Augustown: A Novel

Augustown explores the consequences of racial and social oppression. Babylon, the system of white society that rules Jamaica, perpetrates oppression rampantly throughout the narrative. Kaia, Clarky, and Gina all fall victim to Babylon’s racial and social oppression in violent ways. Kaia loses his hair and with it, his sense of identity; Clarky loses his hair and with it, his will to survive; Gina loses the tenuous sense of safety she felt she could provide for her son and with it, her life. All of these are contemporary losses, taking place after Jamaica’s independence from direct British colonial governance, but they mirror Bedward’s loss back in 1920. Though the colonial governing structures are gone, the same Babylon exists, the very Babylon that “pull[s] the preacherman right back down to the ground” (108). Before Bedward can “escape the trapments of the world” (25), as Ma Taffy calls it, Babylon forces him to return to the ground, placing the “stone” of oppression back upon his head and preventing him from flying again.

There are more subtle oppressions that also take place throughout the novel. The issue of classism, for example, is brought to light through the characters of Leslie Probyn and Richard Azaar in 1920 and through the Garricks in 1982.