The Help

by Kathryn Stockett

Jackson, Mississippi was not the most progressive place in the 1960s, at least in terms of race relations. Our story takes place during this time and focuses on the relationships between women and their hired help (hence the title).

Our three narrators are as follows:

• Aibeleen: the maid who works for the Leefolt family. She is, above all, the mother figure in this home;

• Minny: another maid in Jackson who has just landed a job in the home of Celia Foote, an outcast in Jackson’s tightly knit society; and

• Eugenia “Skeeter” Phelan: the young, white college graduate who has returned to Jackson and become dismayed by race relations, particularly between her friends and their “help.”

Skeeter’s inability to relate to her junior league friends and their horrific treatment of domestic help fuels her to take action. For an aspiring writer like Skeeter, a book is the answer. She enlists the help of Aibeleen and Minny and many others to write Help, a true account of life as a black maid in Jackson, MS.

I have several complaints, which include:

• The novel is too long,

• Only the maids’ narration (and dialogue) includes dialect,

• We never get to really know any of the narrators, and

• The novel just seems really overworked.

This novel is totally overrated, but I can see how the masses might love it.

12/19/10