Jamaica Kincaid in People Magazine

Joanne Kaufman highlights Jamaica Kincaid's ordinary life in People Magazine. 15 December 1997
One car per hour passes Kincaid's three-acre property, much of it given over to her flower, fruit and vegetable gardens. In the front yard are there-mains of a wooden Succoth booth, covered in stalks of grain and leaves, that was constructed for the Jewish festival of tabernacles. Kincaid, who was raised a Methodist and converted four years ago to Judaism, which is also the religion of her husband, is reticent on the subject of faith. "I don't know why," she says, "but I do feel that God is a private issue." She is also, typically, passionate about her belief: Somehow it doesn't come as a surprise that she is president of the local 100-plus-member Congregation Beth El. "Jamaica will show up at a business meeting in overalls with garden dirt under her nails. She is able to win the respect of CEOs and persuade them to commit time and money to the synagogue," says Beth El's rabbi, Howard Cohen. "There is something of the prophet in her writing," he adds. "She writes a lot about oppression and makes people uncomfortable, which is what the prophets did."