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Constructing a Nervous System
Constructing a Nervous System: A Memoir | Margo Jefferson
7 posts | 4 read | 3 to read
From "one of our most nuanced thinkers on the intersections of race, class, and feminism (Cathy Park Hong, New York Times bestselling author of Minor Feelings) comes a memoir "as electric as the title suggests" (Maggie Nelson, author of On Freedom). The award-winning critic and memoirist Margo Jefferson has lived in the thrall of a cast of othersher parents and maternal grandmother, jazz luminaries, writers, artists, athletes, and stars. These are the figures who thrill and trouble her, and who have made up her sense of self as a person and as a writer. In her much-anticipated follow-up to Negroland, Jefferson brings these figures to life in a memoir of stunning originality, a performance of the elements that comprise and occupy the mind of one of our foremost critics. In Constructing a Nervous System, Jefferson shatters her self into pieces and recombines them into a new and vital apparatus on the page, fusing the criticism that she is known for, fragments of the family members she grieves for, and signal moments from her life, as well as the words of those who have peopled her past and accompanied her in her solitude, dramatized here like never before. Bing Crosby and Ike Turner are among the authors alter egos. The sounds of a jazz LP emerge as the intimate and instructive sounds of a parents voice. W. E. B. Du Bois and George Eliot meet illicitly. The muscles and movements of a ballerina are spliced with those of an Olympic runner, becoming a template for what a black female body can be. The result is a wildly innovative work of depth and stirring beauty. It is defined by fractures and dissonance, longing and ecstasy, and a persistent searching. Jefferson interrogates her own self as well as the act of writing memoir, and probes the fissures at the center of American cultural life.
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charl08
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"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.

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charl08
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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.

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charl08
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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.

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Augustdana
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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.

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Kazzie
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Beautiful collection of essays/criticism of what is is to be a woman, a Black woman, an artist, a creative. Really enjoyed

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Chelsea.Poole
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Mehso-so

Do 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.

dabbe Thank you for saying this! There are times when I feel the same way about a book. Why can't I get it? How dumb am I? You've made me feel so much better. Books metaphorically are sentient beings, and not all beings are meant for each other. 🤔 Hmm. That's my last glass of wine tonight. 😀 1y
batsy @dabbe That's perfect! That's how I think of books 🥂 1y
71 likes2 comments
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Sydneypaige
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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.

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