Black Like Me
2 journalers for this copy...
I haven't read this book but I would like to someday.
Here's the description: "The Deep South of the late 50's was another country: a land of lynchings, segeragated lunch counters, whites-only restrooms, and a color line etched in blood across Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Georgia. White journalist John Howard Griffin, working for a black-owned magazine Sepia, decided to cross that line. Using medication that darkened his skin to deep brown, he exchanged his privileged life as a Southern white man for the disenfranchised world of an unemployed black man.
"What happened to John Howard Griffin - from the outside and within himself - as he made his way through the segregated Deep South is recorded in this searing work of nonfiction. Educated and soft-spoken John Howard Griffin changed only the color of his skin. It was enough to make him hated ... enough to nearly get him killed. His audacious, still chillingly relevant eyewitness history is a work about race and humanity every American must read."
It sounds great!
Here's the description: "The Deep South of the late 50's was another country: a land of lynchings, segeragated lunch counters, whites-only restrooms, and a color line etched in blood across Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Georgia. White journalist John Howard Griffin, working for a black-owned magazine Sepia, decided to cross that line. Using medication that darkened his skin to deep brown, he exchanged his privileged life as a Southern white man for the disenfranchised world of an unemployed black man.
"What happened to John Howard Griffin - from the outside and within himself - as he made his way through the segregated Deep South is recorded in this searing work of nonfiction. Educated and soft-spoken John Howard Griffin changed only the color of his skin. It was enough to make him hated ... enough to nearly get him killed. His audacious, still chillingly relevant eyewitness history is a work about race and humanity every American must read."
It sounds great!
Just received this in the mail -- I'm looking forward to reading it!
Condition: This is a mass market paperback that's seen better days; I'm probably going to tape the spine before I send it out into the world again. Still totally readable, though, which is what's important. :)
Condition: This is a mass market paperback that's seen better days; I'm probably going to tape the spine before I send it out into the world again. Still totally readable, though, which is what's important. :)
This is a really fascinating book. The most interesting part, to me, was the section wherein Griffin describes the reaction people in his town had to his writing about his experiences. It is almost as if by passing as black, Griffin BECAME black in his neighbors' minds, but worse -- to them it was as if he was a traitor to his own race. It's quite depressing, but also fascinating. The book made me wonder whether a similar experiment could be undertaken today; for some reason, it seems as though it would be harder for Griffin to pass in the same way, but I may be wrong.
Donated to Second Mile Center thrift store, 45th & Locust, Philadelphia PA.