“My President Was Black,” by Ta-Nehisi Coates

13 Tuesday Dec 2016

Posted by Richard in Articles & Books of Interest, The Outer Loop

Tags

"Between the World and Me", "The Atlantic", "The Beautiful Struggle", "The New Jim Crow", Michelle Alexander, Ta-Nehisi Coates

Ta-Nehisi Coates, writer for The Atlantic, author of Between the World and Me and The Beautiful Struggle, and someone who always seems to have something of value to teach, just wrote a lengthy (17,000 words) article in the upcoming Atlantic.

Entitled My President Was Black: A History Of The First African-American White House And Of What Came Next, it is, for me, the best article I’ve read about the Obama presidency and the 2016 election results. While it will certainly take years to fairly evaluate President Obama’s legacy and untangle the meaning of the 2016 election, Coates certainly opens the discussion.

Coming just after I finished Michelle Alexander’s superb 2010 book The New Jim Crow, which has opened my eyes in a way nothing else has in the last few years (more on this in a later post), Coates’ thoughts and views on the meaning of Obama’s presidency continue to instruct.

See what you think: My President Was Black.

Our Carceral State

22 Tuesday Sep 2015

Posted by Richard in Articles & Books of Interest, The Outer Loop

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

"Letter to My Son", "The Black Family in the Age of Mass Incarceration", "The Case for Reparations", Politics & Prose Bookstore, Sixth and I Historic Synagogue, Ta-Nehisi Coates, The Atlantic Magazine

I had to look up the word in the title above, but it is quite appropriate.

It is a word that Ta-Nehisi Coates uses frequently in his most recent and lengthy article, The Black Family in the Age of Mass Incarceration in the October 2015 issue of The Atlantic.

This article has certainly expanded my thinking and my understanding about something that is happening in our country but that rarely makes the news.

I am reprinting first the Atlantic’s Editor’s Note that introduces the article and will give you a sense of what will follow if you invest time in reading the Coates’ piece.

(Also, at the end of this Editor’s Note, there is information about two free tickets to see and hear Ta-Nehisi Coates in Washington, DC Oct. 14th.)

Editor’s Note

In Case You Missed Some Summer Posts

29 Saturday Aug 2015

Posted by Richard in Articles & Books of Interest, Escapes and Pleasures

≈ Leave a Comment

Tags

"Between the World and Me", "Cartel Land", "Go Tell a Watchman", "Love & Mercy", "Me, "Mr. Holmes", "Soy Cuba" ("I Am Cuba"), "Spy", "The Precious Ordinary", "When Marnie Was There", Early & the Dying Girl", Ellen's Lens, Ellen's Photos, Harper Lee, John Hersey's "Hiroshima", Kent Haruf, Marilynne Robinson, Movies, National Book Festival, Pico Iyer, Ta-Nehisi Coates

I thought I’d gather in one place a few of the posts you might have missed while you were enjoying the summer.

DC Area Book Lovers – Save the Date: a reminder about the National Book Festival that takes place here next Saturday, Sept. 5.

Why We Travel – Pico Iyer: one travel writers thoughts about why we enjoy travel.

Broadway as You’ve Never Known It: One very good and one terrific musical that are different from the ones you’ve known.

John Hersey’s Hiroshima: The New Yorker’s free on line release of Hersey’s recounting of what happen to six ‘survivors’ of the Atomic explosion.

Three Very Different Films: Mini-reviews of Cartel Land, Mr. Holmes, & Soy Cuba (I Am Cuba).

A Novel & a Memoir: Each Tells a Story Worth Discussing: Mini-reviews of Harper Lee’s Go Tell a Watchman and Ta-Nehisi Coates’ Between the World and Me

Japan Through Ellen’s Eye: Photos from a recent trip.

Travels to Japan: On Being Schooled by the Younger Generation: Why it’s sometimes a good idea to listen to our kids.

Movies Movies Movies: Mini-reviews of Spy, When Marnie Was There, Me, Earl & the Dying Girl, and Love & Mercy. Plus, links to eight other films we saw in various film festivals over the past year that have now been released to the public.

Baseball Through Ellen’s Lens: Ellen takes her camera to a baseball game (Red Sox, of course).

Through Ellen’s Lens: A Weekend of Baby Sitting. More on the three grand children.

The Precious Ordinary: Reviewing four books by Kent Haruf.

Summer Fiction Update: Reviewing three by Marilynne Robinson.

A Novel and A Memoir: Each Tells a Story Worth Discussing

21 Tuesday Jul 2015

Posted by Richard in Escapes and Pleasures

≈ 6 Comments

Tags

"Between the World and Me", "Go Set a Watchman", "The Atlantic", "The Beautiful Struggle", "To Kill a Mockingbird", Harper Lee, Pulitzer Prize, Ta-Nehisi Coates

Here are two books that consumed me in the past week. I read them back to back and think there is good reason to read them together. They are very different in major ways, one being a novel that takes place in the 1950s and the other being nonfiction, a letter to the writer’s son, written this year. Both are short and both deal with issues of family, race, and society in our country.

Go Set a Watchman by Harper Lee, 288 pages

4c4d632d5

MillersTime

Tag Archives: Ta-Nehisi Coates

“My President Was Black,” by Ta-Nehisi Coates

Our Carceral State

In Case You Missed Some Summer Posts

A Novel and A Memoir: Each Tells a Story Worth Discussing