56 pages • 1 hour read
Root Magic
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Chapters 1-5Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 1 Summary
Content Warning: This section of the guide includes depictions of racially motivated violence.
The novel opens with Jezebel “Jez” Turner and her twin brother, James “Jay” Turner, who are 11 years old, at their grandmother’s funeral, where Jez narrates that in Gullah culture, “babies in the family get passed over the coffin so the dead person won’t come back from the beyond to take them away” (1). They stand next to their mom, Janey Turner, and their uncle, Doc Buzzard.
Many attend Gran’s funeral since she was a gifted rootworker and helped people with compresses and potions for snake bites and for luck. The pastor adds that Gran likely enjoyed hearing President John F. Kennedy’s recent speech calling for equal access to jobs and education for Black Americans.
Jez thinks about how she both misses Gran and also wants a better future, since things have been different since her father left. Her mother and uncle are both crying, but she tries not to, instead thinking about how Gran told her stories. Her favorite story was about boo-hags—night creatures with blue skin that could sneak through tight spaces.
When it’s her turn to throw dirt on Gran’s coffin, Jez squeezes the small doll named Dinah that Gran made for her in her pocket. She starts crying.
Jez and her family walk home. They live on Wadmalaw, an island 20 miles from Charleston, South Carolina. Jez listens to her mother talk to Doc about rootwork. As they approach their home, Mama tells the twins to “Hice tail,” which is Gullah for “hurry up.” (8). They have many crops on their property, which they both sell and live off of. There is also a rootworking shop. Since Gran passed, folks come to Doc to ask his opinion on fertilizers and companies, things that they would ask Gran. Gran didn’t often take payment, but people brought gifts anyway.
A police officer is at their porch when they get home.
Chapter 2 Summary
Janey first addresses Deputy Collins only by his last name. He chastises her for being disrespectful, and she concedes. He is there to search the house without reason. He adds that he’s already forced open the door to the rootworking shop. Jez is terrified, as Deputy Collins is often after rootworkers. Janey opens the door. Deputy Collins dumps out drawers and breaks some of their items, including a vase. When he finishes, he says that he’s heard rumblings that they’re witches, adding that he’s watching them.
After Deputy Collins leaves, Doc tells Janey that he thinks that they should start teaching Jay and Jez some rootworking. He thinks that it will help protect them. Jez is confused, thinking that it was only used for healing. Doc says it is for healing, especially since many Black Americans aren’t permitted into hospitals, but it can also be used for protection, both from ill-intentioned white people and from others who look down on root magic. He goes on to explain that trickster stories like Br’er Rabbit keep them connected back to their African roots: It’s important that their traditions continue. He reminds them that it doesn’t matter how others see them.
Jay wonders if it’s real magic, and Doc replies that “[i]t’s as real as you believe it is” (20). Doc asks Janey’s permission to teach them. Janey hesitates, knowing the violence that might ensue and the lack of police protection for Black Americans. Jez and Jay promise to be careful.
Later, Jez and Jay go into the kitchen, and Doc and Janey tell them that they have to keep up with their schoolwork while learning root magic. Jez grows more excited because Gran wanted her to learn.
Janey reminds Jez that Jay won’t be in her class since she skipped a grade. Jez is a little worried about going to school since she knows other students talk about her, and she no longer has Gran to cheer her up. Finally, Janey officially agrees to let her kids learn rootworking.
They start lessons immediately. Though Doc says that rootworking is usually passed down through oral tradition, he thinks using notebooks will help them study.
Doc shows them how to make root bags to help with a variety of things, including wishing or making a peaceful home. Jez thinks about using one to wish for a new friend. She uses orange cloth for the bag, which she then fills with an odd number of items. Then, they breathe into their bags to activate them. Doc gives them some cologne to put on the bags to activate them, and Jez realizes that the bags are alive with a purpose. Doc is impressed. Finally, they go hide them. Jez puts hers under the house near a hole in the floor. She kisses the bag, hoping for a friend.
Chapter 3 Summary
The next day is the first day of school. Jez will be joined by children of wealthier Black families looking to support the new education laws. On the radio, Jez also hears that today is the day that 11 Black students will integrate within white schools. South Carolina was the last state to desegregate: Police have had to go to schools to supposedly stop angry white families.
Jay and Jez’s schools haven’t integrated, but Janey explains that it’ll mean they have better access to resources. She’s still worried because many white people think they’re superior. Jay also asks about the police, and Janey says that some are really trying to help, while others aren’t.
Before she leaves for school, Jez hugs her doll, Dinah. Then, she and Jay leave. At school, a girl named Lettie pushes Jez, teasing her about her old dress. In her class, however, another girl smiles at her.
The teacher, Miss Watson, who is also Black, comes in. When she gives the history lesson, she reminds the students that sometimes history is told by people who don’t think that the stories of Black people are important. She says that it’s important to write down their own history. She then reads a poem called “I, Too” by Langston Hughes. It feels like a spell has fallen over the room.
At lunch, the new student, whose name is Susie Goins, asks to sit with Jez, and they talk.
Chapter 4 Summary
Jez and Jay run home for their root magic lesson. Doc tells them that they need to look out for each other. They go inside the rootworking shop; Doc says that they can’t come in there on their own. He opens a wooden box, showing them a set of vines called Devil’s Shoestrings. Jay thinks they’re ugly, and Doc quickly corrects him saying, “Dark is not ugly. Get that out of your mind” (50). They come from generations of rootworkers, spanning back hundreds of years. That’s their first lesson.
Doc has them help put down some protection for the house. Jay gathers a can of paint, and Doc tells Jez to pour a small bottle of blue liquid into it, turning it “haint blue” (51). Haint blue is the color ghosts hate the most because it reminds them of the ocean. They will stay away from the color. Doc tells them to mix the paint and then paint the house. At first, the twins fight over how to mix and stir the paint. They yank the paint stick back and forth, and it flies out, getting paint on their clothes, faces, and the cabin. Doc is upset, and they know Janey will be too.
A man named Mr. Benjamin comes to the cabin and apologizes for not coming to Gran’s funeral. His daughter passed away recently, and he didn’t want to go to another service. Doc sends them to paint while he and Mr. Benjamin talk. Jay and Jez apologize to one another for fighting. They remember their father painting and doing other things to fix up the house. He went to work one day and never came home, and now, the twins talk about him so they can maintain their memories.
Janey calls them for dinner. Afterward, Jez asks the difference between making teas and rootwork. Janey explains that she’s not intending to anything besides make a drink. She sets the twins to filling jars with jam when a police car appears. A tall white man gets out, and Janey goes out, carrying a pair of sewing scissors. The man introduces himself as Sheriff Nate Edwards. He’s new and has come to warn her that he’s heard about local deputies coming to Black American homes and searching without a warning. He is shocked when Janey tells him that Deputy Collins already did. The sheriff admits that Deputy Collins shouldn’t have done that and apologizes, but Janey grows angry because she knows he won’t arrest the deputy. He leaves.
That night, Jez prays that she’ll be able to help her family if she needs to.
Chapter 5 Summary
Jez reflects on how different life is without Gran, especially because Janey and Doc have to get up earlier to make breakfast. Janey warns them that they still need to stick close together.
On the way to school, Jez asks Jay if any of the boys make fun of him for learning root, but he says that they think it’s cool. When they get there, Lettie teases Jez again, saying that root magic is “stuff only backwards country people believe” (69). Jez responds that she would make Lettie disappear if she could. Susie finds her, and they agree to start walking to school together. Susie then asks what Lettie was teasing her about, and Jez says that she’ll tell her later.
In class, Miss Watson reads a poem by Gwendolyn Brooks, and the students are surprised to hear work by a Black American woman. Jez closes her eyes and listens.
At home, Jez admits that she’s being teased about rootwork, and Doc explains that some African Americans want to forget because remembering their history is painful. He tells them to be careful who they tell about root magic. That day, they work more on protecting things by spreading a mix of brick dust and graveyard dirt. Doc says it’s always good to have around but that you must leave a gift for the person whose grave you took the dirt from.
Inside the cabin, Doc emphasizes that he can’t prepare them for everything, but they must always believe in themselves and trust one another. Then, he sends them to finish painting the house. As they go, Jez remembers it’s their birthday. They wonder if Mama or Doc will do anything because of the stress following Gran’s death.
When they finish painting, Doc tells them they can go and play, so they go down to the marsh. When Jez steps into the mud, she hears a voice say, “Time” (79). Jay doesn’t her it. Soon, they decide to go back to the house, but Jez’s feet are stuck. She hears the voice again: “It’s time” (81). Jay tries to pull her out, but her feet stay stuck. Just as she sends him to get their mother, she notices that the mud on his shoes stops right where there is haint blue paint. Jez realizes that the paint does work to ward off spirits and has Jay put the paint stick from his pocket in the mud near her feet. Finally, she’s able to escape the mud, but just as she’d pulled her feet free, she heard the voice again, saying her name.
Chapters 1-5 Analysis
The novel opens and closes with a reminder of a Gullah tradition: that “babies in the family get passed over the coffin so the dead person won’t come back from the beyond to take them away” (1). This introduces the theme of Learning Rootwork and Gullah Traditions, demonstrating that learning Gullah Geechee traditions will be central to the novel while also illustrating that Grappling With Grief plays a prevalent role in the novel. Rootwork overlaps with grief in that it is founded in tradition of one’s ancestors, but the time in which Jez and Jay learn rootwork also coincides with the loss of Gran. Without Gran, the children must begin to learn protective and defensive rootwork. As the book progresses, Jez will better understand Gullah traditions and rootwork, which, in turn, helps her to cope with the deaths of loved ones. Rootwork and grief are intertwined not only as concepts but also as major sources of action within the text.
Rootworking as a tradition is not always accepted because it is different from mainstream practices in the South—especially those passed down by white families. For Jez, it is grounding because “working the roots, our ways to protect ourselves and to get rid of spirits” helps keep alive a tradition that extends back generations (19). Jez is constantly torn between this tradition and feeling isolated because others think of her as a “witch” (123). However, she comes to accept that it must be kept secret, but it does not need to be something that isolates her. Indeed, learning to feel pride and connection to family and ancestors through rootwork will be a point of growth and a rite of passage for Jez; though she is not ashamed of where she comes from, she struggles with identity because of the way others treat her.
Additionally, education and schooling also appear as a motif, as Janey emphasizes that her children must keep up with their classes in addition to their rootwork lessons. This dichotomy between school and rootwork appears periodically throughout the book, and Janey’s decision not to be a rootworker provides an alternative to the life modeled by Doc and Gran. This offers a sense of choice that Janey seeks to provide her children with, as they are perhaps too young to commit wholly to one practice. However, events like Jez’s attack in the marsh and her meeting a friend, Susie, the day after wishing for a friend foreshadow her natural affinity for rootwork and subsequent power. These two events also represent the good and the danger that can accompany rootwork, and the repeated reminders that Jez and Jay must look out for one another also signals to this danger. So, while rootwork provides protection in a hostile environment, the very act of defense can be viewed as resistance and power, thus angering one’s enemies, whether human or magical.
Racism in the Jim Crow South is woven directly into the setting of this novel. It takes place in 1963, a time before the passage of the Civil Rights Act. The Turners and other Black families live in constant fear that they are in danger even from the police, and Jez explains that “Deputy Collins was the worst one of them, that he was looking for reasons to bother rootworkers, even take them away” (14). Deputy Collins embodies the looming threat of racism, showing his disdain and aggression for the Turners by searching their house without a warrant. Further, Sheriff Edwards shows how racism permeates society and affects social expectations, as he is unwilling to act against Deputy Collins without irrefutable evidence, and it is ultimately Jez who will resolve the conflict between the police and her family. This conflict also speaks to the larger systemic issue in which societal institutions like the police, who are supposed to protect families, ultimately fail, thus necessitating protective practices like rootwork.
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