Welcome to Litsy!

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^p78 twisting language to preserve white character‘s agency & perspective in “To Have and Have Not.” Wesley can‘t even yell “Fish!”—Harry has to “saw he had seen” the fish.
“A better, certainly more graceful choice would have been to have the black man cry out at the sighting.” Observations, small details.

P30 “The ability of writers to imagine what is not the self, to familiarize the strange and mystify the familiar, is the test of their power.”

Strong piece. “American Africanism” as an OTHERED Blackness, a “fabricated presence” as foil for white characters. 1992

P77 “Eddie is white, and we know he is because nobody says so.”

P93 “Studies in American Africanism, in my view, should be investigations of the ways in which a nonwhite, Africanist presence and persona have been constructed—invented—in the United States, and of the literary uses this fabricated presence has served.”

I AM DOING A THEME YEAR!! It‘s apparently been 8 months since I‘ve been here, and I‘ve felt it. Didn‘t make my reading goal for the first time in ten years, so back to this app and reading to try again. My theme is letters, diaries, notes and journals! I wanna be real nosey and get epistolary!! Any recommendations would be helpful! These were my first two reads of 2024.

Wow, just wow! This is so impressive and strong and brutal and true. It sometimes really hurts to read such texts, but they are meant to. Otherwise things wouldn't change. I've wanted to read something by bell hooks for a long time and I'm happy I finally did. Once again I've been showed all the privileges I have. bell hooks shows us the deep roots of slavery and misogyny. Sometimes I was out of words by what I heard and felt so angry and confused

John H. Johnson may have helped share African American history on a weekly (Jet magazine) and monthly (Ebony magazine) nearly more than any other single person. Lerone Bennett, Jr. was a hall-of-fame senior editor with Ebony. What an amazing piece of periodical history during its earlier days. Hoping Ebony finds its way back to glory!

Organized by numbered notes, in sections with connected themes, Sharpe recounts anecdotes from her life, stories of unprovoked violence on black individuals, historical events and figures, quotes, musings on art, poetry, and much more to form a narrative on racism, social justice, and cultural critique. Heavy, but important. I have not read nearly as much anti-racism works of late and needed this. Toni Morrison‘s Beloved features prominently.

I put my dog down today. I bought these to help. It didn‘t.

My December #bookspin was definitely one of the best books I've read this year. I tend to read a lot of nonfiction dealing with issues of race, but in this unique format, Sharpe offered some observations about being Black that I haven't encountered before. I appreciated the new perspective -- it definitely made me think!

@thearomaofbooks