The Salt Eaters

Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 1980

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Summary

Background

Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Chapters 1-3

Chapters 4-6

Chapters 7-9

Chapters 10-12

Character Analysis

Themes

Symbols & Motifs

Important Quotes

Essay Topics

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Discussion Questions

Background

Cultural Context: Black Spirituality in the Americas

Minnie’s healing of Velma draws upon spiritual traditions that originated in West Africa but were impacted by the transatlantic slave trade. Minnie directly mentions a goddess from Yoruba when she says Velma is “one of Oshun’s witches” (43). Yoruban goddesses like Oshun and other deities from Dahomey were entwined with Indigenous West Indies beliefs because the slave trade stopped there. Christian missionaries caused Christian beliefs to become entangled with these African and West Indian beliefs. This mingling of gods and traditions resulted in Vodou in Haiti, Santeria in Cuba, and Voodoo (or Hoodoo) in the southern United States.

In The Salt Eaters, Minnie and Old Wife (her Christian but also witchy spirit guide) discuss the haints, which are also called the loa, referring to the Haitian gods. Early in the healing, Minnie looks “toward the stereo where the loa were setting up” (54). The loa are not simply used as a way to describe Velma or as just part of an ideological debate but are also present in the infirmary as intangible spirits. Minnie tells Old Wife that she cannot control the loa—she can only hope her offerings are enough to win their favor. This indicates that they are far more powerful than humans as well as present in the human realm. In Haitian Vodou, Ioa are intermediaries between humans and a creator divinity, Bondye. Bondye himself cannot be accessed by people—only by Ioa—but maintains a universal order.

There are a number of nonfiction texts about the spiritual practices that Bambara channels in The Salt Eaters. Noteworthy books on the topic include Flash of the Spirit by Robert Farris Thompson and African Vodun: Art, Psychology, and Power by Suzanne Preston Blier.

Literary Context: The Black Arts Movement

Bambara was part of the Black Arts Movement, which used creative works to advocate for Black Power. In the 1960s and 1970s, the Black Arts Movement created the Third World Press, the Free Southern Theater, and the Black Arts Repertory Theatre School, as well as other institutions for Black art and literature. It included the authors Amiri Baraka, Nikki Giovanni, Sonia Sanchez, Ishmael Reed, James Baldwin, Gwendolyn Brooks, and more. It was associated with political groups such as the SNCC (Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee). The Black Arts Movement challenged colonial and white supremacist practices, such as barbaric portrayals of Indigenous and African cultures. Racist narratives also portrayed Black Americans as being politically naive and subject to Russian Communist influence. By portraying complicated African-descended spiritual traditions and engaging with them, Black activists and the Black Arts Movement combated these stereotypes and ideas.

Toni Cade Bambara was also linked with the famous literary figure Toni Morrison. Bambara adapted Morrison’s Tar Baby into a screenplay, and Morrison edited Bambara’s posthumous collection of writing. Morrison uses some of the same experimental elements as Bambara in other works. Morrison’s Beloved, for example, shares similarities with The Salt Eaters in its nonlinear narrative and blending of the real and supernatural.

Another Black Southern writer who explored the topic of Black spirituality is Randall Keenan. In his novel A Visitation of Spirits, the main character deals with a split self. However, his protagonist is a gay Black man instead of a straight Black woman, like Velma. Themes of Black spirituality can be observed in much of Black literature from the 1970s onward. Jay Wright, who also belonged to the Black Arts Movement but who later distanced himself from it, channeled African spirituality in much of his poetry. Conversely, James Baldwin often detailed the Black Christian spiritual tradition. The interplay between Minnie and Old Wife depicts questions Black artists were raising about which spiritual traditions they should pursue.

The novel forms a tapestry of Black voices, serving not necessarily as a linear narrative but as a depiction of the Black Arts Movement community and its combined aesthetic perspectives. The tapestry also reflects the challenges the movement faced, including ideological splintering within activist groups, infiltration by law enforcement, and sexism.