A small town becoming front-page news (“John Henry Days” by Colson Whitehead)

Abstract

In “John Henry Days” (2001), the well-known African American writer C. Whitehead addresses the phenomenon of a provincial town that, in an attempt to survive, uses the local legend of 19^th century African American laborer John Henry who took part in building the Big Bend Tunnel during the construction of the Chesapeake – Ohio railroad, defeated the steam drill in a contest (a human vs non-human vs Nature) and died immediately after. To commemorate John Henry, a number of ballads, songs, stories and other memorabilia have appeared since the event that took place in the early 1870s. Local authorities arrange a grand festival with a fair and other celebrations in the hope to improve the town’s budget. Not only numerous tourists come here, but also journalists, whose task is to “promote” the local phenomenon. The novel focuses on both the personality of John Henry and 20th century Americans who visit the small town of Talcott in order to reveal the atmosphere of the town as well as that of the backwaters of the USA. The book is a parody of both provincial customs and the press, which feeds off sensations, and consists of a series of vignettes depicting the multidimensional world of the American province. Among the major themes are racism which has taken disguised forms, junketeering as a phenomenon of the evolution of the media under the influence of new technologies, difference in the mentality of people living in big cities and small towns, family relationships, and responsibility of a person for his/her choices in life.