Name: Men We Reaped
Rating: 4.445945945945946 (37 reviews)
ISBN: 9781608197651

Jesmyn Ward

A memoir that examines rural poverty and the lingering strains of racism in the south by the prize-winning author of "Salvage the Bones."

A Memoir

Men We Reaped

I think I listened to this at the wrong time

Sarah Erle

Named one of the Best Books of the Century by New York Magazine Two-time National Book Award winner Jesmyn Ward (Salvage the Bones, Sing, Unburied, Sing) contends with the deaths of five young men dear to her, and the risk of being a black man in the rural South. “We saw the lightning and that was the guns; and then we heard the thunder and that was the big guns; and then we heard the rain falling and that was the blood falling; and when we came to get in the crops, it was dead men that we reaped.” -Harriet Tubman In five years, Jesmyn Ward lost five young men in her life-to drugs, accidents, suicide, and the bad luck that can follow people who live in poverty, particularly black men. Dealing with these losses, one after another, made Jesmyn ask the question: Why? And as she began to write about the experience of living through all the dying, she realized the truth-and it took her breath away. Her brother and her friends all died because of who they were and where they were from, because they lived with a history of racism and economic struggle that fostered drug addiction and the dissolution of family and relationships. Jesmyn says the answer was so obvious she felt stupid for not seeing it. But it nagged at her until she knew she had to write about her community, to write their stories and her own. Jesmyn grew up in poverty in rural Mississippi. She writes powerfully about the pressures this brings, on the men who can do no right and the women who stand in for family in a society where the men are often absent. She bravely tells her story, revisiting the agonizing losses of her only brother and her friends. As the sole member of her family to leave home and pursue higher education, she writes about this parallel American universe with the objectivity distance provides and the intimacy of utter familiarity. A brutal world rendered beautifully, Jesmyn Ward's memoir will sit comfortably alongside Edwidge Danticat's Brother, I'm Dying, Tobias Wolff's This Boy's Life, and Maya Angelou's I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings.

Satya Nelms

It may be because my own grief is still so fresh, but bearing witness to the loss Ward describes in this book was heart wrenching, and yet I could not look away. These lives that she has written about, that she has colored in so vividly that these men feel like your own kin, were lived by real people. Knowing the hardships that fill these stories, and the courage it took Ward to recount them, reading these words, and holding them in my heart feels like the very least that I can do.

Rachel Kwon

Well, I guess I'm just a person who cries while reading books on the subway now. This is heartbreaking and beautifully written, and offers a glimpse into the frustration that many black Americans must feel every day.

Leah | @LeahsLittlePleasures

Devastating and heartbreaking, yet beautiful and moving. A must-read!

'...And then we heard the rain falling, and that was the drops of blood falling; and when we came to get the crops, it was dead men that we reaped.' Harriet TubmanIn five years, Jesmyn Ward lost five men in her life, to drugs, accidents, suicide, and the bad luck that can follow people who live in poverty, particularly black men. Dealing with these losses, one after another, made Jesmyn ask the question: why? And as she began to write about the experience of living through all the dying, she realized the truth--and it took her breath away. Her brother and her friends all died because of who they were and where they were from, because they lived with a history of racism and economic struggle that fostered drug addiction and the dissolution of family and relationships. Jesmyn says the answer was so obvious she felt stupid for not seeing it. But it nagged at her until she knew she had to write about her community, to write their stories and her own. Jesmyn grew up in poverty in rural Mississippi. She writes powerfully about the pressures this brings, on the men who can do no right and the women who stand in for family in a society where the men are often absent. She bravely tells her story, revisiting the agonizing losses of her only brother and her friends. As the sole member of her family to leave home and pursue high education, she writes about this parallel American universe with the objectivity distance provides and the intimacy of utter familiarity.

Sam Pulliam

Powerful and heartbreaking. I love Ward's writing and respect her rawness and honesty. Important reading.

Leonor Estrela

(4.5)
Chorar nos últimos capítulos e agradecimentos? This is the book for it. Estou destruída.

Men We Reaped A Memoir

Reviews

Highlights