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 A Letter to My Children October 14, 2008
This book in many ways took on the flow and the cadence of a letter for his daughters Maggie and Liza. It is in the preface that he writes of the fears that his childhood home would cease to exist, that this place, the village of Piedmont, West Virginia snuggled in the Allegheny mountains across the way from what was referred to as the Tri-Towns, three cities not more than a mile or so apart, Luke, Maryland; and Westernport, Maryland. This was the place in which the stories that he has related in this book, originate. In time as this village, this town, whose people saw, taught and mentored him, a time and place that molded and shaped him, that groomed and grew him, would cease to exist , that it would be vaporized by time and space, by growing on and growing old, by an industry that saw and rode through the changes and served as the life blood, the life force of the town, the fears and concern that his town could become a ghost town, a place to be from, and in many respects it is not there anymore, except in the memories of the inhabitants present and former, it rests in the memory of what once was. Because the industry in which was the centre of activity for the town had decided that it would be better off else where. Piedmont still stands, it remains in place, and however it has become a smaller village still, suffering mergers and consolidation of the school system.
As each book is a journey, and as a result you come away from each page a changed person and when the journey is complete, you are different, you are changed.
In all there was much in this book, a very short one I might add, was quite enjoyable and refreshing to read. In some ways this book is no linear, meaning it did not start exactly when the writer was born, it started somewhere a little after the fact and jumped around through his life as if going through a series of flash backs, he gently describes the change of life for a very small town and its inhabitants adeptly, the relationship he has with several of his friends is special, I especially enjoyed how he relates his growing apart from a girl that he went to school with, how they were in a manner of speaking friendly rivals, how similar that they were and still very different, and how they got on famously until she was taught that she should not have that kind of relationship with a black male. This was a story that reflected what many of us take for granted, however when the author does relate how he started in an integrated school, how his father came to finally purchase a house with the assistance of him and his older brother, how he was not really any good at sports, but he later adapted and found something that was equally important to the sports world in order to be closer to his father and older brother. There was a little bit of talk about Marcus Garvey, the record store that they would frequent. There were many, many other instances in which Louis Gates became he, the person that he has become today, from the range of reading material, the suggestion that he change the difficulty level in what he was reading and it changed him as a person. To his religious upbringing, if you think about it, almost all people of African descent attended church, at least while they were young, it's in our DNA. I would highly recommend this book to everyone
A Book to Learn and Remember By May 7, 2007
Colored People is a wonderful book. It has humor, sadness and illuminates a specific period of time. I liked how his family and town shaped his values and made him what he is today. We are using this book as a Common Reading and also a One Book, One Community Program with the small university town of Shepherdstown. The author is coming and will meet the students who will have all read the book. The topic of race and the civil rights movement are highlighted and will be the topic of many discussions. I highly recommend the book. You will enjoy reading it and if you learn from it, so much the better.
 He's done it again January 10, 2007
An informative, interesting look into the attitudes, situations, and resoucefulness of "Colored People". Henry Louis Gates Jr. is a gifted and sensitive leader of thought and expression of our day.
Courageously Honest Memoir May 16, 2006
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
I place Colored People alongside Angela's Ashes as one of the best works of memoir in recent years. He doesn't moralize; he just tells the honest story. This is a story that, to my knowledge, has not been told elsewhere. It is a story about the freedom and comfort and the pain of a segregated commuinty, and the heartbreak that came with leaving some of that world behind. Most things are deeper and more complex than we like to think they are. Colored People brings that concept forward in a way that no other book has. The people whose expressed frustration with not being able to keep the characters straight are missing the point - this isn't a murder mystery and it doesn't make any difference. Buy it. Read it. Share it. I only wish I'd done so when it first came out.
Piedmont childhood December 21, 2005
1 out of 2 found this review helpful
Gates fears that Piedmont, West Virginia will cease to exist. His father felt and instructed him that people of the same race should not cling to each other through habit or fear. The author rebels at the notion that he can't be part of other groups, too. Piedmont is in Mineral county. Piedmont as a whole seems to be graying. The town's identity was bound up by the existence of the Westvaco paper mill. Almost all the colored people in Piedmont worked at the paper mill. Until the 1970's the houses were rented from white landowners.
The civil rights era came late to Piedmont. The family watched Dr. King on the news. The author's father was jaundiced about the civil rights movement. His mother was courageous. She sent four brothers to college and was recognized on "The Big Pay-Off". Through his mother, Gates was part of the Coleman clan, a big deal in Piedmont. The Gateses lived in Cumberland. Brown v. Board of Education marked the author and his peers for life. Integration brought interesting cultural clashes.
Gates was marked out to excel from first grade. Gateses had been attending Howard for three generations and Harvard for two. The family, in the beginning, went to the Walden Methodist Church. Gates was afraid of the power of the Holiness Church and he avoided it. His mother became depressed with the change of life when the author was twelve and she was forty six. The mother became a pack rat after a childhood of scarcity. Gates began to cook dinner for the family and he joined the church in his anxiety. A childhood friend urged him to read Dickens and he became a fervid reader. He attended an Episcopal church camp in West Virginia, Peterkin, in 1965. He thought it was like stepping into a dream world. He read NOTES OF A NATIVE SON. For some of the older people in Piedmont integration was experienced as a loss. Gates went to Potomac State for one year and applied for a transfer. He was admitted to Yale.
This is a lovely portrait of a community and a people.
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