"With elegant simplicity and uncommon wisdom, Clarence Major gives us not just the truth of his mother's life but the unspoken truth behind the lie of color in the American story. A compelling narrative."
-- Rilla Askew, author, Fire in Beulah
"A brilliant rendering of a rich and eventful life. With creative insight, love, and admiration, Major shows us how in family life down through the generations, race really matters."
-- Andrew Billingsley, author, Climbing Jacob's Ladder:
The Enduring Legacy of African American Families
Critical acclaim for Clarence Major
"Clarence Major has a remarkable mind and the talent to match."
-- Toni Morrison, Nobel Laureate
"One of America's most gifted and versatile writers."
-- Library Journal
CLARENCE MAJOR is an established voice in American letters: a 1999 National Book Award Finalist and acclaimed author of twelve books of poetry, eight novels, and several nonfiction works. Major, who has been the recipient of numerous awards and fellowships, is currently a professor of modern American literature and creative writing at the University of California at Davis.
Using his poet's eye for detail and his novelist's ear for speech, Major (who was shortlisted for a 1999 National Book Award for configurations) mutes his voice to create his mother's memoir. With authentic plainness, Inez - who is "light, not white"- relates her journey to self-fulfillment through a world of demented racial complexity. "In a country where a white woman could give birth to a black child but a black woman could not give birth to a white child," Inez lives a "secret life as a white woman." Issues of race (as she deals with the employment opportunities available to her only as a white woman) and issues of gender (as Inez deals with an abusive husband) occupy, by virtue of their social significance, the core of this skillfully written book. The rich details of growing up (school, games, friends, church) and of family life (courting, marriage, babies, dying) give Majors book particular vitality. Captured through the vision of one woman, "interchangeably black or white" in a time and place where she "could not be both," Inez's memoir moves from plantation to segregation to migration. As one generation's smallpox becomes another's measles, as Aunt Saffrey's "fancy horse-drawn buggy" is outmoded by "Pa's new Chevrolet;' as Inez moves from tiny Dublinville to the big city of Atlanta, a whole history of African-American life unfolds. Women readers will find Inez's resilience and perseverance inspirational. (May) Forecast: In academia, the study of" passing" (looking white without being white) is a longstanding favorite. Specialists and students in cultural studies and women's studies will want this book. ( Publishers Weekly, May 6, 2002)
