Light in August

Joanna lets Joe stay in the cabin on their property. They become physically intimate, but their conversations remain stilted, like strangers. Joanna is unlike the other women Joe has been with. At times, she gives off a masculine aura. Being with her, Joe feels unsure about his understanding of the opposite sex. He starts working at the mill and learns Joanna spends her time helping Black communities in the surrounding area: “When he learned that, he understood the town’s attitude toward her, though he knew that the town did not know as much as he did” (234). Skeptical of Joanna, Joe considers leaving, thinking she’ll eventually throw him out. Despite this instinct, he stays. He regularly goes up to the house for food, irritated by Joanna’s hospitality. One evening, he returns to his cabin and finds Joanna waiting for him. She opens up to him. She’s lived in the house her whole life, although her family is originally from the North. Then she recounts her family’s history.

Calvin Burden, Joanna’s grandfather, settles in the South after running away from home as a boy. He raises his children religiously and teaches them to disgust slaveholders. Joanna’s father, Nathan Burden, runs away and spends years in the western states of the United States like his father before him.