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A beautiful new edition of I KNOW WHY THE CAGED BIRD SINGS, the iconic, beloved and deeply moving first volume of Maya Angelou's autobiography.

The international classic and bestseller, Maya Angelou's memoir paints a portrait of 'a brilliant writer, a fierce friend and a truly phenomenal woman' BARACK OBAMA

'I write about being a Black American woman, however, I am always talking about what it's like to be a human being. This is how we are, what makes us laugh, and this is how we fall and how we somehow, amazingly, stand up again' Maya Angelou

In this first volume of her seven books of autobiography, Maya Angelou beautifully evokes her childhood with her grandmother in the American south of the 1930s. Loving the world, she also knows its cruelty. As a Black woman she has known discrimination, violence and extreme poverty, but also hope, joy, achievement and celebration.

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Unforgettable classic

Tento príspevok prezrádza dôležité momenty deja, preto je skrytý, aby sme Vám nepokazili pôžitok z čítania.
Reviewing autobiographies sometimes feels like a sacrilege. Who are we to say how well someone managed to depict their life for us? And who are we to say that some experiences are less interesting than others?

I feel the same way when thinking about the Caged Bird.

I fell in love with Maya Angelou and her autobiography series after listening to the first book on Audible. Her reverberating voice transported me right into the middle of Stamps, Arkansas, and I listened, entranced, for hours and hours, as she played out for us all the scattered events that shaped her into who she eventually became.

I fell in love with her magical twists of the language (“The girls ran about wild, now here, now there, never here, never was, they seemed to have no more direction than a splattered egg.”)

I let myself draw back into the playful way child’s mind works (“Only one thing could help me, so I prayed earnestly that I’d be allowed to sit under the house and have the building collapse on my left jaw.”)

And I let myself be entertained, only to be crudely woken up right after by edgy, uncomfortable truths (“I was going to look like one of the sweet white little girls who were everybody’s dream of what was right with the world.”).

Maya Angelou was a five star love at first sound, and I could not wait until I had the Caged Bird sitting snugly on my bookshelf, in a hard copy.

However, when I picked up the book the second time and delved into it again, this time without the magic of her voice, my enthusiasm slightly lessened, as indeed there are passages that are a bit slower to read and that did not bring me as much value as I had thought initially.

Nevertheless, the Caged Bird remains for me a coming-of-age masterpiece, on the same level with A Tree Grows in Brooklyn and To Kill a Mockingbird (anyone else found The Caged Bird and the Mockingbird surprisingly similar?).

The book tackles a wide variety of topics, such as family relations, education, feeling of belonging and sexuality with mind-boggling honesty and class, but I was most astounded by the tasteful, clear way Angelou talked about her experience with racism without ever sounding patronising or pretending she had any answers.

I will remember for a long long time the story of the drowned black man, the visit to the dentist, the wrestling match, the derogatory graduation speech or when Maya gets called Mary for the sake of white woman’s convenience.

All of these were felt as sharp fragments of a broken mirror, piercing your skin where you least expect it, and all of them reflecting the very same thing to you - the pain racism inflicted on absolutely everyone who got in touch with it.

I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings is a beautifully written book full of difficult topics and I could go on for another three pages about its merits. Luckily, there is a much simpler way for you to discover the book - just go ahead and read it.

You won't regret it. Čítať viac

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