by Aaron Thier
“The grand argument,” he was saying, “against the continuation of the plantation system in general, is undoubtedly the terrible waste of life which it occasions, yet if we consider the alternatives . . .”
But the secretary had drifted off to sleep. And thus, no less surely than any other—though some questions were left unanswered, and some problems unsolved—the semester came to an end.
From: “Maggie Bell”
To: “William Brees”
Date: April 8, 2010, at 4:15 PM
Subject: RE: Checking In
Hi, Bill,
I wouldn’t get too discouraged. You’re not going to draw any water at that well. I think your idea of a website is very smart, and these days it’s easy enough to publicize these things.
I told Chris, but I didn’t tell my parents anything. And then do you know what happened? Chris told Mom and Dad he was gay. Dad said, “Shit!” Practically the only time I’ve ever heard him swear. Then he hugged him and said he loved him, simple as that. I was amazed. I guess Mom already knew. She said, “Thank God that’s over with!”
I’m actually doing very well. You know how when you get back from camping, you can’t get enough of the hot shower and the clean towels and the food all right there in the fridge, no sand in it, no bugs? That’s how I feel. Because it was bad, yes, but it wasn’t the end of the world. It wasn’t as bad as it could have been. And now I’m here, just sitting here, and aren’t I allowed to be mostly okay? Of course I am.
Nothing in my life has ever tasted as good as the piece of carrot cake I ate in your house the day we got back.
What am I supposed to make of it all? As soon as you get past the immediate context, the things people do and the reasons they have for doing them begin to seem outrageous. Human life becomes a sinister cartoon. But maybe the truth is that we just invent or impute these complex motives, and really the only motives that matter are fear and love. And how do you know that love isn’t just a kind of fear? This doesn’t seem like a very satisfactory lesson, does it?
But how do you know, on the other hand, that fear isn’t just a kind of love?
Do you know what I find strangest of all? The strangest thing is that one day, maybe not next year but maybe in five years or ten years, these last months will be nothing but a wan memory. Vague images, the impress of horror, nothing more. I won’t remember that it was this particular bug bite on my ankle that itched more than any of the others. And that’s nice.
For your help, your kindness, I can never say the right kind of thank-you.
Love,
M
Excerpted from
A True & Exact Historie of These Ilands of the West Indies, with an account of the Carwak Indians, and Observations upon the Newlie-Discover’d Iland of Saint Reynard, or Guanahani
by
John Morehead Tripoli
CHAPTER the Last
I am Rescued ~ Brotherhood of Man ~ Seekness and Climate
My Method How to Disarme the Planter ~ Sorrow to Depart ~ Farewell to Guanahani ~ The Future of the Carwak
Now I was brought on board shippe, and indeed these men thought they were doing me a great service, viz rescewing me from the Carwak. My cloathes had long since rott’d from my body, and now I wore, in all truthe, nothing more than that in whitch I had come into the world, tho I was painted all over to keep off the muskitos / which torment’d the sailors e’en to Madness /. But this is above all the most Sensible garmet in such a Climate, for tho my Rescuers gave me some things to ware, yet I could not, it being too hott. And being long accustomed, too, after One Year among the Carwak of Guanahani, to walk barefoot, my feete could not bear the confinement of shoos.
Many tymes in these years that have pass’d away have I asked my Self why I did go with them, for shurely I was happyer upon Guanahani than e’er I was in Merrie Englande, and shurely they would not have compelled me aboard? And to this great question I know not the answer, except to say that I had liv’d all this year in the hope, or so I thought, of rescew, so that suche a hope was but a habit of mind, and ne’er examin’d, with the effect that onlie in the fullnesse of tyme did I discover that I want’d it not, & then it was to layte.
I will now offer some thots on the Englishman, for having been among the Carwak for so long a time, I coud now see the Englishman as it were with Fresh Eyes, viz. that he is exceading filthy, esp. after long confinement a board shippe, and stank like the verry Devil. His eyes seem like those of the Abouri or Swamp Weasel, and his complexion in the tropicks is of pink, and white, for he dos not know how to painte his bodie as the Carwak do. And finally there is a worse circumstance, namely, that he is cover’d over with Vermin.
But now I thought, that, I had bin my Self an Englishman, and after one year, as it seem’d to me, was one no longer, and how could that be, for in that argument what was I? And so, tho dreading Prolixity of which, perhaps, I have already been to often guilty, I cannot forebare to offer some thoughts on the Indian, or rather on Man. For the Indian, as I judge, is like to the Russian, who is like to a combinashun of the Chinaman & the Pole, who are like to others in theyr turne, and others, &c &c, which leades me to believe that there is but 1 Set of Men on the globe, such diffrences of height & breadth, &c., as there are from one to another, and most particlerlie of the darkness, liteness, or redness of the skinne, are produced according to the Soil and Climate in which he livves, from which I conclude, not onlie that the Indian is brother to the Russian, and perhaps is latelie come from the Russias by Canoo, yet so am I brother to the Indian, & the Russian, and also that shoud I remaine in this iland I shall be as brown and red as these the Carwaks, by the action of the Soil, and also of the Sunne. For that is the reason the Ethiope is become soo darken’d, and the Swede, who is no more expos’d to the Sunne than a Cave Louse, is white.
I will saye, if the reader will be pashent, another thing, viz. that tho I had been sicklie when I was first come to this iland of Saint Reynard, or Guanahani, yet I regained my health wonderfully, and when I had been one week a board shippe again, I grew sickly, from which I conclude, first, that it is not this region of West India that is so deadlie, but onlie our shippes, or, as it may be, our cloathes, or, even, tho I know there are many will protest, it may be that the verry Sugar Cane imits some subtile malarious poyson, for on those ilands, such as Iamaica, where it is cultivat’d, there is great mortality, and on this iland there is none either of the cane or of the seekness but what we bringe with us. For me this yet remains to be controverted, for the truth is that when all my companions had dyed, & I alone was left to shift for my Self among the Carwak, & the seekness had all burn’d its Self out, then no person among us whether it be Man, Woman or Childe grew seek. From which I conclude that Guanahani is a bless’d Isle.
It may well be hop’d that the Sugar Cane is never brought to Guanahani, and, that the iland is preserv’d in its Virgin State, to be a Paradize for the Carwak, and for the European /, not I shud say the dregs and dross of all Europe, but those more gentle Souls, or perhaps the infirm, who may yet regane theyr health heare marvelouslie well /. Yet I know not how to exclude the Cane from this iland my true hart’s Home, for as long as A profit is Religion, & B money is pope, & C sugar be the most dear of all the produce of these ilands, then D the sugar planters will controlle that gratest share of power, being the Priests of theyr Religion of Profit, and the commanders of Money, and all this region will be annex’d to theyr interest. Yet it may be, that, in this matter of Money lyes the answere, for wee can turne the Planter’s Religion to Our Profit, viz that A suche Monies as they do have must be had in exchange for theyr produce, so that B we need onlie restrane our Selves from the purchase of Sugar to pinch off the flowe of Money, and to robb the Planter of his power. So, I saye to you, Reader, if like me you have enjoy’d this time among the Carwak, then take your Tee with Honey, which is neare as sweete, and it may be you will preserve poor Yarico and these others, her contry Men
the Carwak, from the ravages of the Sugar Cane, and keep Guanahani as beautiful as ever it was, so that others our posteritie may enjoy it for ever, along with the Carwak.
Yet it now comes tyme to say my farewell to Guanahani, or, as it is so call’d by the Englishman among whom I was now come once more, Saint Reynard. A board shippe I was given food, for it was suppos’d I was hungrie, being marooned among the Savage, but the soop was smoaky, & the beef was old, & my face was bedued with tears. Long and tearfully had I plead’d with my Yarico to come back with me to Englande, yet tho I wept, and cry’d, and beat my breast, she would not, saying that her place was among her people the Carwak. O Yarico!—kind Reader forgive me this Ejaculation—would God that you are happie, my Great Friend!
Yet one consolashun was mine, as the shippe wayed anchor, and the sails grew big-belly’d, and my belov’d Yarico, and indeede my true home of Guanahani, slid away over the See, and, it was this—namely, that tho it be a tyme of great Despaire among the Carwak, & great Mortality, when seekness is on board with every English shippe, yet mayhap the reason is onlie that this be but a tyme of change, when all the world seeks for a new balance and harmonie, & shurely in the course of tyme suche a balance will be found, or as t’were restor’d, and then they are shure to become, in the space of years, as wonderfull numerous as in dayes gone by, for they knowe well how to live on the lande, which is theyr ancient home. And that is the best I can wish for them, and my true and greatest hope as long as I live, for it should make my hart gladd to know that such peopll as the Carwak are there, just so, across the wyde blue See.
But now I must say Good Bye to Guanahani, Good Bye to the yellow’d Coco-nuts, Good bye to the colours of the Tropick sunne Set, & to the Perino, & the wite sands, & the watter of Guanahani which is inconceivable Blue & clear & bright, and Good Bye, Good Bye, my Yarico! For I will saye, that, Yarico, tho it tooke me some tyme to know it, yet now I do know that if I had it all to do again, I would have staid with you, and many was the tyme that I lament’d that curs’d hour when I allowd my Self to be taken, and put a board the shippe, for tho I vowed to return, yet Life swallow’d me up, and gave me a new wyfe, and I ne’er saw you more.
SOURCES AND ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
There were many historical William Beckfords, several of whom were writers, one of whom wrote A Descriptive Account of the Island of Jamaica. My Beckford is a fictional creation. He does not quote directly from this book, but its spirit, its casual cruelty, is a part of him. He does, however, speak lines written by Teddy Roosevelt and Benito Mussolini. His e-mail to the college is a messy collage of Mussolini’s speeches and articles, in particular “The Doctrine of Fascism,” a 1935 translation of an article Mussolini co-wrote with Giovanni Gentile. Later, Beckford and James Cavendish both pick up bits of language from eighteenth- and nineteenth-century writing about the West Indies. Both of them speak lines from The West Indies and the Spanish Main, an infuriating book by Anthony Trollope. One or the other also speaks lines from The History, Civil and Commercial, of the British Colonies in the West Indies, by Bryan Edwards; The History of Jamaica, by Edward Long; An Account of Jamaica, by John Stewart; Journal of a West-India Proprietor and Journal of a Residence Among the Negroes in the West Indies, by Matthew Gregory Lewis; and Memoirs of a West-India Planter, by John Riland.
Richard Ligon was a real person who traveled to Barbados in the seventeenth century and wrote a remarkable account of his journey, A True and Exact History of the Island of Barbados. He speaks some lines from this book when he appears in the novel and the menu of the Big Anna® banquet is taken from him as well. Lady Nugent quotes her own journal, Professor Carlyle quotes “The Futurist Manifesto,” and the Constitution of the Free Produce Society of Pennsylvania is a real document. Commandant Kabaka’s dispatches are modeled after the writings of Subcomandante Marcos, which are collected in Our Word Is Our Weapon: Selected Writings. Kabaka acknowledges his sources but it’s worth emphasizing that John Gabriel Stedman’s Narrative of a Five Years’ Expedition Against the Revolted Negroes of Surinam is a wonderful and humane book, still very much worth reading. I borrowed phrases from Stedman and Ligon, as well as from Ned Ward’s astonishing Trip to Jamaica, for John Morehead Tripoli’s own travel narrative. The letters of Israel Framingham Tripoli contain a few phrases from letters written by Thomas Jefferson and Ephraim Williams.
With very few exceptions, the treatments described in the Field Studies Handbook are, or rather were, real medical practices. I quote without attribution from the following: West African Hygiene, by Charles Scovell Grant; On Duty Under a Tropical Sun, by S. L. Hunt and A. S. Kenny; Tropical Trials by A. S. Kenny; The Stranger in the Tropics, by C. D. Tyng; A Few Words of Advice to Cadets, by Henry Kerr; and The Soldier’s Pocket Book for Field Service, by Viscount Garnet Wolseley. The treatment to which the dean is subjected on St. Renard comes from West India Customs and Manners, by J. B. Moreton, who offers this prescription as a cure for venereal disease.
Most important for the spirit of this book are the slave narratives, which I think have more to teach us about the nature of the United States of America than do any of our founding documents. I will list the names in no particular order: Henry Bibb, Charles Ball, Olaudah Equiano, Frederick Douglass, William Wells Brown, Moses Roper, Mary Prince, Harriet Jacobs, Sojourner Truth, Solomon Northup, John Brown, William and Ellen Craft, Henry “Box” Brown, James Albert Ukawsaw Gronniosaw, James Williams, Ottobah Cugoano, Briton Hammon, John Marrant, and Venture Smith.
I relied on a large number of secondary sources as well, among them Plagues and Peoples by William H. McNeill; Ecological Imperialism and The Columbian Exchange, by Alfred Crosby; 1491 and 1493, by Charles Mann; Sweetness and Power, by Sidney W. Mintz; The Sugar Barons, by Matthew Parker; Sugar and Slaves: The Rise of the Planter Class in the English West Indies, 1624–1713, by Richard S. Dunn; Hegel, Haiti, and Universal History, by Susan Buck-Morss; The Middle Passage and The Loss of El Dorado, byV. S. Naipaul; From Columbus to Castro, by Eric Williams; and The Traveller’s Tree, by Patrick Leigh Fermor.
I am very grateful to everyone who read early drafts of this book or provided assistance of some other kind. Many thanks to David Leavitt, Michael Hofmann, Ed White, Audrey Thier, Peter Murphy, Rob White, and David Weimer. Thanks also to my agent, Cynthia Cannell, and my editor, Rachel Mannheimer, and thanks to everyone at MFA@FLA.
I’d be living in a cardboard box with a squeeze bottle of malt liquor if it were not for my wife, Sarah Trudgeon, who also read many many drafts and provided invaluable editorial advice. Thanks are not enough, never enough. I can offer only my love.
A NOTE ON THE AUTHOR
Aaron Thier was born in Baltimore and raised in Williamstown, Massachusetts. He and his wife have just returned from Florida, where they lived in Gainesville and Miami, and they are now hiding in western Massachusetts once again. His essays have appeared in the Nation, the New Republic, and the Buenos Aires Review. He is currently at work on his second novel.
Copyright © 2014 by Aaron Thier
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in
any manner whatsoever without written permission from the publisher
except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.
For information address Bloomsbury USA, 1385 Broadway,
New York, NY 10018.
Published by Bloomsbury USA, New York
Library of Congress cataloging-in-publication data
Thier, Aaron.
The ghost apple : a novel / Aaron Thier.—First U.S. Edition.
pages cm
eISBN 978-1-62040-529-1
1. College students—Fiction. 2. Snack food industry—
Fiction. 3. New England—Fiction. I. Title.
PS3620.H546G46 2014
813´.6—dc23
2013036240
First U.S. edition 2014
Electronic edition published in March 2014
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