54 pages • 1 hour read
Bernardine EvaristoMr Loverman
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 2013A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Chapters 16-18Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 16 Summary: “The Art of Speechlessness (Tuesday, September 14, 2010)”
Barry and Morris are peacefully reading at the kitchen table when they are surprised by Carmel and Donna barging through the front door. Barry notices Carmel’s extensive makeover, which makes her look younger and more confident. Morris sneaks away, and Carmel asks Donna to leave so that she can handle the confrontation herself.
Barry tries to begin his own speech, but Carmel interrupts. She reveals that her father left her everything in his will and that her lawyer is fighting off anyone who lays claims to her inheritance. She declares that she is closing this chapter in her life and plans to return to Antigua and start anew. She announces that she wants to start divorce proceedings. She takes off her ring and flicks it at Barry. Carmel further reveals that she has been gossiping with Odette. She berates Barry for having a “sickness” and tells him she spent “[f]ifty years with a man who used [her] as his cover story to protect his disgusting business, making a mockery of [her]” (280). Carmel tells Barry she is convinced that he has wasted her life.
Barry does not get a single opportunity to speak. At the end of the chapter, when he tries to interject, Carmel says, “Shut up. You a sick man, Barry, and the only person who can help you now is God” (282).
Chapter 17 Summary: “Song of Freeness (2010)”
Arriving at the Antiguan airport, V. C. Bird International, Carmel is shocked at all the foreigners who visit the island as a holiday destination, as this was not the case when she was growing up. She sees their influence on the island in the massive properties owned by expats or vacationers, as well as all the yachts on the ocean. Carmel reaches for her UK passport and wonders if she even still belongs in Antigua.
After leaving the airport, Carmel immediately visits her dying father, who can’t register her presence because of his illness. She reflects on the pain he caused her mother. She then visits her childhood home in the hopes of feeling more grounded and discovers that it is still mostly the same, except that things are now broken and dusty. The garden is unkempt and overgrown because her father did not accept any help despite his age and illness.
Carmel’s cousin, Augusta, tells her that her father is a changed man. In the past few years, he has been weeping from regret at how he had treated his wife. He reflected on how he came from a line of men who took out their frustrations on their wives, and he wished that he were different.
Carmel is overworked and stressed from dealing with her father’s will when she encounters her old friend Odette in town. They have a conversation about Barry and Morris, and Odette reveals Barry and Morris’s affair. Carmel is so devastated by this news that Odette insists that she stay at her luxury spa, which mostly caters to rich tourists, free of charge until she can emotionally recover.
At the spa, Carmel starts taking better care of herself. She properly exercises for the first time in her life. She gets regular massages, and her diet changes for the better as she stops overeating and eats healthier food. All this aids in her physical transformation.
During lunch on the beach, she hears someone shout her full first name, “Carmelita.” It’s Hubert, a suitor of hers before she married Barry. Hubert reveals that he is a widower and that he has retired to Antigua after a successful academic career in the United States. He tells Carmel that he always hoped he could be with her, and they immediately fall into a romantic relationship. They spend the night together, and Carmel prays for forgiveness. They also dance together, and Carmel realizes she hasn’t danced since the 1970s.
Carmel and Hubert discuss opening a Christian retreat in Antigua. Carmel dreams about bringing all her Antiguan friends back from the UK to help her so that they “can all be together on home soil after fifty years away” (196). She gives all the glory to God for her change in fortune.
Chapter 18 Summary: “The Art of Travel (Sunday, May 1, 2011)”
Barry and Morris get ready to take a road trip in their restored Buick. The car broke down in 1975 and hasn’t been driven since.
The narration flashes back to the previous year’s Christmas. After Morris cooked a turkey lunch, Barry drove them to a luxury-car showroom. Barry told Morris that he still had a lot of money even though Carmel took half of it in the divorce. Barry shared his wish to purchase an expensive red Lamborghini that other men would envy. Morris cited the recession and Hackney’s poverty as reasons not to spend on such a lavish expense. Barry eventually decided Morris was right and forgot about the Lamborghini, opting to fix up his Buick instead. Barry and Morris started stripping the car the same day the builders arrived to renovate the house to their taste. They dismantled Carmel’s décor and replaced it with their shared vision of their ideal living space. They also built a mock studio apartment in the attic as a cover story for Morris’s anti-gay family.
Back in the present day, Daniel arrives before Barry and Morris leave on their road trip. Daniel apologizes for the night he and Barry fought and says he is no longer friends with that group of boys. Barry accepts his apology and asks about Donna. Daniel reveals that she has a new man in her life, a high-court judge who she feels makes up for her previous relationship failures. Daniel also tells his grandfather that Carmel has told Donna about his affair with Morris and that Donna has been spreading the news to her friends.
Daniel shares that he has been accepted to Harvard with a full scholarship; he plans to attend Harvard Law School after completing his undergraduate degree, at which point he will become a politician. Barry and Morris congratulate him, and they all celebrate by dancing. Before Daniel leaves, Barry asks if they’ll lose him to America, but Daniel replies that they won’t because his roots are in London.
Thinking about how he would like to congratulate Donna on the good job she has done with her son, Barry realizes he never congratulated her on anything. In contrast, he realizes that he spoiled Maxine. He reflects on how Maxine is finally turning her business into a success, as she is learning from the business manager he hired.
As Barry and Morris cruise on the M1, leaving London, Barry realizes that he has rarely visited the rest of the UK. He feels like a foreigner as they reach the countryside. He yearns to visit Antigua again but knows that Carmel won’t be ready to see him. He wrote her an apology letter and feels remorseful for wasting 50 years of her life, as she stated in her confrontation.
Committed to starting anew, Barry wants there to be no secrets between him and Morris. Barry divulges details about his other relationships with men, but Morris stops him. Morris says that he has just as many secrets but that they shouldn’t fixate on them. Rather, Morris argues, they should focus on enjoying the “vibes” in the moment.
Chapters 16-18 Analysis
Carmel’s final confrontation with Barry further indicates her hateful anti-gay bias. She tells him, “You a sick man, Barry, and the only person who can help you now is God” (282). This verbal attack is in line with Carmel’s use of the word “homosicksical” in place of “homosexual”; Carmel views Barry’s orientation as an abnormal sickness, and she believes he should turn to God for a cure.
Even though Carmel’s prejudice never changes, the final section of the novel indicates the character’s growth. Carmel undergoes a transformation in Antigua symbolized by the makeover she receives there. The only other time that Carmel goes through a drastic makeover occurs when she confides in her work friends about her true desires—another instance of her opening herself to previously repressed feelings. Her makeover, which is the result of positive lifestyle changes such as dieting, exercising, and falling in love, gives her the confidence to finally end her loveless marriage.
The ensuing confrontation is markedly one-sided, as Carmel does not let Barry speak. This upbraiding, like her bias, is nothing new, but its narrative function is to provide space for Carmel to tell her own story; the reader already knows what Barry feels and thinks because he narrates most of the novel. Carmel accuses Barry of wasting 50 years of her life, and unlike most of her accusations, the novel suggests that this one has some merit, framing Carmel’s frustrations as collateral damage of the Anti-Gay Bias, Violence, and the Fear of Coming Out that have shaped Barry’s life. In the final chapter, Barry agrees with this sentiment and sends Carmel an apology letter, showing his own character growth.
Barry’s growth and change is symbolized through his 1975 Buick. Morris rejects Barry’s “late-life crisis” wish to spend a fortune on a Lamborghini. Instead of buying something new, expensive, and flashy, Barry and Morris opt to work on something that is old but beautiful and rare, trying to get it back on the road. This symbolizes their relationship itself. They have been romantically involved since they were teenagers, but their relationship has broken down many times because it didn’t have the attention or space to flourish. Instead of ignoring the past, the couple celebrates its beauty and sets out to fix and improve the relationship they have always had.
The other members of Barry’s family also grow by the end of the novel. Daniel apologizes to his grandfather for how he responded in their fight, and he indicates that he no longer associates with his anti-gay friends. Maxine’s growth is evident in the budding success of her business and her increased responsibility regarding her work. Donna is more of a question mark; her willingness to gossip about her father’s orientation suggests that she still holds some of her old prejudices. However, Barry’s recognition of the ways he failed her as a father suggests that much of the friction in their relationship has nothing to do with Barry’s orientation and is in fact a justified response to parental favoritism. Furthermore, his pride at Donna’s success in raising Daniel suggests that there may be a way forward for them after all.
This final section also comments on feelings of belonging among diaspora communities. As Daniel is moving to America, Barry asks that he not forget his family, but Daniel says that he will always return to his roots. As Daniel was born and raised in London, he has a different cultural identity than Barry, whose roots are in Antigua. This idea is further explored when Barry travels out of London at the end of the novel. For most of his life, he has depended on the Caribbean community in London, so he has not ventured far outside the city. Now that Barry has embraced his identity as a gay man and is living semi-openly with Morris, new possibilities of community are available to him, which the expanded vistas of the novel’s conclusion symbolically suggest.
