John Wideman--"Fever"

AGENDA:

Read John Wideman's "Fever"--a difficult and complex story that is very insightful as we experience our own epidemic in 2020.  Take your time with this one and post a response just to let me know you read it and perhaps to get a conversation going.

https://www.sas.upenn.edu/~cavitch/pdf-library/Wideman_Fever.pdf

Fever

John Edgar Wideman

https://www.encyclopedia.com/people/philosophy-and-religion/protestant-christianity-biographies/richard-allen

To help you understand "Fever":

from Project Muse:

It stands to reason that an urban crisis of such magnitude cannot be captured by means of one of the conventional short story patterns, especially not if in addition the author intends to reconstruct its racial dimension. Wideman wisely dispenses with a linear plot and a character portrait, instead choosing a different pattern, a combination of single textual units, which careful selection, deliberate fragmentation, and associative arrangement has made representative of a wealth of similar happenings [End Page 718] and experiences. The synecdochic effect is enhanced by the frequent elimination of the names of characters, focalizers, or narrators, who thus either seem exchangeable or are made to stand for typical experiences, attitudes, or moods. Of the thirty-five sections, about one-third can be connected in one way or another to Richard Allen who thus appears as the writer of his and Jones’ Narrative (128, 129) as an internal focalizer (133, 156), as a character described by one of his brothers (139), as a homodiegetic narrator (144, 146, 148), as a letter-writer (19), and even, depending on one’s interpretation, as the author of the story (142). If one adds the six sections in which Allen functions as the addressee in the discourse of Master Abraham, an old Jewish merchant, the sections related to him comprise about half of the entire number. The remaining sections may be attributed to James Forten in 1782 (143), to Benjamin Rush (147), to a slave on the Middle Passage or in a boat escaping from Santo Domingo (130), to a wise old African slave (131), to an old African American at the close of the Civil War (155), to a young black male nurse in an old age asylum of the 1980s (159), and to a heterodiegetic narrator who cites definitions (129, 130, 156), gives objective reports from a modern vantage point (128, 147, 159), or begins and closes the story with cryptic remarks that are even more ambiguous than some of the other sections (127, 160, 161). Whereas the rapid shift of narrators and focalizers appears to place the story securely in the tradition of American modernism (Eliot, Dos Passos, Faulkner), the wide generic range of the different textual units and their extremely fragmentary quality are strongly reminiscent of Melville’s Moby Dick and, together with the striking oscillations of narrative distance and the frequent absence of the focalizer’s or even the narrator’s identity, give it the quality of a postmodern montage.

“Fever” draws much of its energy from the tension between closed and open form. One of the most fascinating aspects of this collage is Wideman’s ability to treat the textual fragments as singular voices and then to make these voices interact and echo each other so that a fascinating kind of communal song emerges which manages to overcome the single experiences of anxiety and apprehension, the ordeals of pain and suffering by means of a sober and dignified celebration of black bravery and selfless dedication. Maybe this is what an early reviewer means when she speaks of the “oddly impartial narrators” of Wideman’s book who “seem to be looking down upon the planet with genuine omniscience” and who “speak with the neutrality of gods” (Schaeffer 30). In this particular story, however, the narrative situation is more complex; underneath the celebratory tone, one can always recognize the counterpoint of a dazed, apathetic, almost fatalistic strain which occasionally rises to heights of caustic comment or descends into depths of oracular rumblings. Paradoxically, it is on such a note that the story begins and ends. And thus, we are never allowed forget that, whereas the biological epidemic may be survived, suppressed, or eventually prevented, the spiritual plague, the inner sickness, will merely change signifiers. Yet, before looking for messages or meanings in this story, it will be helpful to single out some of the structural devices by means of which the tension between open and closed form is maintained.3

Although “Fever” has no linear plot, it is nevertheless possible to recognize tendencies towards coherence within particular textual clusters. If we ignore the introduction, sections reporting on the development of the epidemic loosely follow [End Page 719] the chronological sequence of the fever as outlined above. Even those sections, or parts of sections, dealing with other events appear in more or less chronological order, analeptic passages generally preceding proleptic ones. Additional coherence is achieved by means of underlying formal devices such as bracketing and repetition. These are easily recognized in the cluster of sections devoted—or attributable—to Richard Allen, but they are typical of the entire text.

http://muse.jhu.edu/article/6053

Reviewers of Fever also single out the title story, noting its uniqueness, its range, and its message. Susan Fromberg Schaeffer, writing for The New York Times, calls ‘‘Fever’’ ‘‘almost majestic in its evocation of the goodness and evil of the human heart.’’ She further notes the peculiar perspective used by Wideman in this collection, which she expresses as ‘‘not quite human but godlike, not limited by the conventions of ordinary storytelling.’’ She finds that ‘‘Fever’’ makes use of this style of storytelling successfully, culminating in ‘‘an almost unbearably anguished meditation on human nature in plague time, the power and sadness of the story are enormous, its vision triumphant.’’

Wideman’s career can be characterized by his search for new ways to explore themes and ideas and to express the African-American experience. ‘‘Fever’’ is a boldly experimental work, one that floats back and forth between time periods and narrators and thus defies easy labeling or analysis. Randall Kenan of The Nation forthrightly deals with Wideman’s slipping back and forth in time; he presents his own reasoning: ‘‘It is as if Wideman is again playing games with us, forcing us to see the past and the present as one; how we are affected by what has gone before, not only in our thinking but in our acting and in our soul-deep believing.’’ Despite the story’s elusive nature and Wideman’s claims to Rosen that the story ‘‘shouldn’t be tied to any historical period,’’ reviewers note his evocation of a specific period in American history. Other reviewers comment on the way Wideman collapses time to present a composite picture of a certain place and mindset. Cara Hood writing for the Voice Literary Supplement claims that present-day Philadelphia emerges as the protagonist of the story.

Reviewers do not overlook the significance of Wideman’s message in examining his style. Herbert Mitgang in the New York Times finds that even after reading the story, he is left with the knowledge of Wideman’s search for ‘‘some sort of universality’’ to the human condition. Some reviewers, however, do not care for the way in which Wideman attempts to get his message to readers. For instance, Clarence Major of the Washington Post believes ‘‘Fever’’ to be the most ambitious if not the most artistically successful story of the collection. Mitgang recognizes the importance of what Wideman is saying when he writes that Wideman’s ‘‘voice as a modern black writer with something to report comes through.’’ Despite this praise, Mitgang does not believe that the rest of the stories are successful, asserting in his review of the collection that they add nothing to Wideman’s reputation as a writer.

In Wideman’s extensive and accomplished body of work, ‘‘Fever’’ occupies only a small spot. Yet, if it accomplishes nothing more, it demonstrates Wideman’s careful exploration of relationships among people and the effects that these relationships have on society. Wideman’s interest in the issues he raises in ‘‘Fever’’—including racial relations, communication, personal freedom, and violence— is seen in the works that he has written later in his career. Philadelphia Fire picks up the final section of the story in its fictionalization of the 1985 MOVE bombing. The Cattle Killing explores the devastating effects of racial prejudice on the African Americans who remained behind in Philadelphia during the 1793 yellow fever epidemic in greater detail. The body of Wideman’s work strengthens Robert Bones’ assertion, made in 1978, that Wideman is ‘‘perhaps the most gifted black novelist of his generation.’’

Source: Short Stories for Students, ©2012 Gale Cengage. All Rights Reserved. Full copyright.

Analysis 

"Fever" is a story of slavery and disease, both caused by the poison in men's hearts. It is a complex narrative composed of many different voices that use a range of points of view, or perspectives: third-person limited, third-person omniscient, first-person, and even first-person plural (the collective "we"). In fact, this, along with the nonlinear, or non-chronological, structure, is the most striking feature of the story. At its essence, "Fever" tells the story of a free black man who, during the course of a yellow fever epidemic in 1793 Philadelphia, discovers he is still enslaved. Eighteenthand nineteenth-century Philadelphia was known as a refuge for runaway slaves, a city founded on Quaker egalitarian ideals. However, through the perspective of Allen, we learn that Philadelphia at the time of the story does struggle with inequality; although blacks and whites can come together to celebrate the founding of Allen's church, Allen was forced to build the church because blacks were not allowed to sit in the front of white churches. The Delaware River, which brings white and black immigrants, slaves and freed (and escaped) slaves, is thick with waste, and forms an invisible barrier between white and black. Here, white immigrants learn English and move on, while black immigrants, though they learn English, are destined to live the remainder of their days in the squalid filth of the caves they have dug for themselves. These caves are a symbol of the dark future Allen sees for his people, who, having obtained their freedom, have fallen victim to poverty and complacence. He tries to preach to them of dreams of parting the river like Moses and leading them away, but he is interrupted by the outbreak, which only throws the racial division of the city into sharper relief. Blacks are accused of both having caused the plague and being immune to it, the latter only when it serves the purposes of the white population. Nevertheless, the central question of the story is why Allen, a free man, chooses to stay in the infected city and treat the whites. Allen, obsessed by what he sees as spoil all around him—both physical waste in the river and the dissolution of the sinners among his people—is conflicted between his desire to save his people and the waste he sees among them. In fact, they fling waste at him, curse him, spit at him; they do not seem to want his help, while the white population does. It is this sense of duty to those who demand his help that Allen, on the surface, believes is keeping him in the city. In watching Dr. Rush bleed the sick and autopsy the dead, Allen sees that all the victims, black and white, are the same on the 9 inside, their blood sluggish and vile, much like the river and the poisoned arteries and veins of the city. The city is a key metaphor in the story, compared both physically and figuratively with the people who have been left in it during the outbreak. It is wasted and dying, its streets the veins and arteries that distribute the poison. The poison—prejudice, poverty, hopelessness and isolation—manifests itself in a devastating fever that enslaves everyone, both black and white. While this epidemic runs its course, everyone is a slave —and everyone is equal. Free from both slavery and infection, Allen could choose to run away before he carries the infection home, but he does not. He recognizes the possibility when he sees the black servant who remained with her dying family, but he is unable to make the same choice he would demand of her. Some of the narrative voices function as Allen's internal critics, cursing and insulting him in an effort to get him to leave. Despite his vision of leading his people, Allen is never able to make that decision. Although he ostensibly remains to save lives, whether black or white, Allen also recognizes that the anarchy reigning in the city is an opportunity to advance him. People need him, and they want him because he has worked with a famous white doctor; their physical wellbeing is far more valuable than their souls to both Allen and the people he treats. Allen suffers from the same temptation as the people he preached to, one of the voices suggesting he's more comfortable remaining enslaved, is perhaps afraid of the responsibility of being truly free—able and obligated to make his own decisions and accept the consequences. This is his hypocrisy, and his downfall, and it is foreshadowed directly by the story of the old Jewish merchant who tells Allen that in seeking his fortune he lost his family. In tending to the sick white population, Allen abandons his own freedom in the hope of obtaining more materially, but in doing so, he loses what he loves the most, his wife and daughters, who die of the fever. Family seems to be a central bond in the story, without which the entire community can never overcome the poison killing it. The essential isolation of every character, from the dead couple found back-to-back to the Jewish merchant to the old man in the future— the orphan who carries his unborn parents in his belly—seems to result from a loss of family, and an inability to clearly envision a positive future, or past. The devastation of the city results from the destruction of many families, and the isolation of slavery, whether self-imposed or not, is as much a poison as the fever. Present-day narrators offer a deeper view of slavery than could have been provided by Allen's single perspective, in that they show that while the institution of slavery has been abolished, much of mankind is still enslaved—isolated, impoverished, hypocritical. As the epidemic ends and a new day dawns, the city turns its back on the horror rather than face it, much like the dead husband and wife Allen longed to rearrange. In the same stroke, two hundred years pass and the municipal government of Philadelphia purges violence with violence in attempt to restore its illusory glory. The firebombing results in the deaths of half a dozen children. 10 There is no traditional structure to this story, any recognizable beginning, middle, or end. Rather, the narrative—and the narrators themselves—moves in and out of the central time of the story, lending perspectives of both time and distance. The opening imagery, in which the trees are described as barren women, foreshadow the conclusion, which uses the voices of present-day characters to describe a Philadelphia as sick and dying as it was in 1793. The opening description of winter, the epidemic of the summer, and the recurring theme of the ebb and flow of the water that gave birth to the city all make for a cyclic narrative, in which the reader is brought to understand that as long as poison exists in men's hearts, epidemics will recur and slavery will continue.