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| Book cover via Amazon.com |
Opinion
Welcome back everyone to this last week of February and my #StayClassyFeb series of classical literature. Today I am reviewing another non-fiction novel that I hadn’t ever heard of before Amazon brought it to my attention. I'm frustrated by my history teachers in middle and high school for not letting me know. It is unfortunate that no one in the entire time I was going to school ever mentioned this book to me. After reading this novel, I have learned volumes of information that I was unaware of regarding the reformation of The United States after the Civil War, and most importantly, the way the African American population was treated after the 13th Amendment. I picked this book up on Kindle Unlimited.
This is the part of the review where I am going to talk about my first impressions. Initially and throughout, I am pleased to report how happy I am with the format that this was presented. I am a data and facts kind of person. Thankfully this book has so very many facts that I was able to verify. I took some time to Google, and between the book and the Googling, I learned a lot.
The period of time between the Civil War and 1903 when the book was published, was tumultuous at best. This is one of the first books I’ve read that explains a lot of what Doctor Martin Luthar King Jr. had talked about with the struggle that had continued, including the dream of equality. Things like leaders of the movements to help all black people, encouraging people not to vote or go into politics, but instead, go to school. The problem the writer presents with this philosophy was that there wasn’t a solid educational foundation at the time according to the author, for the implementation to be sufficient. The lack of encouraged voting just made the issues worse.
The reason I am bringing this up for my first impression is that this book I feel is incredibly important. We have to know our history to avoid it from repeating itself. The very beginning of the book stresses the critical need for literacy and for people to participate with voting in their government to thrive.
This part of the review I’m going to talk a bit about some critiques. The first one I have is for the “Story Structure, Foundation, and Presentation” portion of my scoring system. For context, I read this on a 7 inch Amazon Fire tablet using the Kindle app on the tablet. Like all the other Amazon Classic e-book copies I have been reviewing as of late, there was no spacing between paragraphs. Additionally, there is another issue involving paragraphs specifically. It’s not a very long book, and yet, for whatever reason whoever works on the e-book copy has decided not to make the book appear to have paragraphs aside from every 4 to 6-page flips through the book copy said it was all the same page. When there is a paragraph, sometimes it’s followed by a much shorter paragraph. It’s such an odd issue to have walls of text then some smaller indenting breaks.
Likely the issue is because the real book has very long paragraphs, but those who are governing the e-copy need to give this treasure of National History and importance, the beauty it fully deserves. There needs to a pause somewhere, or the eyes strain almost the entire time. Justified walls of text that are unbroken and unyielding are no good for those who are reading seriously. You can get lost too, if one reads at the rate that I do, having markers in the form of indentation is important if you have to pause and look up a fact.
My second critique is in the “Lost In Translation” portion of my scoring, but I assure you I gladly did this not because I had to do it. That critique is to look up facts. Partially I did it to be sure I could trust what I was reading, or at least initially I did. As I went along, I found that not only could I trust the cross data, but I was also able to learn new things independent of it. So while this does fall in my categories and those of you who follow me know I will note the situation, so you are aware, it’s not a deal breaker if you do not decide to stop and research as you go.
Now let’s get into the part of the review where I discuss what I liked about this book. We have a narrative that almost feels like a college lecture by how it is presented. That’s not always something I enjoy, so I am pleased to inform you all that there are beautifully written story elements that the author puts in. He writes these gorgeous works of trips he’s made or people he was with who corroborate the evidence he’s presented in the facts. I found this book both stimulating on an intellectual level, and fulfilling from the aspect of the people he was talking about for what they were going through.
Did you know back in 1903 that the average black person was not only in debt but also facing far too much jail and prison for things like petty crimes? Does that not sound familiar? Even people of white decent at that time according to the reader who stayed in their old plantations or even was in those cities that once were populated with the oppression of slavery were having economic hardships. But none so hard as the African Americans who were desperately trying to overcome poverty and find a place in this world. So to go into what I loved, I loved that I learned why things hadn’t changed much. I want to see changes, I want to see our world change, and I wish more people read this book and correlated it’s lessons to modern issues.
Another thing I enjoyed about the book was the vocabulary choices and the references to classical Greek and Roman mythology and history. It’s refreshing to hear some of the words that were chosen to describe even mundane issues because it’s become out of fashion to use those older classical words. The description of the City of Atlanta to the Greek huntress Atalanta is terrific. I loved that story long ago, but it’s rare to see it referenced in a book. And yet, it applies. What the author is saying about being trapped by the greed for gold is so powerful in the description he used.
Last, and I think the most critical part of this book, is just how much it cautions about what may happen in the future based on what has happened in the past. I want to live in a world where we can be people, that it doesn’t matter what color, gender, religion, sexual preference, or even personal belief someone has, that we can live side by side. I want so badly for others to read this book as well and take a look at themselves personally as I have done. I for one, am going to work more toward the ultimate goal of helping people as much as I can. I will work harder to make sure that literacy and understanding democracy is taken seriously by myself and those I interact with and love. Mostly I will help to teach my children, the lessons that are important are taken seriously by them. I don’t know what difference I can make, but I am going to take it one day at a time, and hopefully, something I do will help make this world better. It’s what this book was written to do, to make the world better to live in for every person on it. One hundred six years after this book was written, it’s inspired me to work toward living in a better world.
Score
With all of the math and scoring taken into consideration, “The Souls of Black Folk” has scored a 90/100. That’s a five-star review on Goodreads and Amazon.com, and I’m putting this in my “Mrs. Y Recommends” pile so that you all can enjoy.
Until tomorrow everyone, have an awesome day.
