Demon Copperhead (2023)
Why this one?
I had been checking out some books from the 2023 Women’s Prize Longlist, and was just getting onto this as it was announced as part of the Shortlist. The plan is now to read the remaining three books on the list before the winner is announced in June. This one was already an obvious choice due to the hype, the fact that Kingsolver is a previous winner and that I really rather enjoyed The Lacuna. Since I picked up Demon Copperhead, it’s also been awarded the 2023 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, sharing the honours for the first time in that prize’s history with Hernan Diaz’s 2022 Booker-longlisted Trust.
Barbara Kingsolver (1955- ; active 1988- ) was born in Annapolis, Maryland, US. She grew up in Kentucky, briefly living in what’s now the Democratic Republic of Congo with her family, before studying at DePauw University, Indiana on a music scholarship. She moved to Arizona where she earned a master’s degree in ecology and evolutionary biology.
She began her writing career in the 80s, first as a science-focused journalist before branching out into fiction, initially as a hobby. Her first novel, The Bean Trees, was published in 1988, followed by Animal Dreams (1990) and Pigs in Heaven (1993; a sequel to her debut). The Poisonwood Bible (1998) is probably her best known work, a huge commercial and critical success that was shortlisted for the Pulitzer. She has since published five further novels, including 2010 Women’s Prize winner The Lacuna, as well as poetry, essays and non-fiction.
In 2000, she established the Bellwether Prize for Fiction, which is intended to support writers whose unpublished works support positive social change. In the 90s she was a founding member of the Rock Bottom Remainders, a rock band made up of published writers including Stephen King, Amy Tan and Matt Groening.
Thoughts, etc.
Demon Copperhead is an epic retelling of Charles Dickens’ David Copperfield, transplanted to the recent history of the USA, and specifically Appalachia. It’s told through the eyes of its title character (real name Damon Fields) who we first meet as a child born into poverty, looked after by his addict mother in :Lee County, Virginia. Its plot closely follows that of its source material, particularly in the early stages where Demon first struggles with an abusive stepfather and is then orphaned, becoming thrown into a cycle of disastrous foster homes that wear him down to the point where it seems he can go no lower.
Eventually he is reunited with his grandmother, Miss Betsy (the Betsy Trotwood figure of the novel) who puts him in the care of high school football Coach Winfield, a local hero but also another spiralling alcoholic, who lives with his daughter Agnes (who here goes by Angus) with whom Demon forms his first notable healthy friendship. He enters a brief period of success as a star on Winfield’s Football team, living in relative luxury in their mansion, and finding a mentor for his talent for comic-drawing, in the shape of schoolteacher Annie. When he develops a knee-injury that stops his sporting success in its tracks, though, he finds himself in an ever-increasing cycle of dependence on Opioids, notably OxyContin, which switches the tone of the novel again to focus on the damage wrought on swathes of the US by the proliferation of addictive prescription medication and its consequences.
It’s hard to know where to start with this one as it’s simply so rich and multi-layered. To get the most obvious question out of the way first: I approached it as someone with a passing familiarity with Copperfield rather than a detailed understanding, and that felt like rather a good place to be in that I was able to appreciate the occasional nods to and twists on the original without getting overly bogged down in the precise comparisons. It’s possible I think that being very fond of the Dickens book could be a downfall for some, as those comparisons could become a little too much of an obsession (even for me, they were one of the few minor frustrations - the Uriah Heep / U-Haul character’s plot feels shoehorned in and unnecessary, and the McCobbs are hardly the Micawbers in terms of grabbing your interest). So going from there, I feel like its best to take it as a new thing - to the extent that not knowing the Dickens at all might be an advantage! As others have said, the main point to take home is that a story about crushing poverty and a system that works to keep people down in the name of rampant capitalism is sadly as relevant in much of the 21st Century world as it was in Victorian England.
So coming onto Demon Copperhead proper then: what a wild, addictive, beautiful ride it is. It’s a chunky read, but one that’s near-impossible to put down. The voice of its central character, both in terms of storytelling finesse and linguistic nuance, is utterly compelling and gives the sense of being taken on a fast-paced journey by a trusted friend. Around him are a cast of memorable but freshly drawn characters, very much worthy of but distinct from their Dickensian antecedent. Here, it feels like the stories of the younger generation of characters who stand out: the emergence of the troubled gothic vibe and sexual identity of Demon’s childhood friend Maggot, the quirky androgyny of the immensely likeable Angus, the tragically doomed Dori, “Fast Forward” (the novel’s Steerforth analogy) and his magnetic pull disguised hidden darkness, etc etc. Where the novel really comes into its own, it’s like the bleakest high school movie you’ve ever seen.
On that note, the handling of the Opioid epidemic is note-perfect. Kingsolver depicts it as the most recent and devastating consequence of a US system that tries to suppress the ‘land economy’ of the Appalachians by mocking and de-humanising its inhabitants as ‘hillbillies’ because they refuse to enter into the ‘money economy’ of the cities and become part of the tax-raising system that capitalism requires. The solution? Hook whole swathes of them on a crushingly addictive, pointless and expensive drug. I’m by no means an expert on the Opioid crisis, but its presentation here feels sadly truthful and absolutely miserable. I really should read more on the subject.
The real genius of Demon Copperhead, though, for me, is that it manages to cover the macro-issues above, as well as the barrage of personal issues that relentlessly knock Demon further and further down (the two ultimately converging to an even more doom-filled level, of course), without managing to feel like misery porn in any sense. It’s hard to fully describe, but while the issues covered in the novel are certainly depressing and abhorrent, the experience of reading it is far from grim. Of course, there are moments that will kick you down and have you screaming at the pages (for me, it’s when Demon seems to have escaped but is then cruelly robbed of the pitiful savings he’s worked long and hard for under the McCobbs), but there’s something in the telling, the characters, and the dark seam of humour that Demon uses as a defensive tactic that keeps the whole thing far lighter than its subject matter would imply. It helps that, despite the trail of devastation along the way, there are uplifting moments throughout - demonstrations of the power of simple human kindness; the joys of pure friendships; and ultimately the realisation that there is a real strength in the Appalachian lifestyle, in its reliance not on an older value system that draws on nature and the land, community support and a self-sufficiency that is held in stark contrast to those in nearby cities that are facing similar crises.
It’s not without its flaws, but to me they were minor when held up against the magnificant compelling whole. I’ve mentioned a couple of those above, to which I’d add that I didn’t quite feel like Demon’s Melungeon heritage was explored as much as it could have been, and that it’s possible that the stories of Maggot’s sexuality and the implications arising from the Agnes/Angus androgyny were also under-explored. But with so much else going on here, it’s hard to complain too much.
Score
9.5
I finished this a few days ago and am already missing its beautifully crafted, rich world. I’d be more than happy to see this take home the Prize and on the evidence so far, would be slightly surprised if it didn’t.
(Also, surely there must be a cinema / prestige TV adaptation of this on the cards already? It seems almost purposefully tailored for that kind of adaptation - hard as it will be to capture Demon’s narrative in such a setting, the proliferation of cinematic locations and scenarios should more than compensate…)
Next up
Continuing with the shortlist and onto the much shorter Black Butterflies.
