Literary Persuasions: Book Reviews by Aberjhani

African Americans Far from Home (part 2): Intimacy, Ethics, and Take-Aways

2/17/2022

Relationship building, arguably, comprises the heart of Gartrell’s institutional success and the soul of his memoir’s emotional intelligence.

(If you missed part 1of this article you can click here to check it out.)

Connecting with the right people to help establish and staff his Wisdom21 schools presents a challenge repeatedly met in innovative ways. Often crucial in this regard are women. His relationships with the same––notably, per the text, repeatedly initiated by them––at times blur what would be considered in the U.S. as lines of professional propriety. You might even say they were completely erased in certain cases. Gartrell is not insensitive to the point and wrestles with its implications and potential consequences.

Loneliness and Rules of Engagement

In a chapter titled “Land of Ladies,” he theorizes that during his time in the country, Japanese women were “especially lonely and in desperate need of love.” This, despite having a reputation for making “the best marriage partners on earth” (p. 108). A variety of factors are cited as possible reasons for their loneliness and desperation but the dangerous end result was an apparent (at least to the author) acute vulnerability which made them easy prey for unscrupulous foreign tourists. As for the author:

“…Back in the U.S., I led a fairly typical life and tended to shy away from romances not suitably cultivated, wholesome, or clean. In Japan, however, the rules of engagement were radically different. In many respects, there were no rules at all... As an aspiring businessman, community leader, and person of conscience, I felt it my duty to address…concerns as appropriately as I could…” (p. 110).

Given the radicalized and revolutionized factions of gender equality activists around the world in 2022, much more could be written about the author’s observations of and experiences with Japanese women. This writer would encourage exactly that for one important reason. A key component to surviving the transitions from homogenous cultural models which many have experienced in the past to more diverse communities currently forming is this: a willingness to understand how members of different cultures experience that of “others.” Powerful examples are presented throughout the subject text.

A definitive example of the possible pitfalls and drawbacks of mixing private intimacies with business ambitions may be seen in what the author describes as a “paper marriage” convenient for legal purposes. In addition to proving herself an extremely competent business partner, his native-born wife Kazumi calmly overlooks her husband’s involvement with two mistresses (a practice widely documented as acceptable in Japan). However, just as the expanding Wisdom21 enterprise begins to spiral downward, her expertise and devotion both disappear.

Black Community in an Asian World

Something many will likely be surprised to learn about when reading 21 Years of Wisdom is the extensiveness of the Black presence in Japan. The discovery makes for a completely different scenario from the solitary status reported by James Baldwin in “Stranger in the Village”––or for that matter by explorer Matthew A. Henson as he planted a flag with Robert E. Peary at the North Pole in 1909––and thereby increases its value as a recent addition to the literature of Black expatriates.

The nonprofit Japan African American Friendship Association had been established in the country some years before Gartrell’s arrival. His rapid rise in prominence, however, made him a suitable choice to lead it following the 1995 passing of the previous president, Harry Stevenson. He would hold that position for a decade.

Interaction with one particular African-American from Atlanta proved exceptionally useful when the school founder clashed with the Yakuza (mob) over a dispute concerning a former employee’s dismissal. Before things could turn violent, his fellow expatriate handled the matter without the boss’s consent and informed him afterwards. Moreover, interestingly enough, it to a city with a more than 50 percent Black population that Gartrell returns at the conclusion of his Japanese odyssey.

5 Teachable Take-Aways

In the Author’s Note for 21 Years of Wisdom, readers are cautioned that people who identify with certain demographics may find some passages in his memoir offensive. He’s probably right. But many of those same individuals are likely to sidestep any sense of personal slight out of appreciation for the larger philosophical, geographical, and historical contexts in which the central story is embedded. They might also find Shannon Roxborough’s insightful foreword useful towards that end.

More than a few commenters have noted the stylish novel-like quality of Gartrell’s narrative. With that in mind: how interesting would it be to see a director such as Spike Lee, Steven McQueen, Regina King, or Quentin Tarantino produce a film adaptation of the book? Time will tell. For now, the following are 5 of what I consider to be important teachable take-aways from 21 Years of Wisdom:

Harmonious interaction between members of converging cultures is as dependent upon those entering a host country as it is upon indigenous communities accommodating them.
The literature of the African-American expatriate experience is one deserving of greater study within the contexts of both American academia and world literary forums.
The potential for mutually life-enriching experiences shared by immigrants and native residents on various shores is an extensively documented one, the study of which could serve America well as the country continues to evolve from one of a majority-White rule to one of a minority-majority population.
Alongside any strategies for raking in maximum profits, effective organizational leadership requires ethical practices which safeguard the integrity of an organization’s products, its image, and it personnel.
The mindful practice of cultural literacy provides an effective deterrent to mind-less violence between people of different nationalities, religious background, and other social distinctions.

By Aberjhani
Author of Dreams of the Immortal City Savannah
and Greeting Flannery O’Connor at the Back Door of My Mind
Creator of Original Silk-Featherbrush Artstyle

0 Comments

Reading Rumi after 9/11 and again at the end of the War in Afghanistan (part 2)

9/23/2021

0 Comments

EDITORIAL NOTE: The essay below was first published in 2007. Along with part 1 of this 2-part post, and a new art series dedicated to the children of Afghanistan, this updated text is presented as part of a series of reflections on the potential impact of Jelaluddin Rumi’s powerful legacy upon the region of his birth and those who have fled it. (If you missed part 1 you can read it by clicking here.)

“The lovers crawl in and out of your alley,
They bathe in drips of blood; and not finding you, they give up and leave.
I am forever stationed at your door like the earth,
While others come and go like the wind.”
––(Although attributed in the book Rending the Veil by Shahram T. Shiva, to Rumi, p. 91, some scholars believe the above was composed by an earlier poet.)

I first fell in love with the poetry of Jelaluddin Rumi while working as a bookseller (as discussed in Greeting Flannery O’Connor at the Back Door of My Mind). That was when the unparalleled lyrical grace, philosophical brilliance, and spiritual daring of his work took me completely by surprise. The impact of its soulful beauty and the depth of its profound humanity were so intense they prompted me to spontaneously compose poetry without being aware I was doing so––until later reading the compositions in my notebook and wondering how they got there.

Writing without realizing I had been writing was no small matter to me, so I wrote Coleman Barks, one of the renowned translators/interpreters of Rumi’s work, to ask what he thought about it. Barks was kind enough to telephone me and said he was aware of many instances where people with a deep passion for Rumi’s work found themselves spontaneously composing, reciting, or singing poetry.

That knowledge, coming from the man whose celebrated “versions” of “Maulana’s” writings helped make Rumi a bestselling poet in the United States, made me feel better about my own experience. It also forever defined the sense of blessed enchantment I’ve come to associate with all things related to Rumi. Consequently, I couldn’t help expecting and yearning for some semblance of that enchantment as I read the novel A MOTH TO THE FLAME, THE LIFE OF THE SUFI POET RUMI, by Ph.D. Connie Zweig.

The Beginning of an Extraordinary Life

From the first page to the last, there is much to admire in Zweig’s amazing recreation of the places, people, and events that shaped the life and work of Rumi. The author skillfully brings to life the everyday colors, activities, and diverse religious customs of the Middle East in the thirteenth century. She also––having been for many years a student of Hinduism, Buddhism, and Sufism––proves more than a little adept at describing various states of psychological and spiritual consciousness.

A Moth to the Flame begins as Rumi’s father, the spiritual leader Bahaoddin Velad, is dying. The future author of the massive and now classic book of world literature, the Mathnawi (or Masnavi) is left to face life alone in Konya, where threats of war and invasion increase daily. As Rumi takes on the mantle of leadership and enters into marriage and fatherhood, Zweig exercises her privilege as author to make readers privy to his thoughts and most intimate moments.

Those who prefer their spiritual heroes presented in their basic humanity may nod approvingly at the portrayal of Rumi’s consummation of his two marriages while those who empower the grace of their own spirituality with that gleaned from his may feel differently (reviewers on different platforms since the book’s publication in 2006 have demonstrated as much). In one sense, these brief scenes––in which Rumi experiences both disappointment and erotic intoxication––appear crucial to illustrating the contrast between the nature of carnal desire and the elevated spiritual consciousness towards which Rumi was evolving. In another, they do not, and become even more questionable when the sexual focus is placed on his wife Kira’s fantasies regarding her mystically preoccupied husband.

A Sacred Friendship

It is difficult sometimes to determine whether A Moth to the Flame is intended as a celebration of Rumi’s life, as a feminist critique of it, or simply a balanced account presented in the form of fiction. Much of the book’s substance is a matter of historical record while much of it is a matter of interpretation of that record.

By nearly every account, the Rumi now famed for his boundless defense and espousal of life as a manifestation of divine love would be unknown to the world had it not been for a spiritual transformation triggered by his meeting, and subsequent friendship with, the wandering dervish known as Shams of Tabriz. That fact is a dominant theme in A Moth to the Flame as well. But it is often difficult to understand exactly why or how this is so when the overwhelming impression of both Rumi and Shams in these pages is that of two men whose esoteric obsessions caused devastating––even fatal––psychological harm to those who loved them, particularly the women in their lives.

Consequently, we note with stunned sorrow the forced marriage of Rumi’s young daughter Kimiya to the much older Shams; and the painful desire-filled loneliness that Rumi’s wife Kira suffers while her husband engages, seemingly to the exclusion of everything else, in sacred conversations with Shams. Readers even find themselves empathizing with Rumi’s son Aloeddin’s stinging sense of rejection when his relationship with his father appears to be obliterated by the presence of Shams in their lives. Eventually that rejection leads to Shams’ murder.

As plausible as these scenarios may be, they leave the reader wondering about the majesty of that Shams who was described as “one of the poles of the age,” and who was not only resented and feared as he is in A Moth to the Flame, but who was adored for his love and knowledge of God. Likewise, the novel gives us a true enough account of Shams’ initial departure from Konya after first meeting Rumi, but says nothing of the legendary celebration during which people in the streets spontaneously recited and sang poetry upon his return. We learn instead about guards who are executed because they lied about having killed Shams. The degree to which Zweig’s work as a Jungian therapist and an explorer of “the shadow side of spiritual and religious life” influenced the substance of her narrative is worth readers’ consideration.

A Nation of Lovers

Possibly the most inspiring scene in A Moth to the Flame comes at the end when, once again, Mongols and crusaders threaten to conquer Konya. Rumi, after a lifetime of devotion and sacrifice, experiences this revelation: “I am a lover of God, and those who follow me, Muslims, Christians, or Jews, we are a nation of lovers. Our religions divide us, but our yearning for God, our himma, unites us, whether we are Muslims longing to join Allah, Christians longing to be embraced by Christ, or Jews yearning for the Messiah.”

He decides to “make jihad in my own way,” which means standing, like Moses, rooted unshakably in his faith and watching as Divinity literally fights and wins his battles for him. One does not need to be a U.N. ambassador or professor of religious studies to note the importance of Rumi’s understanding and application of the concept of jihad. For him, it meant battling the “nafs,” or weaker worldly qualities within oneself in order to achieve a greater sense of unity and co-creativity with Divinity as opposed to launching a supposed “holy war” against those who do not share one’s religious beliefs.

Achieving this divine union relegated all else to secondary importance. This point is significant not only for those duped into believing that blowing up themselves and others is the ultimate act of faith. It is also important for those readers who, following the devastations of September 11, 2001, needlessly questioned their passion for writings by Rumi. Among the stronger aspects of Zweig’s novel is its demonstration that Rumi’s literary and spiritual voice is one which champions unity through love over domination through coercion.

In Conclusion

Despite any criticisms offered above, just as it states on the book’s back cover, A Moth to the Flame is clearly presented “in the tradition of Siddhartha and The Last Temptation of Christ” as “a mythic story of the human soul.” This distinction is necessary because while the book is categorized as fiction, the subtitle reads “The Life of the Sufi Poet Rumi,” which could lead some to interpret it as historical biography. The more accomplished volume along those lines remains Franklin D. Lewis’ Rumi, Past and Present, East and West, the Life, Teachings and Poetry of Jalâl al-Din Rumi (though Brad Gooch’s Rumi’s Secret: The Life of the Sufi Poet of Love is a popular volume some readers consider more accessible).

A Moth to the Flame does contain a very useful appendix timeline of events pertaining to Rumi’s life. Moreover, translations of Rumi’s poetry by Jonathan Star and Shahram Shiva, utilized throughout, help make the novel as a whole an exceptional work of literary art well worth reading and cherishing.

Aberjhani
©814th Anniversary of the Birth of Jalal al-Din Mohammad Balkhi/Rumi

Author of The River of Winged Dreams
and Greeting Flannery O'Connor at the Back Door of My Mind

0 Comments

Chinese Author Jisheng's TOMBSTONE a Grim Reminder of Dangers of Authoritarian Leadership

6/4/2019

0 Comments

Yang Jisheng's Tombstone, the Great Chinese Famine 1958-1962, is not the kind of book I could rate based on nothing more than how much I did or did not like it. The subject matter is much too deep for that and the dangers the author endured to write this phenomenal work far too real.

Jisheng's account as presented to us in the English-language edition of Tombstone is a single-volume 629-page condensed version of the original Chinese-language 1,200-page 2-volume set first published in Hong Kong a decade ago. There's no need to question what may or may not have been lost in translation because Jisheng provided so much fact-based data with which to work in the original publication.

Moreover, Tombstone is much more than just a triumph of historical writing. It represents in many ways the triumph of a movement to shed light on "the worst famine in human history." As an integral part of that movement: "Yang got people who experienced the famine to describe it in their own words. He found local journalists who'd witnessed and reported on murders and starvation and got them to write their memoirs. He located and interviewed local implementers of the fatal policies. He got surviving resisters to recount their experiences" (pp. X-XI).

Magnitude of the Horror

It took a while for me to adjust my brain to magnitude of the fact that the horror described actually occurred less than 70 years ago. In that hellish avoidable atrocity an estimated 30 to 45 million people died within a four-year period basically because of authoritarian arrogance and a total disregard for the freedom of individuals. Yet my shocked incredulity as a reader is nothing compared to the painful awakening Jisheng experienced as a member of the Communist Youth League proudly committed to promoting the policies of Mao Zedong's "Great Leap Forward" initiative only to discover those very policies in 1959 caused his father's death.

Ironically, it was while working in the late 1960s as an official journalist that he learned "how 'news' was manufactured, and how news organs served as the mouthpiece of political power." (Very different dynamics from what U.S. President Donald Trump's so often proclaims as "fake news.") However, it was not until the late 1970s that the awful deadly scope of the great famine became apparent:

"Now we knew that it was a man-made disaster that had caused tens of millions of people to starve to death... In my effort to shake off deception, I came to understand the social background of my father's death and to reflect more profoundly on his life..." (pp. 11-12).

That "deception" has remained hard for a lot of Chinese to shake off in part because of many official's refusal to acknowledge the famine for what it was and insist on referring to it in such euphemistic terms as "the three years of natural disaster," or "the years of difficulties." Another seems to be to avoid the appearance of discrediting the legacy of People's Republic of China founder Zedong.

Double Objectives

Tombstone is not easy reading by any means. Where Jisheng narrates the actions leading up to the abuses of power, and fear of the same, which led up to the famine, he is straightforward and factually dense. That is a quality hardcore historians relish but average readers might find less entertaining. And in a way that is the point.

Jisheng's objective as a journalist is to share awareness of an event which it would seem impossible for the entire world not to know about already, but which it appears relatively few actually do. As a human being and the son of foster-parents who gave all they had to raise him and support his education goals, he is determined to honor those parents and the dozens of millions who lost their lives to the famine. Therefore, the title selected for the book: "A tombstone is a memory made concrete." (p. 3)

The result his investigative labors is indispensible documentation of officials' motives for allowing the tragedy to occur; and, how many hypocritically gorged themselves on the good life while entire villages literally starved to death. Yet such documentation is balanced with reports difficult to read for a very different reason. In short, Jisheng does not censor the stories of people describing acts of cannibalism which they either witnessed or committed themselves.

We learn about: people in villages who wait for strangers to come along so they can kill and eat them, an adolescent sister who kills and eats her younger brother after their parents have died, people who wait a few hours after funerals so they can dig up corpses and consume them. These and other actions seem too extreme to believe they really occurred in a civilized nation. But we are aware now that they did. Some people even describe which parts of the human body they found most delectable.

If you're a fan of the movie Bone Tomahawk, starring Kurt Russell, Lili Simmons, and Patrick Wilson, and you did not flinch watching the scene where "Troglodytes" split a man in half to eat him, then the above accounts of cannibalism might not bother you too much. Anyone who did flinch, throw up, scream, or faint, can empathize to some meaningful degree with those who survived the horror of the Great Famine and with Jisheng's determination to tell their collective story.

The Record of This Particular Memory

The importance of the history provided in Tombstone is evident enough in its own right, or at least it should be. "Human memory," the author tells us, "is the ladder on which a country and a people advance. We must remember not only the good things, but also the bad; the bright spots, but also the darkness" (p. 3).

The record of this particular memory is a significant indicator of the dangers that can befall populations which opt for authoritarian rule by a single individual, or small group of individuals, versus government by a robust engaged citizenry exercising some form of democracy. Even more than pitting one political ideology against another, it is about accepting some share of communal responsibility that automatically comes with living in any society hoping to make great strides forward, or just to maintain for its citizens peace, security, and decently-stocked refrigerators.

Aberjhani
author of Dreams of the Immortal City Savannah
co-author of Encyclopedia of the Harlem Renaissance

0 Comments

American Dream Meets Black Reality in Johnson's 'From “N Word” to Mr. Mayor'

5/6/2019

0 Comments

To fully appreciate reading former Savannah mayor Otis S. Johnson's From 'N Word' to Mr. Mayor, Experiencing the American Dream, you might want to note some important clues he shares at the book's beginning. The first is his identification of himself as a "scholar activist." Take that for exactly what it sounds like: he has long been devoted to the cultivation of knowledge within himself and others, as well as to the reversal of heinous social and political injustices.

A second shared hint is his struggle over whether to spell out the word "nigger" in this book's title or employ the more politically-accepted abbreviation. Following his publisher's suggestion, he chose the latter but felt the original more "symbolic of my struggle as a black male in American society." With that in mind, the book in general, he states, "documents my struggle to achieve the American Dream while having to confront the vicissitudes of being black in a racist society" (p. 11)

A Timeline of Powerful History

From 'N Word' to Mr. Mayor, Experiencing the American Dream autobiography by Dr. Otis S. Johnson.

The above words may sound, to some, like little more than sensationalistic jargon employed to grab attention. It would be more accurate to describe them as precise when considering Johnson was born in 1942 and, from the beginning until the present era, his experience of the American dream has unfolded along a timeline of powerful history-shaping events on personal, national, and international levels.

For its precisely-balanced combination of social history and personal memoir, Johnson's book under any title is one of the most valuable written in recent years by an African-American man, and one of the most important for any time by a native of Savannah, Georgia. Being the former dean of Savannah State University's College of Liberal Arts and Social Sciences, and current Scholar in Residence and Professor Emeritus that he is, Dr. Johnson's text often reflects the language of his intellectual leanings. That allows him to place his life and his times within an analytical context similar to important works by some of his scholarly heroes, like Harlem Renaissance strategist W.E.B. Du Bois and political scientist Hanes Walton Jr.

Yet, at the same time, he is a very down-to-earth writer who engages readers with stories of his family's Gullah culture heritage, what it meant to lose his father at an early age, learning about racism for the first time, falling in love and getting his heart broken, discovering the world as a young sailor, and confronting the challenges of leadership within a demographically-evolving community.

Anti-racism Activism

The city of Savannah and the state of Georgia as Johnson experienced them while growing into maturity during the 1960s were much like America at that time as a whole. African Americans with many White Americans alongside them were calling for an end to Jim Crow apartheid and battling against the system by staging public sit-ins, conducting protest marches, and targeting racial barriers ripe for breaking.

Of his position in this history, Johnson writes, "My life has been full of being in places where I shocked non-blacks with my presence" (p. 88). One such place was on the campus of Armstrong State College (now Atlantic University) where in 1963 he famously became the first African American to enroll in the school. Another was the campus of the University of Georgia, Athens, where he was the first Black from Savannah to attend that institution. At UGA, he walked out of one class after a white professor discussing the U.S. Supreme Court's landmark Brown vs. Board of Education decision proclaimed the only reason African-Americans wanted to integrate schools in Georgia was to marry white women.

Most of the kind of anti-racism activism Johnson chronicles is to be expected given the time-frame. In his chronicling, however, he provides important snapshots of black leaders in Savannah, like Wesley Wallace "W.W." Law and Hosea Williams, in political action. But his reportage goes beyond the dynamics of blackness clashing with whiteness.

Through his account of how segregation laws prevented Whites from attending the historically black Savannah State College, founded some 45 years prior to the establishment of Armstrong (as a junior college) in 1935, he demonstrates how racism has caused grievous injury on both sides of the color line. It has also been extremely absurd when considering that in order for him to become the first African-American to integrate Armstrong in 1963 for sake of racial progress in the name of democracy, he had to switch from Savannah State's senior college program curriculum to Armstrong's junior college curriculum.

Navigating Major Changes

Early in From 'N Word' to Mr. Mayor (2016, Donning Company Publishers) Johnson discusses three types of black leadership attributed to sociologist Daniel C. Thompson (author of Sociology of the Black Experience) and with which many readers of African-American literature are familiar: "...the Uncle Tom...racial diplomat...and race advocate" (p. 48). He places himself closer to the third category but more as a "human rights advocate" who believes the following: "'We are all God's children,' but I live in an institutional and structural racist society. 'Self-preservation is the first law of nature'" (p. 49).

By the time Dr. Johnson took office in 2004 as the sixty-fourth mayor of Savannah, and its second consecutive black mayor (after the late Floyd Adams), the city was well on its way to navigating major changes in its multicultural and economic make-up. His determination to meet that challenge at every level resulted in 2006 in a major heart attack experienced while attending the National Conference of Black Mayors in Memphis, Tennessee. Consequently, he writes, "How I approached the job of being mayor during the period before and the period after my heart attack were two very different periods" (p. 291).

As it pertained to his labors as mayor, Johnson's professed sense of racial "self-preservation" took a back seat to his role as a servant leader committed to advocating "for improving conditions that impact people of all races and classes" (p. 261). In the wake of the Great Recession that would create chaos in American cities during his second term, he worked with city council members to help Savannah avoid the kind of disastrous lay-offs and cancellation of services which occurred in cities like Atlanta and Camden. As he points out:

"In 2011, we were still in the greatest economic downturn since the Great Depression. We had to find a way to continue providing all of the services to citizens with about $8 million less than we had in 2010...while the 2011 budget was extremely difficult, it was balanced with minimal impact to our citizens and without an increase in property taxes. That was due to strong leadership, clear priorities, and tough resolve by this council, which chose not to spend wildly when times were good" (p. 325).

Candidates lining up for the 2020 presidential race in America could take a few helpful lessons from this former mayor's playbook. One might be committing to running a campaign based on proven abilities and a strategic comprehensive vision rather than one based on negative personal attacks. In fact, though he won his first election to mayor before former U.S. President Barack H. Obama won his first election to the White House, their campaign styles bore striking similarities. (The president and mayor met when Mr. Obama visited Savannah in 2010.)

Conclusion

At times, From 'N Word' to Mr. Mayor reads a bit too much like a college paper, or lecture, as Johnson parenthetically informs readers where he will continue the thread of a particular subject or on which page he has already discussed it. This is easy enough to overlook, and even smile about, when remembering these pages are coming to us from a master scholar at whose literary feet we are fortunate indeed to sit and learn as much as possible.

Aberjhani
Author of Dreams of the Immortal City Savannah

0 Comments

Text and Meaning in Dick Gregory’s ‘Nigger’ part 2: Unyielding Commitment

10/12/2017

0 Comments

Dick and Lillian Gregory giving a press conference in Chicago in 1967. (AP photograph by Charles Knoblock courtesy of Ebony Magazine)

To read part 1 of this article please CLICK HERE. Part 2 begins now:

One measure of Dick Gregory’s commitment to eradicating the blight of racial injustice from America’s potential democratic paradise was a marked willingness to risk nearly everything he valued in pursuit of it. Prospective employers and audiences alike could easily turn their backs on a comedian specializing in his brand of in-your-face political satire, not to mention “blackball” someone increasingly identified with freedom marchers.

In fact, the political component expressed in the pages of Nigger was not something in which publisher E.P Dutton, according to Gregory, was interested at all. As explained in conversation with the late Dr. Marable Manning (1950-2011, author of the biography Malcolm X, A Life of Reinvention) just before receiving the Hung Tao Choy Mei Leadership Institute's 2006 Paul Robeson "Here I Stand" award, the publisher expected the comic to deliver a manuscript showcasing his ethnic “wit and wisdom” with minimal focus on the racial realities of the time. What they wanted, essentially, was a joke book which left no room for expansions of consciousness.

However, having already received an advance of $200,000 for the proposed work, Gregory opted to partner with white author Robert Lipsyte to produce a book which could simultaneously: 1) help raise people’s awareness about the effects of racial disparity in the United States; 2) share humor based on the human condition as he lived it; and 3) inspire participation in the Civil Rights Movement. This unexpected gamble at first stunned both the publisher and the public but ultimately yielded across-the-board rewards for all stakeholders involved.

Partners in the Struggle

Further evidence of the humanitarian’s unyielding commitment came early on when he insisted on sharing his battle for civil and human rights with his beloved wife, Lillian. Living with that decision proved difficult more than once. As her husband, for example, struggled to observe principles of nonviolent conflict resolution while policemen in the South spat in his face and white supremacists tossed a grenade into a church where he gathered with other activists, Lillian found herself alone when their infant son, Richard Jr., died.

Sometime later, she took Gregory’s place on the front lines of a protest in Selma, Alabama. There, she was arrested and spent a week in jail while pregnant with twins.

Over the years, as their family continued to grow and racial oppression remained a deadly reality, the activist-entertainer made it clear to his children that their personal time and enjoyments as a family would have to come second to the demands of “the movement.” It was the same kind of bitter, but possibly unavoidable, pill of historical destiny which the children of other iconic leaders (again, consider King and Malcolm X) had to swallow.

Prophetic Inclinations

People who laughed at Gregory’s famously racially-tinged monologues, as well as protesters who marched alongside him at various rallies around the country (through the South, yes, but also in Chicago, Washington, DC, and elsewhere) recognized within his personality characteristics associated with prophets.

That specific aspect of his demeanor is particularly noticeable in chapter seven of Nigger . The section contains a transcript of his response to a startling discovery. Preparing to address activists gathered in a church in Selma to coordinate the registration of Black voters, Gregory observed that the front row of the church had been “filled that night with policemen pretending to be newspaper reporters and taking notes” (p. 200). Rather than becoming dismayed or frightened, he used this development to address the infiltrators directly:

“…What do you think would happen to Christ tonight if He arrived in this town a black man and wanted to register to vote on Monday? What do you think would happen? Would you be there? You would? Then how come you’re not out there with these kids, because He said that whatever happens to the least, happens to us all… Let’s analyze the situation…” (p. 202).

Dick Gregory with the late John Lennon and Yoko Ono. (photograph from Yoko Ono as shared via Twitter in honor of Gregory after his passing)

In his determination to help America become as great as he believed it was/is meant to become, Gregory touched so many people’s lives at different stages of his own that his voice and influence––like those of athlete Muhammad Ali (1942-2016), author James Baldwin (1924-1987) and Civil Rights icon Rosa Parks (1913-2005) are likely to increase rather than decrease as the 21st century unfolds. In addition, he often pointed out that he was only one of movement’s numerous foot-soldiers and, in truth many, like Congressman John Lewis and educator Angela Davis, are still standing strong and lend validity to Gregory’s contention as directed to the spirit of his mother:

Getting Stronger

“Those of us who weren’t destroyed got stronger, got calluses on our souls. And now we’re ready to change a system, a system where a white man can destroy a black man with a single word. Nigger… When we’re through, Momma, there won’t be any niggers any more” (p. 209).

Although it appeared America had reached a kind of final goal when former POTUS Barack Obama occupied the White House for eight years, Gregory knew we had not. He nevertheless retained faith in the American people’s ability to one day achieve such a goal.Sitting on the sidelines and dreaming or complaining about it could never be enough to make it happen. An accomplishment of that magnitude would require––as demonstrated by his own amazing life example––an unwavering dedication combined with a willingness to make sometimes painful sacrifices, and, a sustained belief that ultimately the benefits of the long hard struggle will come to outweigh all untold anguish endured.

About Aberjhani

On any given day of the week, the creator of Postered Chromatic Poetics and co-author of Encyclopedia of the Harlem Renaissance, Aberjhani, may be found wearing any number of hats descriptive of multiple pursuits: historian, visual artist, poet, advocate for compassion, novelist, journalist, photographer, and editor. Having recently completed a book of creative nonfiction on his hometown of Savannah, Georgia (USA) he is currently working on a play about the implications of generational legacies as symbolized by efforts to rename the Eugene Talmadge Memorial Bridge.

0 Comments

Literary & Cultural arts Persuasions:
Reviews & Remembrances by Aberjhani

African Americans Far from Home (part 2): Intimacy, Ethics, and Take-Aways

Loneliness and Rules of Engagement

Black Community in an Asian World

5 Teachable Take-Aways

Contact Author-Artist Aberjhani at Bright Skylark Literary Productions

Reading Rumi after 9/11 and again at the end of the War in Afghanistan (part 2)

The Beginning of an Extraordinary Life

A Sacred Friendship

A Nation of Lovers

In Conclusion

Aberjhani
©814th Anniversary of the Birth of Jalal al-Din Mohammad Balkhi/Rumi

Author of The River of Winged Dreams
and Greeting Flannery O'Connor at the Back Door of My Mind

Contact the Author at Bright Skylark Literary Productions

Chinese Author Jisheng's TOMBSTONE a Grim Reminder of Dangers of Authoritarian Leadership

Magnitude of the Horror

Double Objectives

The Record of This Particular Memory

Contact the Author

American Dream Meets Black Reality in Johnson's 'From “N Word” to Mr. Mayor'

A Timeline of Powerful History

Anti-racism Activism

Navigating Major Changes

Conclusion

Text and Meaning in Dick Gregory’s ‘Nigger’ part 2: Unyielding Commitment

Partners in the Struggle

Prophetic Inclinations

Getting Stronger

About Aberjhani

Contact Author

Archives

Categories

Literary & Cultural arts Persuasions: Reviews & Remembrances by Aberjhani

African Americans Far from Home (part 2): Intimacy, Ethics, and Take-Aways

​Loneliness and Rules of Engagement

Black Community in an Asian World

5 Teachable Take-Aways

Contact Author-Artist Aberjhani at Bright Skylark Literary Productions

Reading Rumi after 9/11 and again at the end of the War in Afghanistan (part 2)

​The Beginning of an Extraordinary Life

A Sacred Friendship

​A Nation of Lovers

​In Conclusion

Aberjhani©814th Anniversary of the Birth of Jalal al-Din Mohammad Balkhi/Rumi​Author of The River of Winged Dreamsand Greeting Flannery O'Connor at the Back Door of My Mind

Contact the Author at Bright Skylark Literary Productions

Chinese Author Jisheng's TOMBSTONE a Grim Reminder of Dangers of Authoritarian Leadership

Magnitude of the Horror

​Double Objectives

​The Record of This Particular Memory

Contact the Author

American Dream Meets Black Reality in Johnson's 'From “N Word” to Mr. Mayor'

​A Timeline of Powerful History

​Anti-racism Activism

Navigating Major Changes

Conclusion

Text and Meaning in Dick Gregory’s ‘Nigger’ part 2: Unyielding Commitment

Partners in the Struggle

​Prophetic Inclinations

​Getting Stronger

About Aberjhani

Contact Author

Archives

Categories

Literary & Cultural arts Persuasions:
Reviews & Remembrances by Aberjhani

Loneliness and Rules of Engagement

The Beginning of an Extraordinary Life

A Nation of Lovers

In Conclusion

Aberjhani
©814th Anniversary of the Birth of Jalal al-Din Mohammad Balkhi/Rumi

Author of The River of Winged Dreams
and Greeting Flannery O'Connor at the Back Door of My Mind

Double Objectives

The Record of This Particular Memory

A Timeline of Powerful History

Anti-racism Activism

Prophetic Inclinations

Getting Stronger