Book Report #165 - Between the World and Me

Between the World and Me by Ta-Nehisi Coates

Coates writes a letter to his son reflecting on what it is to be Black in America. It's only 150 pages, but I had to read it slowly over a month because it was so dense with insights that got right into the fabric of my being. They broke me open, and it was painful. I wanted to hide sometimes but I knew there was no way but through. If I want to be fully compassionate, I need to hear these things and let them touch me.

I didn't know about the fear that many black people feel because they have endured a history of horrible violence, and I didn't know how that fear informed so much of their behavior that I have been hopeless to understand. I didn't know that the lyrics of many rap songs that I listen to without a second thought hold the blueprints of this fear. A quarter of the way through the book, I listened to Changes by TuPac and cried.

Now, when I think about the US Prison System, I am enraged. I see how it is designed to hold Blacks and Hispanics down. I understand more about why Senator Booker's work on changing the prison system is so important to him.

The book doesn't leave you with a sense of hope like a Disney movie would. There's no way to wrap up what Coates has said with a pretty bow. Isn't it up to us, what happens next?

I so appreciate Coates writing this and sharing it with the world. It's like he's found the language that can't help but get through to people, gently but forcefully. I definitely needed this wake-up call, and I'll think of his words often, maybe every day.

General consensus: Life can be broken up into two parts: The time before you read Between the World and Me, and the time after you read it. It is that transformative.