Wednesday, February 27, 2013

Rainbow Plantation what?

As I laid in bed last night, alone and unable to sleep, it dawned on me that some people might stumble upon this blog and wonder what the hell Rainbow Plantation Blues is about. So since I was alone and had nothing, or nobody, better to do I thought about today's post and decided to make it a summery of the novel. So here it is.
   In 1850, Jonathan Thomas, a young, personable and aristocratic Southern gentleman has returned to his antebellum home from an ivy league school in the North. His father is dying and Jonathan is sole heir to the families lavish, prosperous and renowned Rainbow Plantation. While up North, two major revelations had seriously shaken his self-image. Exposure to Northern abolitionism had permanently changed is out on slavery, the South's ''peculier institution.'' Worse, he began to believe he might be a sodomite, a most wretched creature reviled by the customs of nineteenth century American society.
   When he tours the plantation grounds for the first time in many years, he sees that his boyhood playmate, a slave named Kumi, has matured into a Black adonis. Jonathan is instantly captivated. Now he knows he is a sodomite and, even worse, he is hopelessly smitten over a slave.
    As he grapples with his sexual proclivity and the ''peculier institution,'' he befriends Stephen Wentworth, a social non-conformist living an esoteric life-style, who has a deep, hidden connection to him. Under Stephen's influence, and from another unlikely source- the Bible- Jonathan is able to unravel his demons and triumph in the end.
    Okay okay, I admit the summery is basically right off the back of the book. But I only said I thought about today's post last night. I didn't say I wrote it!
    My work may be of interest to gay, lesbian, bi-sexual, transgendered and questioning people as well as progressives, history buffs, religious scholars, feminists and civil-libertarians. Social conservatives may proceed with caution!

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