Augustown: A Novel

Ma Taffy is the first character to appear in the narrative, except for the narrator, Gina. She is an elderly Rasta woman who went blind after many rats fell through the ceiling of her bedroom and clawed out her eyes. Though she cannot see, her other senses have improved, allowing her to hear Kaia’s crying as he returns home and smell the jackfruit, which symbolizes the oppression and violence that has happened to him. Ma Taffy’s blindness is an integral part of her character because it is through her other senses that Miller describes Augustown’s sensory details. Ma Taffy smells “coal fires burning, turn cornmeal turning, crack rice boiling, the sweat of blackwomen standing over pots, the sweat of blackmen standing in the streets” (220); she hears “wind in the tall breadfruit trees and in the shorter croton plants; the mongrel dogs of Augustown are calling to and answering each other; radios are on in every house” (18). This level of sensory specificity expands the setting and demonstrates Ma Taffy’s acute perceptiveness, which is an important aspect of her character as she is the first to sense Kaia’s sadness and the approaching disaster of the autoclaps.