An engaging collection of writings that celebrates and reveals the historic Black Arts Movement.
Juanita’s (Virgin Soul, 2013, etc.) multigenre study guide invites readers to investigate, through fiction, poetry, drama, and essays, the many facets of the revolutionary black artistic and political movements of the 1960s and ’70s.
In the short story “The Black House,” a young woman’s first encounter with the Black Panther Party begins with nervous skepticism as she practices the Islamic greeting that the members use. She soon gets a quick introduction to sexual politics when a man ushers her into the kitchen with the words, “You belong in here.” After some resistance, she finds strength and commonality among the women of the group. The poem “(not) forgotten man” is a tribute to the author Amiri Baraka (aka LeRoi Jones), whom the speaker describes as a “quixotic nobody” who “blasted the bridges between black and white.” “Life is a Carousel” is a two-act play, set at an academic symposium and at an airport before and after it. In it, a 1960s Black Arts Movement activist (based on Baraka) spars with airline agents and younger black academics as he declaims a manifesto that modern readers will find to be both hopelessly dated and frustratingly timeless. When a younger professor says, “You lose credence when you refuse to update,” the old lion snaps back, “We call that co-opted.” The book ends with two essays, “Five Comrades in the Black Panther Party, 1967-1970” and “Meeting LeRoi Jones,” a dryly humorous story of hero worship and the thrill of a burgeoning movement. Overall, Juanita has created a dense and intriguing tribute to an important literary group whose influence still reverberates in American culture. Her works effectively embrace a wide variety of issues from gender politics to skin-color privilege within the black community. “Life is a Carousel,” for example, is a complex tapestry of intergenerational dialogue that punctures the pomposity of both the old and the young while also skewering academic conferences and probing issues of sex, sexuality, and gender identity. The discussion questions at the end of each work raise thought-provoking issues and encourage creativity.
An engaging collection of writings that celebrates and reveals the historic Black Arts Movement.Pub Date: June 12, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-9716352-2-7
Page Count: 104
Publisher: EquiDistancePress
Review Posted Online: Oct. 23, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2018
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
PERSPECTIVES
This is not the Nutcracker sweet, as passed on by Tchaikovsky and Marius Petipa. No, this is the original Hoffmann tale of 1816, in which the froth of Christmas revelry occasionally parts to let the dark underside of childhood fantasies and fears peek through. The boundaries between dream and reality fade, just as Godfather Drosselmeier, the Nutcracker's creator, is seen as alternately sinister and jolly. And Italian artist Roberto Innocenti gives an errily realistic air to Marie's dreams, in richly detailed illustrations touched by a mysterious light. A beautiful version of this classic tale, which will captivate adults and children alike. (Nutcracker; $35.00; Oct. 28, 1996; 136 pp.; 0-15-100227-4)
Pub Date: Oct. 28, 1996
ISBN: 0-15-100227-4
Page Count: 136
Publisher: Harcourt
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1996
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
An extravaganza in Bemelmans' inimitable vein, but written almost dead pan, with sly, amusing, sometimes biting undertones, breaking through. For Bemelmans was "the man who came to cocktails". And his hostess was Lady Mendl (Elsie de Wolfe), arbiter of American decorating taste over a generation. Lady Mendl was an incredible person,- self-made in proper American tradition on the one hand, for she had been haunted by the poverty of her childhood, and the years of struggle up from its ugliness,- until she became synonymous with the exotic, exquisite, worshipper at beauty's whrine. Bemelmans draws a portrait in extremes, through apt descriptions, through hilarious anecdote, through surprisingly sympathetic and understanding bits of appreciation. The scene shifts from Hollywood to the home she loved the best in Versailles. One meets in passing a vast roster of famous figures of the international and artistic set. And always one feels Bemelmans, slightly offstage, observing, recording, commenting, illustrated.
Pub Date: Feb. 23, 1955
ISBN: 0670717797
Page Count: -
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: Oct. 25, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1955
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