I've had this review/ interview sitting around forever...
I haven't read any Walter Mosley, but I saw some of Always Outnumbered on cable a long time back and mean to rent it soon... his new book is a stand-alone, outside of his normal mystery genre. The Man in My Basement is about race in the US, but in his Publishers Weekly interview Mosley says, "There's no question that it's a political novel, but it's a story first."
The story concerns Charles Blakey, a black American man whose family was never enslaved but rather has lived well in New England for centuries. One day, a wealthy white man named Anniston Bennet asks him for a favor-- he first rents Blakey's basement out, but later adds that he wants to be locked in as some sort of punishment. As the book goes on, the book reveals both what Bennet's life has been and how Blakey feels that his own life is in need of moral direction.
Some of the PW interview:
Mosley - "I gave a talk the other day in Chicago, and one of the things that I said was that every person in the room has on their body some piece of clothing that was sweated over by a slave, or at least by somebody in a sweatshop... that we're a society not only of victims but of victimizers. There's no getting away from that. The idea isn't even to wear clothes that no slave sweated over; it's to realize that it's an unavoidable reality in our economy. So when you start making decisions about the war on terrorism and the war in Iraq, and this and that, understand that you yourself are deeply involved in this worldwide economy, just like Anniston Bennet.
Jeff Zaleski - "So what does one do?"
Mosley - "A good question, 'What does one do?'... I think it's nearly always- and believe me, I ask it often enough so it's not a criticism- an attempt to abrogate responsibility. The truth is, you have to live with it. The truth is yes, my shoes were made by slaves. All right. What can I do about that? Well, really and immediately, nothing. In the long run, maybe a little something, which is what Charles Blakey does."
I'm obviously shorting the review and interview drastically; but I hope this lil taste intrigues some as much as it does myself.
I haven't read any Walter Mosley, but I saw some of Always Outnumbered on cable a long time back and mean to rent it soon... his new book is a stand-alone, outside of his normal mystery genre. The Man in My Basement is about race in the US, but in his Publishers Weekly interview Mosley says, "There's no question that it's a political novel, but it's a story first."
The story concerns Charles Blakey, a black American man whose family was never enslaved but rather has lived well in New England for centuries. One day, a wealthy white man named Anniston Bennet asks him for a favor-- he first rents Blakey's basement out, but later adds that he wants to be locked in as some sort of punishment. As the book goes on, the book reveals both what Bennet's life has been and how Blakey feels that his own life is in need of moral direction.
Some of the PW interview:
Mosley - "I gave a talk the other day in Chicago, and one of the things that I said was that every person in the room has on their body some piece of clothing that was sweated over by a slave, or at least by somebody in a sweatshop... that we're a society not only of victims but of victimizers. There's no getting away from that. The idea isn't even to wear clothes that no slave sweated over; it's to realize that it's an unavoidable reality in our economy. So when you start making decisions about the war on terrorism and the war in Iraq, and this and that, understand that you yourself are deeply involved in this worldwide economy, just like Anniston Bennet.
Jeff Zaleski - "So what does one do?"
Mosley - "A good question, 'What does one do?'... I think it's nearly always- and believe me, I ask it often enough so it's not a criticism- an attempt to abrogate responsibility. The truth is, you have to live with it. The truth is yes, my shoes were made by slaves. All right. What can I do about that? Well, really and immediately, nothing. In the long run, maybe a little something, which is what Charles Blakey does."
I'm obviously shorting the review and interview drastically; but I hope this lil taste intrigues some as much as it does myself.
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CNN......Cheech News Network. Only if there was a god, righto?