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Searching... R.H. Stafford Library (Woodbury) | 921 GIOVANN | Searching... Unknown |
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Summary
Summary
A collection of sharp and clean essays that cut to the bone of racism, by one of America's best writers. Annotation copyright by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR
Author Notes
Nikki Giovanni is one of the most prominent black poets of her generation. Born on June 7, 1943, in Knoxville, Tenn., she graduated from Fisk University and later studied at Columbia University. Giovanni creates strongly written poems to convey messages of love, frustration, alienation, and the black experience. She gained national fame with the publication of Black Feeling, Black Talk, Black Judgement in 1970. Full of the spirit of the black community during this era, her works captured the anger and frustration of many of its members.
Giovanni has been the recipient of grants from both the National Endowment for the Arts and the Ford Foundation. She has taught English at Rutgers University, Ohio State University, and Queens College and has given frequent poetry readings. She is also known for several sound recordings of her poetry, including Truth Is On Its Way. She has also been a Professor of English at the Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University.
(Bowker Author Biography)
Reviews (5)
Publisher's Weekly Review
These brief essays by poet Giovanni ( Sacred Cows and Other Edibles ) on subjects both personal and societal are fluid, often perceptive musings that beg for more substance. Written since she joined the English faculty at Virginia Polytechnic five years ago, the pieces contain her reflections on the path of her career and offer advice to black students on how to apply themselves scholastically, as well as how to deal with stupid questions from whites. Giovanni values the influence of W.E.B. Du Bois's intellectual honesty but also criticizes those whom she sees as his neoconservative progeny, writer Henry Louis Gates Jr. and Justice Clarence Thomas among them. She is harsh on Spike Lee's film, Malcom X , calling it a ``sick joke,'' and lionizes novelist Toni Morrison. Asserting that she doesn't feel alienated from Western culture (``my people have contributed so much that is vital and good to it''), Giovanni adds, ``I am alienated from the people . . . who think they own Western tradition.'' Author tour. (Feb.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Kirkus Review
From bestselling poet Giovanni, recently appointed professor of English at Virginia Polytechnic: over two dozen short essays, personal and political, on topics ranging from Spike Lee's Malcolm X to matters of family and friends While working primarily in the public realm by writing about various aspects of American life as she has encountered them in the past few years, Giovanni also leaves room for more intimate ruminations: on moving to Virginia; on the vagaries of teaching poetry; or on the significance of buying a candy-red sports car. Often affirming her affinity for the original Star Trek series, and especially for the role of communications officer Uhura (``The voice of the entire Federation''), she frequently evokes the memories and lessons of the Sixties as evidence of gains in justice and equality for black Americans. But with racism still present in both society and the classroom, and African-American collegians still an imperiled minority, the author comes down hard on those seen as perpetuating the problem, such as Spike Lee, for his lack of historical perspective and for his distorted, self-serving portrait of a genuine black hero. The general rage may be mellower with age, but Giovanni's ability to provoke with barbed comments remains much in evidence. Unfortunately, though, without the cutting edge consistently applied, these views of society and culture tend to ramble and reminisce more than drive the point home, leaving a favorable--but less than lasting--impression.
Booklist Review
/*STARRED REVIEW*/ Giovanni's status as a best-selling black woman poet seems, even 25 years after Black Feeling, Black Talk, still to half-baffle and half-delight the publishing world. Her sixteenth book, a real dynamo, will also arouse mixed reactions, but that's pure Giovanni, who is always herself whether anyone likes it or not. This potent group of essays varies in tone from breezy to vehement and covers a mind-tingling assortment of topics that all relate in one way or another to being a black American, or as Giovanni prefers, a "Black american," a usage she explains in "Black Is the Noun." Currently a professor at Virginia Polytechnic, Giovanni has a lot to say about the African American community and education, the value of a historical perspective, and the essentiality of stories and writing. In her more meditative pieces, Giovanni recalls her childhood and years at Fisk University and admits to being a die-hard Trekker and an unrepentant smoker. She sings the praises of Toni Morrison and Dr. Mae Carol Jemison, the first black woman astronaut, and muses over why freed slaves chose to stay in the land of their oppressors. Then she takes off her gloves and goes after Clarence Thomas and other black conservatives for their rejection of affirmative action. She also absolutely shreds Spike Lee's Malcolm X, grieves over the fact more black men study in jail than in college, and in a scathing bit of satire, mocks the complacency of white women. Giovanni is a shrewd observer and an exhilarating essayist, modulating her tone from chummy to lethal, hilarious to sagacious as smoothly as a race-car driver shifts gears. (Reviewed Dec. 1, 1993)0688043321Donna Seaman
Choice Review
Giovanni adds to her prolific body of work this collection of 29 brief essays on topics that include Spike Lee's filmmaking, her own childhood, and teaching creative writing. The essays maintain the tone Giovanni has made famous, that of straightforward truth-telling, and the jazz-like style of many of her poems. Her voice speaks clearly throughout the volume in the rhythms of ordinary speech. The memoirs are often touching, but the ostensibly political essays frequently suffer from lack of development on complex topics. Giovanni is unquestionably professional at eliciting responses, but her analysis seems fragmented and at times shallow. The reader must be satisfied with the occasional crystallized insight. In that respect, as in their organization, the essays resemble prose poems. Giovanni explains in the author's note that the "racism" of the title does not describe everything in the volume, but that the "101" does, in the sense that she is simply observing her world. Highly recommended for libraries that have maintained complete collections of Giovanni's work and for those with large collections of contemporary African American women's writing. Undergraduate; general. J. Tharp; University of Wisconsin--Marshfield-Wood County
Library Journal Review
Her books having sold nearly 400,000 copies, Giovanni is proof that poetry remains vibrant. Here she forsakes verse for political essays touching on Malcolm X, affirmative action, and the Sixties. (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
