"The book of Negroes" whey u think?

[niceniss]

saw a white woman on the subway reading this earlier today and trust me, it took all my self-restraint to not cough on her.

written by this prick

It looks exploitive and the title pisses me off. How about me, a black person write a novella titled "the book of the pallid skinned" [img]/forums/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/rolleyes.gif[/img]

[Nylah]

Re: "The book of Negroes" whey u think?



i am in the middle of reading Donnika and it isnt at all a bad book.

[CeaBee]

Re: "The book of Negroes" whey u think?

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">Book Description


Abducted as an 11-year-old child from her village in West Africa and forced to walk for months to the sea in a coffle—a string of slaves— Aminata Diallo is sent to live as a slave in South Carolina. But years later, she forges her way to freedom, serving the British in the Revolutionary War and registering her name in the historic “Book of Negroes.” This book, an actual document, provides a short but immensely revealing record of freed Loyalist slaves who requested permission to leave the US for resettlement in Nova Scotia, only to find that the haven they sought was steeped in an oppression all of its own. Aminata’s eventual return to Sierra Leone—passing ships carrying thousands of slaves bound for America—is an engrossing account of an obscure but important chapter in history that saw 1,200 former slaves embark on a harrowing back-to-Africa odyssey.

Lawrence Hill is a master at transforming the neglected corners of history into brilliant imaginings, as engaging and revealing as only the best historical fiction can be. A sweeping story that transports the reader from a tribal African village to a plantation in the southern United States, from the teeming Halifax docks to the manor houses of London, The Book of Negroes introduces one of the strongest female characters in recent Canadian fiction, one who cuts a swath through a world hostile to her colour and her sex.

</div></div>

http://www.harpercollins.ca/global_scripts/product_catalog/book_xml.asp?isbn=0002255073

[Nylah]

Re: &quot;The book of Negroes&quot; whey u think?


thanks coolbeans I was just searching for the same thing.

it is a well-written book IMHO.

to tell the tale from the POV of a young girl gives you a different feel than say Roots or those other books.

there is this passage where the young girl is being marched along with others to the slave auction. She was captured just a short while before and doesnt understand what is happening to her and the others. This passage describes her cycle starting and how because she is naked the blood is running down her legs. Her sense of shame is palatable......

[SandiF]

Re: &quot;The book of Negroes&quot; whey u think?

[img]/forums/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/confused.gif[/img] Why are you [censored]...? [img]/forums/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/confused.gif[/img]

The title? The skin colour of the person reading the book? The skin colour of the person who wrote it? Or is it the author........ something else about the author?

I don't get it.

[niceniss]

Re: &quot;The book of Negroes&quot; whey u think?

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: SandiF</div><div class="ubbcode-body">[img]/forums/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/confused.gif[/img] Why are you [censored]...? [img]/forums/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/confused.gif[/img]

The title? The skin colour of the person reading the book? The skin colour of the person who wrote it? Or is it the author........ something else about the author?

I don't get it. </div></div>
I could easily say all the above but the title is exploitive and belittling. What does a caucasian know about an entire race of people to write such a title.
What does a north american white man know about an african girl?
And yes, the visual of the white woman feeding of the book with such a title left a bad taste in my mouth...

[CeaBee]

Re: "The book of Negroes" whey u think?


at first glance him never look white to me. From his biography here it appears that he's bi-racial.

dunno if that makes a difference to u, regarding his qualifications to write the book (or if u already knew that).

[Sugar Shug]

Re: "The book of Negroes" whey u think?

<span style='font-family: Georgia'><span style='font-size: 11pt'>Donnika the author isn't white. I could tell just by looking at his pic, but I found this on his website. I did find it iteresting how the book has another title in the US release.
[img]/forums/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/70409-waytogo.gif[/img]Peace and Blessings. [img]/forums/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/70409-waytogo.gif[/img]


Hill is the son of American immigrants — a black father and a white mother — who came to Canada the day after they married in 1953 in Washington, D.C. On his father's side, Hill's grandfather and great grandfather were university-educated, ordained ministers of the African Methodist Episcopal Church. His mother came from a Republican family in Oak Park, Illinois, graduated from Oberlin College and went on to become a civil rights activist in D.C. The story of how they met, married, left the United States and raised a family in Toronto is described in Hill's bestselling memoir Black Berry, Sweet Juice: On Being Black and White in Canada (HarperCollins Canada, 2001). Growing up in the predominantly white suburb of Don Mills, Ontario in the sixties, Hill was greatly influenced by his parents' work in the human rights movement. Much of Hill's writing touches on issues of identity and belonging. Hill is also the author of Any Known Blood (William Morrow, New York, 1999 and HarperCollins Canada, 1997) and Some Great Thing (Turnstone Press, Winnipeg, 1992).</span></span>

http://www.lawrencehill.com/bio.html

opps coolbeans beat me to it!

[Nylah]

Re: &quot;The book of Negroes&quot; whey u think?



the man doesnt look white atall. [img]/forums/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/70402-thinking.gif[/img]

and if u see what the book is about then you see that the title makes sense.

[Suesumba]

Re: &quot;The book of Negroes&quot; whey u think?

lawrence hill is a black(?) man. well according to the one drop rule. his father is dr. dan hill whose son is tippy toed folk singer dan hill. anyway, what's wrong with a white woman reading a book about black folk? for all we know she could have a few black children herself and is trying to teach them about history.

*shrug*

Anyway, donnika shoulda just smashed her face in and done in the interest of racial understanding. [img]/forums/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/70456-eyebrows.gif[/img]

[evanovitch]

Re: &quot;The book of Negroes&quot; whey u think?

Before the greetings, before the readings, before the music, before the announcements on Thursday evening at the UWI's Undercroft, Dr Michael Bucknor noted that 90 per cent of the submissions for this year's Commonwealth Writers' Prize (Canada and the Caribbean Region) came from Canada.

And on the shortlists of six books each for the Best First Book and Best Book awards, there was only one non-Canadian, Jamaican Erna Brodber's The Rainmaker's Mistake up for the latter award.

It was not surprising, then, that after the greetings, after the readings and after the music, two books from Canada had been named after the standard "and the winner is...." The End of the Alphabet by C.S. Richardson won Best First Book and Lawrence Hill's The Book of Negroes Best Book.

[niceniss]

Re: &quot;The book of Negroes&quot; whey u think?

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: SueSumba</div><div class="ubbcode-body">lawrence hill is a black(?) man. well according to the one drop rule. his father is dr. dan hill whose son is tippy toed folk singer dan hill. anyway, what's wrong with a white woman reading a book about black folk? for all we know she could have a few black children herself and is trying to teach them about history.

*shrug*

Anyway, donnika shoulda just smashed her face in and done in the interest of racial understanding. [img]/forums/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/70456-eyebrows.gif[/img] </div></div>well dan hill get jacket. [img]/forums/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/smirk.gif[/img]
few black children? if she adopted them... a young young gyal. and smaddy whey white cyaan have a black child, dem can only have mixed naturally. and dat bway noh black in fimmi book if him less than 60% african.
*I can hear the thud of a tree falling all the way in Brazil after that statement [img]/forums/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/704555_dwl.gif[/img]*

[Suesumba]

Re: "The book of Negroes" whey u think?

k. knowledge is power. more power to you. [img]/forums/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/smirk.gif[/img]

[mamatun]

Re: &quot;The book of Negroes&quot; whey u think?

He who knows and knows he knows, he is a wise man seek him.
He who knows not and knows he knows not, he is a child teach him.
He who knows not and knows not he knows not, he is a fool shun him.
Aye sah!

[Nylah]

Re: &quot;The book of Negroes&quot; whey u think?


[img]/forums/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/704555_dwl.gif[/img] @ SueSumba

that was quick