Homegoing

“Cobbe had lost seven yams, and he felt each loss as a blow to his own family. He knew then that the memory of the fire that burned, then fled, would haunt him, his children, and his children’s children for as long as the line continued.” 

In the opening paragraphs of the novel, Cobbe is left with the new baby Effia as he salvages what he can from the fire that burned the night Maame fled. This is the beginning of the “curse” that follows his children for seven generations, symbolized by the loss of seven yams. The image of fire, possibly set by Maame herself, will follow Effia’s family line for generations, with Maame herself reappearing as the firewoman who haunts Akua’s dreams. 

“And in my village we have a saying about separated sisters. They are like a woman and her reflection, doomed to stay on opposite sides of the pond.” 

Abronoma, the captive slave girl in Esi’s household, names the separation of Esi and Effia but also foreshadows Esi’s voyage across the Atlantic as she is sold into slavery. Like the sisters in the saying, Esi and Effia, and their descendants, exist on opposite shores until Marcus and Marjorie find their way to one another.

“Quey had wanted to cry, but that desire embarrassed him. He knew that he was one of the half-caste children of the Castle, and, like the other half-caste children, he could not fully claim either half of himself, neither his father’s whiteness nor his mother’s blackness. Neither England nor the Gold Coast.” 

Part of Quey’s struggle in this chapter is with his mixed identity, which is brought into focus when he meets Cudjo, who later becomes a love interest. Quey is a lonely child, in part because he does not feel he belongs to either culture, neither English nor Fante. When he becomes part of his mother’s village, he feels a sense of belonging for the first time.