second edition

While interesting to see what has changed (and sadly note what has not), I found that these essays didn't impact me the way [a:Zora Neale Hurston|15151|Zora Neale Hurston|https://d.gr-assets.com/authors/1194472605p2/15151.jpg]'s [b:Their Eyes Were Watching God|37415|Their Eyes Were Watching God|Zora Neale Hurston|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1368072803s/37415.jpg|1643555] or [a:Alice Walker|7380|Alice Walker|https://d.gr-assets.com/authors/1406752585p2/7380.jpg]'s [b:The Color Purple|11486|The Color Purple|Alice Walker|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1386925078s/11486.jpg|3300573] did. I guess I relate to the more intimate personal lives shown in novels than the same situation shown in aggregate form in nonfiction. The parts I liked best were the ones that dealt with individuals, such as 'Of the Coming of John'. ( )

See the Kindle edition for my review of the content. For this audiobook edition, I might give 2½ stars.

Mirron Willis's narration may have played a role in my feelings for the book, as his deep slow voice was soporific. I had to speed up the narration to 2x to get what felt like normal speed to me. Even at that speed, I had difficulty focusing on the narration and frequently ended up reading along to force my attention to the text. ( )

Sometimes a book just blows my mind. This is one of them!

To think that this book, with the most cogent explanation of the race situation in the US, was written over one hundred years ago is just astounding. That a black man was so well educated in the US at the start of the twentieth century was a surprise. That any person, surrounded by such prejudice, could produce such an honest book leaves me almost speechless.

Du Bois is honest about the failings of his fellows, both black and white. He manages to write without the venom that I know that would fill my prose, were I to live under such injustice.

And yet, and yet... I have still to pronounce its greatest achievement. When one reads a book and thinks, "I should have known that": it indicates that the facts are self evidently true.

How can this book be so little known? Were it a set book - not just in America, but in England and probably every other country too, then racism would become a thing of the past in no time. ( )

In this founding work in the literature of black protest, first published in 1903, W.E.B. Du Bois (1868–1963) eloquently affirms that it is beneath the dignity of a human being to beg for those rights that belong inherently to all mankind. He also charges that the strategy of accommodation to white supremacy would only serve to perpetuate black oppression. Essential reading for everyone interested in African-American history and the struggle for civil rights in America. (Publisher)