The Women and Men of Brewster Place
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Two of Gloria NaylorÆs books, The Women of Brewster Place and The Men of Brewster place feature the same characters and location. The location is Brewster Place, a deteriorating tenement where African American inhabitants come to live more by circumstance than by choice. There are many similarities between the two works, including structure, as each of the works contains seven different sections narrated respectively by the women and men who live in Brewster Place. Another similarity is the overriding theme of the search for identity and solidarity among a group of disparate African Americans who often abuse each other as much as offering nurturing and compassion. However, in The Women of Brewster Place, Naylor presents a group of women who seem largely victimized by African American males. In contrast, in The Men of Brewster Place, the author provides the male perspective, with characters who were abusive or neglectful in the first book coming back to Brewster Place to ôconfess and atone,ö (Hoffman, p. 1). This analysis will compare and contrast these two works with a focus on the victimization of Black women at the hands of Black men but how Black women are often culpable in such relationships. A conclusion will address the similar theme of the two works.The Women of Brewster Place features a collection of women living in a dilapidated tenement whose lives are filled with laundry, cooking, and diapering babies
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ng time to say these next few words: This street gave birth to more than its girl children, ya know. And in all my years working as janitor on this block, I ainÆt seen no favoritism, one way or another, all had a hard way to go,ö (Naylor, p. 1).
Indeed, if the men of Brewster Place in The Women of Brewster Place seemed to take their frustrations out on the women who had a hard way of it, the women were culpable in the sense that they were unable to understand the rage, injustice, and sense of powerlessness driving the men. Denied access to all the measures of a man (money, power, position), the women exacerbated the frustrations of the men by being one more source of irritation toward them. As Ben tells us of the women in his narration in The Men of Brewster Place, ôThey cursed, badgered, worshipped, and shared their men. But their men loved them too. And many hung in here on this street when the getting woulda been more than good because of themùand their children,ö (Naylor, p. 2).
In many ways, for both the women and the men of Brewster Place the environment is one that both sustains them and entraps them. When Lorraine dies, the women are united in the tragedy through a series of dreams each of them has regarding her.
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Approximate Word count = 2140
Approximate Pages = 9 (250 words per page)
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