I did. And I’m happy to say, my own experience was nothing like The Poisonwood Bible. My father worked for fifty years as a physician dedicated to medically underserved populations. Mostly he practiced in rural Kentucky, but occasionally he took our family to live in other places, where “medically underserved” is an understatement. We spent 1963 in a Congolese village where most residents had never experienced electricity or plumbing, let alone western medical care. I was seven years old when we went. My parents were not missionaries, though we met some missionary families and benefited from their generosity on many occasions.
My memories of playing with village children and exploring the jungle are acutely sensory and indelible. My parents were courageous to do the work they did, risking their own comfort and security to help address problems like leprosy and smallpox. But for me, it was just an adventure. I was a child, and understood only about a thimbleful of what was happening around me in the Congo. The thematic material of The Poisonwood is serious, adult stuff. I wrote the book, not because of a brief adventure I had in place of second grade, but because as an adult I’m interested in cultural imperialism and post-colonial history. I had to approach the subject in an adult way.