THE USA celebrates February every year as Black History Month. Although the idea of having a month dedicated to Black History has been met with some controversy and may seem unusual to those who do not observe it – generally, there is an awakening of sorts that can be gained when people around the world learn about the achievements and contributions of black people whose stories have never been told due to the pervasive power of the white hierarchy, born from colonialism, that has resulted in the covering up or the loss of these stories that remind us of the many gifts, talents, and influences that black people have left for the world.
My students are currently studying The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot. It is a work of non-fiction that presents to us the life and legacy of a black American woman named Henrietta Lacks. Her story contains several lessons that are important not only for people of African ancestry alive today but also to the world in general, as the story of Henrietta Lacks is one that reminds us of the plight and misfortune that affect black people, even as they are exploited for financial gains by others.
It is a story that simultaneously brings to mind the darkness of slavery from our history books, while also being a warning for the still-existing danger in modern and future times, with one of those dangers being especially the danger of not unearthing stories that were buried and bringing to the forefront stories that need to be told.
Henrietta Lacks was the woman from whom emerged the first immortalised cell lines (the HeLa cell line) – cells that had the ability to recreate themselves forever – and were then used for a great number of important scientific purposes, such as the invention of the polio vaccine, as well as in furthering research on cancer, etc. The author of The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks ensures that she highlights the fact, and perhaps the most sensational aspect of the book, that Lacks did not consent to have her cells removed from her.
In fact, she did not even know her cells were being taken. Added to that is the fact that the cells went on to make money for the men who replicated and sold them, while Lacks and her family all lived in poverty. It is a tale of theft and exploitation, one that is shot through with science and such far-reaching consequences that it managed to stir up debates about consent in science, and remains an enduring example of the acts that have been committed not only against people of colour but also in the name of science.
Skloot’s writing is well researched and filled with poignant moments that help to fill out the character of Henrietta Lacks, giving her an identity that was denied to her in all the years that her cells were being used without most people knowing that she was the source of the cells. Skloot writes of the moment when she first learns about Henrietta Lacks, as a college student studying cells.
She retells the story of how her professor, a man named Defler, writes Lacks’ name on the chalkboard for the class. Skloot writes of Defler informing the class that “HeLa cells were one of the most important things that happened to medicine in the last hundred years” before he goes on to say, “She was a black woman” and then promptly erases Lacks’ name from the board “in one fast swipe and blew the chalk from his hands. Class over.”
This kind of narrative detail makes Skloot’s book read like a work of fiction, even though it isn’t. It’s easy to see how in the way she structures and presents details in the scene outlined above, we can analyse the information she gives us, from the casual way Lacks is highlighted as being only “a black woman” to the way the professor wipes Lacks’ name away, giving the impression that that is all there is to know about her.
In much the same way that this is the catalyst for young Skloot to pick up an interest in finding out more about Henrietta Lacks, the writer uses the same technique on the reader to ensure that we, like herself, are drawn into the story of Henrietta Lacks by responding to the lack of information that exists in the general knowledge of us, readers, about a woman who would have contributed so much to science. The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks is filled with many such moments.
Skloot’s knack for including even the most minute pieces of information that come together to form an entire picture of Henrietta Lacks and the story of her cells is truly admirable. There are many important insights on the family of Henrietta Lacks, doctors, nurses, and countless others who in some small way or another contributed to the tale that Skloot’s book tells, and the writer ensures that she gets all of them in there so that the story is told in a way that is both interesting and capable of covering many different personalities from different fields who helped to make it what it became.
The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks is a dazzling work of non-fiction about a woman who deserves every ounce of publicity she can get for everything her cells have done for the world.
