#410 My Man Bovanne- Toni Cade Bambara
This is from Bambara’s collection, Gorilla, My Love,
originally printed in 1960. A woman, a single mother dances with a blind man,
she enjoys herself. She is a city girl, through and through.
“And I ain’t never been souther than Brooklyn-Battery and no
more country than the window box on my fire escape.”
All around her the community is changing, the “grass roots”
and “black power” is growing, and suddenly thongs she is wearing and thongs she
has been doing for years is being criticized. Her own sons are calling her
horrible names for dancing with the blind man. Maybe she enjoyed the dance,
because he was the only one in her life that wasn’t judging her superficially.
In the introduction to this collection, Bambara says she
doesn’t write autobiographical fiction because she doesn’t want the hassle of
friends and family getting upset at what she writes about.
“So I deal in straight up fiction myself, cause I value my
family and friends, and mostly cause I lie a lot anyway.”
That’s a great quote!
No comments:
Post a Comment