Reviews

**Update (4/6/16)** Tonight I had the privilege to attend a reading and discussion with Claudia Rankine here in Holland. It was a real treat. Especially powerful was seeing the visual elements of her book brought to life on the screen, with the video (made by her husband John Lucas), the music all mingling with her words to create an intensely powerful and emotive display. Rankine is a pure joy to hear read and speak, full of wit and humor and a reminder to us all that we all have the responsibility to constantly 'continue the conversation about our society.' She says that it isn't people that anger her, because it is important to remember that we all - even those who offend us - are people, but the failed judicial systems, white privilege, and all the social constructs that build a closed door to individuals based on race are what fuels her poetry. I particularly enjoyed her story about how she became a writer. She was working for a legal degree when she came across the poetry of Adrienne Rich. She says its a moment that can only happen around the age of 21, but when she read Rich she thought 'this is good, but I can do it better.' She loved what Rich had to say, but wanted to tweak the text to speak to her conditions, her story, her struggle. After abandoning the legal field (her first job was for a firm that defended two men for insider trading) she went on to a masters in creative writing and now has delivered an extraordinarily powerful book about racial politics and micro-aggression. Rankine is a national treasure and I feel so lucky to have seen her speak.

Lately it seems every time I turn on the news I come across a story that reminds me of this collection. The further I get from it, the more it grows within me. Rankine argues with teeth for a world where we can look bigotry in the face and pulverize it. A world where cops don't shoot unarmed citizens, regardless of race or creed. A world into which we can be proud to have birthed new lives. Citizen: An American Lyric is fiercely important to us all, not limiting to race, gender, nationality, etc, et al. I hope Rankines message is taken to heart.

‘The past is a life sentence, a blunt instrument aimed at tomorrow.’

It is sad and utterly pathetic that racism still runs rampant in the modern world. Even here in America, despite the Civil Rights movement of the 60’s, vulgar displays of racism occur in everyday life. These displays of ignorance don’t always come in bold, headlines-making instances but in fleeting, casual moments where one hardly recognizes they’ve revealed their prejudice hand though the hurtful blow is cast all the same. Claudia Rankine’s Citizen: An American Lyric does more than just explore the existence of a black American in the modern world, it blasts the whole situation wide open with explosive power and frustration that echoes loudly across the valley of the heart in a choir of all those muted voices long held in silence. Though Rankine has a particular focus, the effect should be taken to heart as universal, and that we should not judge based on the color of skin, or gender, or sexuality in any country. From casual encounters to the Trayvon Martin murder or the hurricane Katrina news coverage, Rankine creates a wonderful multi-media artistic expression that straps the reader into the awkward situations where words get ‘stuck in the throat’, and though the purpose outshines the prose, the reader is left gasping for breath in a world much larger than themselves that is in desperate need for an awakening and change.

‘Do you feel hurt because it’s the ‘all black people look the same’ moment, or because you are being confused with another after being so close to this other?’

Rankine never falters in her mission to position the reader in the uncomfortable moments of being assessed not for your abilities, personality, qualities or deficiencies, but simply for the color of your skin. While there are passages of extreme power that focus on national news style racism, much of her book deals with situations between friends or everyday life with store clerks and other service providers.

At the end of a brief phone conversation, you tell the manager you are speaking with that you will come by his office to sign the form. When you arrive and announce yourself, he blurts out, I didn’t know you were black!
I didn’t mean to say that, he then says.
Aloud, you say.
What? He asks.
You didn’t mean say that aloud.
Your transaction goes swiftly after that.

Rankine uses her own experience coupled with those of her acquaintances to build a tidal wave of everyday racist encounters that are sure to horrify the reader. The discomfort of a friend trying to lightly refer to you as a ‘nappy headed hoe’ or a colleague dismayed that they are forced to hire a black person when ‘there are many great writers out there’, and the feeling of forced guilt when you must keep silent in order to keep the peace despite the flagrant insult placed before you. A particularly moving series details a young man pulled over on his way home from a client’s because his skin color matches a suspect sought by police.

And you are not the guy and still you fit the description because there is always the guy fitting the description.

This, and the line ‘you can’t drive yourself sane’ repeat like a mantra during the events of handcuffing and questioning, the repetition effectively used to harness the feeling of utter frustration spiraling to the brink of disaster if one cannot hold them in as the situation would surely create.

A metaphor frequently employed throughout Citizen is one akin to Ralph Ellison’s [b:Invisible Man|16981|Invisible Man|Ralph Ellison|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1352854247s/16981.jpg|170957], that of being unseen, such as people cutting in line at the grocery store to bumping into and knocking over a person on the subway and continuing on without taking notice. Or even worse, to be unseen as a human being and only seen as a color, as Rankine examines in the section on tennis superstar Serena Williams. Written as a prose essay, a strong departure from the style in the other segments, Rankine calls to light the difficulties faced by Williams from obviously bad calls to body parody by a fellow player, reminding us of [a:Zora Neale Hurston|15151|Zora Neale Hurston|https://d.gr-assets.com/authors/1194472605p2/15151.jpg]’s quote

I feel most colored when I am thrown against a sharp white background

Rankine places this beside an account of William’s at London’s All English Club match where a three-second celebratory dance was broadcast on news medias as ‘a crip-walk….What Serena did was akin to cracking a tasteless, X-rated joke inside a church,’ an incident that she was heavily fined for and suspended. Rankine’s exploration of the ‘black body’ against the white dominated background is made most evident by the extraordinary choice of cover art: a black hood underlined by black text against a solid white background. The image is sure to recall the Trayvon Martin murder, though the art used is actually David Hammon’s In the Hood from 1993. The saying about history repeating itself if we fail to learn from it may be echoing in the back of your head about now.

While this collection has been commonly shelved as ‘poetry,’ any distinct classification detracts from the fluid artistic nature of this book. Rankine uses a wide range of styles: prose vignettes, essay form, and free-form poetry, and couples her prose with moving photography. Several segments are intended to be read aloud against a series of photographs (a collaboration with husband John Lucas), making this collection reach beyond the boundaries of typical literature and give it a very artistic, modern feel. There are frequent allusions to youtube videos and other events easily found through a quick Google search (Rankine already reminding us of our modern condition through frequent mentions of watching screens and using social media) that transfer the power from the author and her words into the reader, as if sending them on a quest of continual learning and understanding.

You said “I” has so much power; it’s insane.

The artistic experimentation is impressive and expansive, though it does occasionally buckle under the weight of it’s own ambition. Rankine delivers many moments of shearing prose, yet I was left wanting to see that powerful wit and control of language more often. However, this may also be the point and many of the vignettes may be rendered with duller prose than—considering her obvious potential—they could have been as an expression of mundane, everyday reality. This makes the shocking realization of common racist remarks all the more powerful as they seem to occur so casually and carelessly. Rankin does not need the use of deep metaphor or sly figurative language, she just needs to harness reality and extract the power of the “I”: the voice that shouts across barriers and through the obdurate hand trying to keep it silent. Perhaps I read this too soon after Hilton Als extraordinary [b:White Girls|13239419|White Girls|Hilton Als|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1344745901s/13239419.jpg|18438575], which explores similar themes but paints with a broader palette of themes, examining race, gender, sexuality and how we affect one another all through a masterful prose that made the book feel more like poetry than essay. But then again, Rankine need not explore a wider field as she has done so well with her focus and has created a book of the utmost importance in today’s world.

Yes, and this is how you are as a citizen: Come on. Let it go. Move on.

This is a blunt blow to the heart, one that cannot be read without coming away carrying its weight deep in the soul. This is a book that everyone should read, or at least spend time thinking about. It is an important look at the world in which we live, and must continue to live, and begs us to make that world a place that accommodates all. The hurt people dish out without even realizing it is just as striking and painful to read as the sections on national, and international news stories like the unarmed Mark Dugan gunned down by Scotland Yard. While Citizen aims its potent focus at the lives of black Americans, the message can be extended to a more universal truth: that we should respect all people regardless of race, gender, sexuality, et al. We should respect people as people and not as a classification, and this extends beyond any borders. We all must coexist together, and should do so with love and goodwill. I will certainly explore more of her work after reading this, as she clearly possesses a masterful language and prose that deeply moved me despite not being the sort of poetry that I typically enjoy or pursue. Rankine poetry harnesses the gut-punch of everyday reality to power her words, a reality that is often overlooked because we fear to look at it, to accept it, to give it credence, but there it is just the same.
4/5

The world is wrong. You can’t put the past behind you. It’s buried in you, it’s turned your flesh into its own cupboard. Not everything remembered is useful but it all comes from the world to be stored in you. Who did what to whom on which day? Who said that? She said what? What did he just do? Did she really just say that? He said what? What did she do? Did I hear what I think I heard? Did that just come out of my mouth, his mouth, your mouth? Do you remember when you sighed?

emmabeckman's review against another edition

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I really thought the use of second person in many of the pieces worked well, because it put the reader INTO the piece to experience the microaggressions and outright racism. While I would highly recommend this book, there were a few parts that confused me a bit, mainly the section with the scripts. While I appreciated the scripts, was there supposed to be some visual element to accompany them? There just seemed to be something missing contextually. Otherwise, I would highly recommend this book as it is still as brutally relevant today as it was when I was written in 2014.

burningupasun's review against another edition

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4.0

It's tough to leave a review of this because I feel like it's the kind of work you need to read again and let sort of sink into your mind. But it was very powerful and beautiful and intense.

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