Essay #1

Adah Price

- goes into a virtually permanent exile once her limp is corrected
- her limp made her unique among her family, although body deformities were typical in the Congo
- her physical handicap allowed her to psychologically blossom into an erudite teenage girl
- after her limp is doctored and she is distanced from her family, she no is no longer distinguished by her single abnormality that previously defined her in the states preceding their move to the Congo
- begins to reject men after they flock to her succeeding her limp alteration
- fears that her identity will dissolve along with her new normal means of transportation: "Will I lose myself entirely if I lose my limp?"
- realizes that her limp was not such a bad thing, but rather a necessity to her character


The word "exile" illustrates such a frightening situation, especially since here in the states nobody is ever truly banished and doing such an abominable thing to a human being appears unimaginable. Throughout many other countries in the world, however, it is not that infrequent like in the Congo. This word can take on various meanings though, for instance, people can be socially exiled, physically exiled, or even mentally exiled if they dig that deep of a hole with themselves. Being exiled alters a person, they view everything in an alternate light and start to question everything about their being. Palestinian literary theorist and cultural critic Edward Said appeared to have described "exile" as a physical rift that leads to the production of multiple rifts within one's self. Adah Price's form of exile in The Poisonwood Bible varied from his definition; Adah felt that she was not truly herself anymore once her limp was fixed and that an element of her identity had vanished with it as well. It generated such a feeling of abandonment of the only life she ever knew that she had almost wished she would have never pursued the alteration in the first place before she finally learned to somewhat accept it. After she was no longer the "crooked girl", she felt like a different person and that the sense of home within herself virtually dissolved, sending her into what felt like exile.

At the inception of her life in the United States, Adah was teased and alienated for her handicap because it was not a normal feature of the students enrolled in her school. She did not seek anyone's pity but rather quite enjoyed the fact that everyone thought she was weaker than them and incapable of even the simplest things. She rarely spoke, but her thoughts were filled with the most intelligent concepts that nobody around her could probably even understand what she was referring to. She had her own language in which she wrote both sentences and words backwards and also read books multiple times with different perspectives. Although her family knew she was highly intelligible, they sadly reverted to distinguishing her by her unbalanced walk as well as everyone else. Her limp alienated her from the rest of the children in the states, but she did not necessarily mind as the lack of attention allowed her time to form her own thoughts by listening in on conversations and analyzing books with more concentration. This type of alienation paved the way for Adah to allot time to develop a higher sense of thinking by denying her the time to socialize. It appears that she led a very lonely life but she was perfectly contempt with the fact that she knew she was brighter than everyone who surrounded her.

From an outsider's viewpoint it would be difficult to determine why someone might be so displeased to finally have the ability to walk that basically imitates the rest of the planet. Adah Price, however, is not an average American girl because her physical abnormality helped her to blossom in different areas. She grew accustomed to the fact that everyone felt superior to her due to her lack of vocalization, but she knew that they had completely misjudged her competence. She was comfortable with making observations and forming thoughts that only she could access because no one seemed to value her opinion. She liked hiding in the shadows because that was what she was forced to accept; but all that changed when she was no longer the girl with the limp. The absence of her limp meant the absence of a wall she was able to put up that had prevented people from paying any sort of attention to her. She was an attractive young lady and once she was able to rhythmically walk, the boys flocked to her like pigeons. Initially she enjoyed the attention, but then made the predictable observance that none of the men would have given her the time day if she dragged half of her body still. She feared that the loss of her limp meant the loss of part of her. Her sense of "home" within herself that allowed her daily routine to fit inside her miniscule comfort zone had now disappeared and she was forced to become a new person. Eventually she did accept the new Adah and even began talking more, but there is always a part of her that misses they way she used to exist, even though she was able to see how it allowed her to evolve her into the woman that she became.