Ishmael Reed's "Flight to Canada" - an analysis

Angry. Hostile. Misunderstood. Dark. Literary critics have used these and other pejoratives to describe the work of Ishmael Reed. For one to understand the full breadth of the man and his legacy, one must also consider descriptors such as: satirical, complexity, experience, peculiar, painstaking. Looking at his body of work, it seems as if Reed is on a relentless mission to break convention when it comes to literary traditions. It is rare to discover an artist with such contempt for authoritarian structures who can still manage to see their work maintain a degree of accessibility. Yet there he is, recognized among the best of the Post-modern literary figures and respected by colleagues and critics alike. In the ironic frivolity of Reed’s poem “Flight to Canada” we find the winning combination of accessibility and radical free form.

One of the most interesting aspects of this poem is that Reed incorporates in the narrative a method of travel (airplane) that did not exist in the time and place of the story. Or did it? Some people seem to think that because the poem (which opens the novel of the same name) references air travel, that perhaps the novel is not supposed to be set in the civil war era after all. This appears to be a severe misrepresentation. There is not much room for doubt that the novel takes place in the antebellum south, if for no other reason than that the principal characters are referred to as slaves. Perhaps because Reed has chosen to place Quickskill in another time in the poem, this fools some into thinking that this is his intention for the entire story. Is this some sort of literary dog whistle, meant for those who can decode its meaning? Or is it simply another example of Reed’s use of non-traditional literary forms to communicate an experience that few could understand? Or are these questions essentially asking the same thing? Reed is well-known for using anachronisms; but what purpose does it serve? One is left with more questions than answers when studying Reed’s work, which is the mark of a great artist.

Some of the language used is borrowed from another time. “What it was” is a term used in 1970’s Blaxploitation films; reference is made to getting an “agent” which in context is very much a 20^th Century term; even Saskatchewan did not join Canada until 1905. Reed uses this technique to great effect in all his work. In this piece, he jumps back and forth between the Civil War era and the present. The juxtaposition of the language and references of the modern era with those of the Civil War era gives the piece an almost subversive quality; given the consensus surrounding the analysis and criticism of Reed’s canon, this is probably the desired effect.

While Reed mostly shuns metaphor and simile in Flight to Canada, hyperbole and personification abound. An example of personification: “Last visit I slept in Your bed and sampled your cellar. Had your prime Quadroon give me She-Bear.” Hyperbole examples are creative: “Beats craning your neck after the North Star” and “Passengers came up and shook my hand and within 10 min. I had signed up for 3 anti-slavery lectures.” Given Reed’s penchant for composing his own “language” or writing his own laws of literature, or at least foregoing literary traditions to communicate the unique African-American experience, perhaps the metaphors are disguised.

The poem is also chock full of irony. With Reed’s well-known disdain for verbal niceties as it relates to race relations in the United States, one could say that the poem is almost entirely ironic. “Did you have a nice trip, Massa?” “It’s cold up here but least nobody is collaring hobbling gagging handcuffing yoking chaining and thumbscrewing.” “That was rat poison I left in your Old Crow.” Reed clearly has no qualms about portraying the pain of the slave experience through unabashed ironic language, including delight in pulling one over on the The Man.

It would not be a stretch to say that Reed is contemptuous of white America and his characters would certainly be no different in that regard; therefore, a sarcastic, even celebratory tone is not unexpected, particularly in this piece. Quickskill’s delight in having escaped the clutches of his Massa is apparent throughout; champagne with his fellow passengers, rat poison in Massa’s Old Crow, “safe in the arms of Canada”, he is clearly triumphant, and who could blame him? It is in this celebratory mood that the sarcasm rears; “I knowed you wouldn’t mind”, “Did you have a nice trip, Massa?”, “Remind me to get an agent”, “I borrowed your cotton money to pay for my ticket.”

Despite the fact that much of the time Ishmael Reed’s efforts feel like one big inside joke, I enjoy it immensely. It is challenging and requires research to uncover meaning more than any poet I have encountered. It illuminates with force the African-American condition. His combination of colloquialisms and razor wit spares no American institution and makes Ishmael Reed truly an artist making his own literary rules – or at least breaking some of them.