Description
Book SynopsisA brilliant scholar imparts the lessons bequeathed by the Black community and its remarkable artists and thinkers
Trade Review"
Read Until You Understand is brought to life through Griffin’s account of the ways in which Black culture was an integral part of her being, not just an adornment... Griffin is driven by a belief that the cultivation of aesthetic appreciation – in which the beautiful and the political do not compete – is where real change can be found. It is a book that acknowledges life’s conflicts while still valuing hope and beauty." -- Douglas Field - The Times Literary Supplement
"Now a noted scholar of African American literature, Griffin shares, in a blend of memoir and criticism, the fruits of her lifelong journey to fulfill that aspiration [to read until you understand]… She also richly evokes her childhood in Philadelphia, long a hub for Black activism where she belonged…to a family whose women, skilled seamstresses and gardeners, cultivated beauty." -- New Yorker
"Quietly captivating…This is a life lived among books, and reinterpreted through them." -- Carlols Lozada - Washington Post
"[Griffin] is both masterful critic and master teacher." -- Walton Muyumba - Boston Globe
"A book like
Read Until You Understand takes courage to produce… Griffin’s evangelizing of Black literature does what the best sermons do: It sends you back to Scripture—Baldwin, Coates, Morrison, David Walker and others—to discover or rediscover them, to ponder and treasure them anew." -- Monica Drake - The New York Times Book Review
