Between the World and Me

I chose this book to read in my quest to read more books by black authors. it is written as a letter from Ta-Nehisi Coates to his son about the divide between the black and white worlds. Sadly, I think he has this right. This is a powerful and depressing book, leaving me in tears at the end, because the struggle continues.

This to me is a fascinating and eye-opening read. Over the years I have tried to understand the black culture in various ways, but I think Coates puts it all out there with the idea that no black man’s body is ever safe. I knew this partially, but his description of life as a child in west Baltimore, where I grew up in the 1950s and 1960s in what I considered a safe Jewish community, is nothing like the dangerous and violent black community in which he grew up during the 1980s. Oddly enough, we both ended up in Chocolate City, a name that used to be applied to Washington, DC. We are a generation apart. I felt a need to be part of the civil rights movement in the 1960s, but I was afraid of Malcolm X because of his rage. To Coates, Malcolm X was a hero because his rage was an outgrowth of his experience and his knowledge. I now feel a need to revisit Malcolm X’s world. Being that I am not black, I don’t anticipate being able to fully understand it, but I want to try. He did equate Martin Luther King with the Dream (or the white experience).

I love the part of this book that describes Howard University as a Mecca. It is such an amazing part of Washington, DC, and I enjoyed reading about the author’s experiences there.

The second part of the book in which Coates talks about experiences with his young son made me fear for all black parents of young children, especially those with sons. The author puts his personal terror into words which make the reader feel it. To those who never felt such terror, such as myself, it will be my duty going forward to understand it and act on it in a positive way.

I am hoping to be able to read The Beautiful Struggle, the memoirs of the author, in the future. ( )

Ta-Nehisi Coates writes with a rhythm and a lyricism that is like poetry or song, and that makes this book about a very difficult subject very easy, and almost pleasant, to read. I did not agree with everything he said, but more than once he made me think differently about a subject--race in America--that I already thought I was fairly well educated about. And from the start, he challenged me, in an uncomfortable but ultimately rewarding way. This book was published in 2015, but as the backlash to Black Lives Matter continues to whip itself into a frenzy, attacking imaginary demons like "critical race theory," I think it's more important than ever that we are made to feel uncomfortable, because people who are comfortable do not change. ( )

With all that's been said about this book, I had high expectations that weren't met. At times the prose was unintellible. ( )

Coates is certainly a talented writer. I was moved by this account, which similar to the classic The Fire Next Time, takes the form of a letter from a father to his son.

I do not recall ever reading an entire book in a single day. That says all I feel I need to say about this one. ( )

I think I will read this again, maybe once a year. It fleshes out fundamentals I am sometimes impotently, benignly familiar with in our social system. ( )