"You took me for a Puh-uh-uh-USH-over" is the refrain. "Whoa, you thought I was a"-and here she catches "PUSH" in a wrestler's hold and throws it down over and over, pinning it to the mat. It lies there panting feebly, then expires. Etta leaves the ring, eyebrow pencil unsmudged, cat's eyeliner unsmeared, fluffy blonde coif intact. The six strands of her crystal earrings vibrate slightly as she walks.
This was a bargain!
"In nineteenth-century Massachusetts, Emily Dickinson's virginity was a source of unimpeded vision.
Marianne Moore gave it a modernist's transgressive brio: marriage, like Victorian diction, was an enterprise "requiring all one's criminal ingenuity to avoid"!
The Criminal Virgin plots her way to a practice unim- peded by the regulatory laws of the patriarchs.
Hattie McDaniel had prepared her own remarks. She managed to leave those MGM had prepared for her at the table. She walked purposefully, in fact she strode to the podium.
"I sincerely hope that I shall always be a credit to my race and to the motion picture industry," she said, accepting the award. What American Negro did not harbor a private version of that first hope? "My heart is too full to express just how I feel," she said, weeping.
I don‘t think I‘m smart enough for this book. The writing is superb. Roxane Gay had some nice things to say about this book and I‘ve been slacking on reading women of colour this year.
pickBeautiful collection of essays/criticism of what is is to be a woman, a Black woman, an artist, a creative. Really enjoyed
so-soDo you ever feel guilty for disliking a book that is widely acclaimed? Maybe the feeling isn‘t guilty for me, more like “what am I missing?/am I not smart enough?” 😆
That‘s the case here. It‘s a short little audio about black performers, the author‘s family and race. Margo Jefferson is a cultural critic and writes about Ella Fitzgerald, movies I haven‘t seen, and more. I tried but I‘m afraid it didn‘t work for me.
Another book where I had the wrong expectations of it. I expected a memoir about patterns, about healing, about creating new pathways. While I enjoyed what I got instead, part memoir part cultural critique, I struggled to let go of what I thought the book was. Writing lovely, format worked but does feel different, story weaving and connection brilliant.
Constructing a Nervous System: A Memoir | 
