with irresistible cunning; it is captivating, mischievous and optimistic, generating new stories and plot lines throughout the tale.” So I was able to assure my precious mama that I would be her most conscientious editor. I would raise life out of her most crabbed script to make her tale flow like some of the finest writing in the English language. And there was no shame to be felt from this assistance, for at some of the best publishing houses in Britain—let me cite Thomas Nelson and Son or Hodder and Stoughton, as my example—the gentle aiding and abetting of authors in this manner is quite commonplace. mp_sf_list_3_description:The Long Song was filmed in the Dominican Republic, a setting that offered grueling hot days, but also surprising beauty. “It looked like a film set,” Hayley Atwell said. “When we were at that plantation house and there would be a sunset, there was a moment when we just stopped filming for a second, and everyone went onto the veranda…just look at these purples and oranges. The plantation was on this kind of hilly land and it looked like a carpet of neon green. It didn’t look real at all. It was a very lush place.” THE AUTHOR OF SMALL ISLAND TELLS THE STORY OF THE LAST TURBULENT YEARS OF SLAVERY AND THE EARLY YEARS OF FREEDOM IN NINETEENTH-CENTURY JAMAICASlavery is a grim subject indeed, but the wonder of Levy’s writing is that she can confront such things and somehow derive deeply life-affirming entertainment from them. July emerges as a defiant, charismatic, almost invincible woman who gives a unique voice to the voiceless, and for that she commands affection and admiration. Levy’s aim, she says, was to write a book that instilled pride in anyone with slave ancestors and The Long Song, though “its load may prove to be unsettling”, is surely that book.’ I liked the mother-daughter story about two women who grow up as slaves, and the cruel things they had to endure. In fact the first scene with Kitty, is what really drew me to the book. Later, Kitty's daughter, July (the main character) is introduced, along with Caroline (her mistress). The use of dialect added just enough spice to the book. Part of the book also captures the Emancipation Proclamation--a nicely added twist. The Long Song has an unusual format for a historical novel. Part memoir, part oral history, it is led by July, the narrator, who is detailing an account of her life on a Jamaican plantation, which is then filtered through her son, who is writing her account and experiences on her behalf. It is often non-linear and, at points, Levy deviates with interludes and interruptions, where the two discuss the presentation of the story. What did you think of this format - how did it serve your reading experience and your understanding of July’s experience? Why do you think Levy chose to write in this manner?

The Long Song - Extracts and reviews Andrea Levy - The Long Song - Extracts and reviews

Slavery is a grim subject indeed, but the wonder of Levy’s writing is that she can confront such things and somehow derive deeply life-affirming entertainment from them. ... Levy’s aim, she says, was to write a book that instilled pride in anyone with slave ancestors and The Long Song, though 'its load may prove to be unsettling', is surely that book. The story unfolds at the Amity sugar plantation, where the strong-willed July is working as a lady’s maid for Caroline Mortimer. When Robert Goodwin, a new overseer at Amity arrives, both July and Caroline are intrigued by his revolutionary spirit and intent to improve the working conditions on the plantation. But the winds of change across the hot plantation fields end up not being without consequences. Levy was the daughter of mixed race parents who emigrated from the Caribbean to England in the 1960s and the interactions between the immigrant (coloured) and the host (white) cultures are the subject of all her novels.The new novel from the Orange Prize-winning author of Small Island tells the story of an unforgettable heroine during the last turbulent years of slavery and the early years of freedom following the Baptist War in Jamaica in 1831. Andrea Levy herself takes most of the parts involved and she was most definitely a very talented narrator as well as story teller.

Long Song review – a sharp, painful look at the last days The Long Song review – a sharp, painful look at the last days

Long song was awarded the Walter Scott prize for historical fiction. It was also shortlisted for the 2010 Man Booker prize. En esta novela conoceremos los últimos años de la esclavitud como práctica legal en la isla de Jamaica (que en el siglo XIX era una colonia inglesa) y lo que aconteció posteriormente tras la emancipación de los esclavos por parte de la corona. Todo esto será narrado por July, quien escribirá su historia siendo ya una anciana a su hijo, un prospero editor. Nacida como esclava en la plantación de Concordia, July será abruptamente apartada del lado de su madre siendo una niña por los caprichos de Caroline Mortimer, una recien llegada a la isla, quien la convertirá en su doncella particular. La historia de July no será un camino de rosas, estará marcada por la lucha por la libertad de sus semejantes, el egoísmo de los blancos, el amor y la pérdida. The Long Song was filmed in the Dominican Republic, a setting that offered grueling hot days, but also surprising beauty. “It looked like a film set,” Hayley Atwell said. “When we were at that plantation house and there would be a sunset, there was a moment when we just stopped filming for a second, and everyone went onto the veranda…just look at these purples and oranges. The plantation was on this kind of hilly land and it looked like a carpet of neon green. It didn’t look real at all. It was a very lush place.” Y por fin puedo decir que me he leído uno de mis eternos pendientes de la vida. Conocí este libro al ver en la televisión su versión en miniserie o película larga hará cosa de unos dos o tres años, y si he tardado tanto en leerlo (aunque lo he tenido en la mano muchas veces para comenzarlo) era precisamente porque quería alejarme un poco de la película, esperando que así el libro pudiera sorprenderme más si se me desdibujaba su argumento aunque fuera un poco . Tengo que deciros que la versión cinematográfica es muy fiel al original (De hecho, creo que es la película que he visto nunca que es más fiel al libro del que bebe) y que merece mucho la pena verla.After the book was released, research by a family member proved just how personal The Long Song truly was. “It was all done and then my niece found out a lot about our own family history,” Levy explained. “She found out that my great grandfather was born a slave. His mother was a housekeeper on a plantation called Mesopotamia and her mother was a field slave called Minnie. We found out that my great, great-grandfather was from Gainsborough in Britain, his name was William Ridsguard and he was the attorney on the plantation, and he had a child with his house keeper…that child, Richard Ridsguard was my great grandfather.” The Long Song I found strangely inept for someone who has written such an accomplished novel as Small Island. If I had read it ‘cold’, without knowing the author’s name, I might have judged it the work of a promising (-ish) first-time novelist with a lot to learn. The story is told in retrospect by an older woman and (in very small part) by her son. The woman constantly moans about the son's insistence on using a recalcitrant ink pen and also his verbosity. The novel is certainly peppered with very funny/tragic moments. The scene where July's master dies is particularly funny when it shouldn't be. Andrea Levy was the author of six books, including Small Island, which won the Orange Prize for Fiction, and the Whitbread Book of the Year. Slavery is a subject that has inspired some magnificent fiction, but I had some misgivings: might it not, in this case, make for over-serious writing, especially for a novelist as comically inclined as Levy? But she dares to write about her subject in an entertaining way without ever trivialising it and The Long Song reads with the sort of ebullient effortlessness that can only be won by hard work.