Well, what did I think? Too stunned by this stunner of a memoir that I added a new shelf, and called it Stunners, creating a new shelf. Somehow early eWell, what did I think? Too stunned by this stunner of a memoir that I added a new shelf, and called it Stunners, creating a new shelf. Somehow early evening the same day i check out Acceptance, my hand moved as if called to my round wood coffee table top. I had to feel my way past a lemonade jar, and about 10 books on the materialism, social structure ahead, Global Unitive Healing, race issues. I shoved aside all planned for study and reading and peeked inside the author's introduction. Next i kept on going to chapter One. what followed was a read which caused my fingers to almost burning turning the pages so quickly. Nietfeld, daughter of two people, the dad who transited into a female figure and one custody over Emi in court when the parents split. They all started off okay, but nice houses faded into crummy houses, and soon she reveals a child's desperation of Dad/now Mom becoming a hoarder, i am sure there was alcohol too; and Emi had great plans from Kindergarten on to inhale an education, and leave her world of horrors. She overcame adversity in ways one would think unimaginable. I don't want to say too much. Her journey is soul crushing, gutsy, and as she travels her road of horrors, society's institutions showing absolute lack of awareness towards anyone vulnerable are revealed, one after the other. She will find her way. The reader will inhale her journey, and also experience an open mouth disdain at the institutions out there, helping the poor, the uneducated, those without shoes so to speak. The author is a giant of a human being, and does not whine, but tell you like it is, the reader feels as if someone through a medicine ball into her/his gut. Wow....more
This was one of the most profound and dead right book I've ever read. I am white, so since 1986 I have been working on my awareness. There's a quote aThis was one of the most profound and dead right book I've ever read. I am white, so since 1986 I have been working on my awareness. There's a quote about going from a sorry gnat to becoming a giant eagle. Regarding race, i hope to have maybe 2 baby eagle feathers in my throat. I have read extensively on man's inhumanity to man. I was raised on Scarlett O'Hara, and "Tomorrow is another day," a worthwhile phrase, but the white population did not have a clue what was going down so to speak; some did. Thank God they spoke up. Ms. Wilkerson is prolific, and every word liquid, and filled with dimensions, and thus, a book you can't put down. I had loaned my book out; and a friend who gave it to me asked me 2 years later, "Did you read it," and no I hadn't. Thus immediate trip to library, and immersion. What I did not know was that the German's admired the United States, for it's superb practice of keeping black people down. We were studied! I bet there are a lot of people out "there" who sympathise with the Holocaust, but are stunted by unawareness of race. In 1966 I became aware of the Oneness of Humankind, and it has been a truck up the hill while I, immersed myself into an ocean of books, a community of diverse people, but still in 1980, just because I was at UC Irvine as a returning student, and my son's and my life reflected interracial friends, happenings, I was unaware of unaware racism, institutional racism, you name it. To this day, my learning and gratitude is in process. Isabel Wilkerson's use of language puts me in lyric heaven; she is forthright, and educates. Of course, now at 84 I see and live more differently, but this book belongs in every reader's bookshelf in the United States and elsewhere. Racism is our most vital and challenging issues; its path of reconciliation and illumination is long and thorny. i am a small pebble on the path. Of late, I have been to several conferences, multi-skin colors, multi personalities, and our black brothers and sisters have run these conferences. Friends, when i go, i see not only great proficiency and regard for the little and the big, but an enormous empathy and love towards us all. There are precious little masks in these meetings, and they carry great depth. It's all about upping the dialogue, and make that the love too. Read and watch everything you can; pray to your God that your inner being changes and that we all can spur swiftly towards the path of our destined oneness. This review is long, and doesn't cover the half of it, but boys and girls, when real unity is revealed, it's a stunner. humbly, esther bradley-detally; i guess that means I like the book! Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents...more
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