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Reader Response To The Poisonwood Bible By Barbara Kingsolver

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The Poisonwood Bible

Readers Response #1 :
In the Poisonwood Bible, Kingsolver uses 4 different voices for each sister in the family. It gives each girl’s narration style its own traits which allows for each sister to have a distinct voice. There is Rachel Price who always seems to mispronounce words, thats a big trait that sets her apart from others. Leah Price admires her father deeply and is very open minded and sincere. She has a big heart and tends to focus on the issues that reside in Africa. Her ability to be open with everyone is her key aspect. Adah Price who is hemiplegic from birth knows that her disorder overpowers her intelligence yet she is very smart. She has a fascination with words that are spelled backwards but her key aspect …show more content…

The father of the four girls, Nathan Price is a pastor and those symbols are influenced by him. Faith is a big part of this novel and its been questioned many times. Its been questioned many times because Nathan Price has mislead his family about the Christian Faith and God. Its interesting that the only narrators in the story are the women, never has Nathan Price narrated or shared a part of his life to readers. Instead we see him through the eyes of the women in the family. It gives a better understanding and perspective of Nathan Price through the perspective of other characters. Nathan Price has misinformed his family about religion, God, and faith. The quote that Anatole says “Don’t expect God’s protection in places beyond God’s dominion.” This quote is practically going against the faith that all Christians because if God created everything there wouldn’t be areas beyond his dominion, he’s the creator there shouldn’t have been a dominion. Its matters like this that are happening because Nathan Price has fully spread his misinterpretations to the family. I do agree with Barbara Kingsolver of how everyone is complicit because everyone has their fair share of wrong doings but they aren’t necessarily culprits. If anyone is close to be called a culprit it's Nathan Price who preaches about God and Christian Faith yet when hardships arrive those preachings serve no purpose. I agree with Kingsolver’s conclusion that every character is complicit but not all of them are culprits. Many tend to be victims of poor biblical education and others like Nathan Price who are victims themselves of

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In the Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver, the Price family is living in the ever changing country of the Congo, the author seeks to make a statement on the way that colonialism affects the people of the country being colonized. Kingsolver achieves this effect by adding instances of change and people of different countries coming in and out of the country in order to add the effect of colonization. Colonization in the Congo is shown in The Poisonwood Bible in the way that Nathan rules over his family, he drags his family to the Congo and often acts as the leader and makes all the decisions for the family. Kingsolver uses this as a metaphor comparing Nathan to the European countries and the rest of the family as the Congo. Nathan asserts

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Kingsolver heavily uses hyperbole when speaking from Rachel’s perspective and includes blame as a theme to add personality to characters throughout the book. It is easy to discern Rachel’s voice from the other sisters due to her voice and the way she processes thoughts and emotions. Rachel overexaggerates nearly everything, causing her to be rarely satisfied and constantly discontent with the world around her but never blaming herself for any misfortunes. By describing Leah as “the cause of all our problems,” (Kingsolver, 335) you can see her need to displace any blame away from herself or a predicament’s true factors and onto one set person in the same dramatic way she does anything. A similar attitude can be seen throughout the Price family,

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The Poisonwood Bible explores multiple different meanings ranging from love and loyalty, to ignorance and political oppression. While it is a story of the journey of the Price family in the Congo, Kingsolver uses these narratives to draw a bigger picture of the geopolitics that are at play in the Congo. I think the overarching theme of the novel is ignorance and its opposite: empathy. We follow the journeys of ignorant characters such as Rachel and Nathan Price and are given a parallel with the journeys of Adah, Leah, and Orleanna. However Kingsolver showcases the realities of life here or beyond by the end of the novel where it is clear that none of the characters we met at the beginning would end up with lives that fulfilled all their dreams

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