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Dear Lorraine, I love how inconclusive your portrait of a 1950’s working-class African American family is in A Raisin in the Sun (1959) – the way it…… Read more “It isn’t a circle–it is simply a long line”
Tag: racism
Appearances, she knew now, had a way sometimes of not fitting facts
Dear Nella, Passing (1929) is a book about being labelled, being defined by other people based on what they see (and on the prejudices they carry). It…… Read more “Appearances, she knew now, had a way sometimes of not fitting facts”
My spirit rose to meet this challenge
Dear Jamaica, The Autobiography of My Mother (1996) is an exploration of the self as other – and back. The book is centred on Xuela Claudette Richardson,…… Read more “My spirit rose to meet this challenge”
For this book is the talking voice that runs on,
Dear Stevie, Once I entered your Novel on Yellow Paper (1936), I immediately noticed three things: that I was being held captive; that I was complicit in…… Read more “For this book is the talking voice that runs on,”
And it could have been any street in the city
Dear Ann, How can one write a naturalist novel and still convey strong symbolic effect? I don’t know the answer, but I think you achieved that. The…… Read more “And it could have been any street in the city”
They didn’t dare before; now they do, that’s all
Dear Anna, I was halfway through Manja (tr. Kate Phillips, 2003. Manja: Ein Roman um 5 Kinder, 1938) this past week, when your book acquired a new…… Read more “They didn’t dare before; now they do, that’s all”
Somewhere, within her, in a deep recess,
Dear Nella, I’m impressed by how autobiographical your novel Quicksand is. The protagonist, Helga Crane, much like yourself, is the daughter of a Scandinavian mother and a…… Read more “Somewhere, within her, in a deep recess,”
Some of us cried
Dear Julie, Your second novel, The Buddha in the Attic, centers around Japanese women brought over to San Francisco as picture brides, in the early 1900s, to…… Read more “Some of us cried”
it’s the wound that knows the texture of the pain
Dear Elizabeth, I admit I was a bit reluctant to read your novel We need new names (2013). It covered all the topics typically considered “African” by…… Read more “it’s the wound that knows the texture of the pain”
