#678 The Banks of the Vistula- Rebecca Lee

#678 The Banks of the Vistula- Rebecca Lee

How far would you take a lie to protect yourself from a mistake? Margaret is only a few weeks into her college career and she has gotten herself into a jam. She loves her classes, especially her linguistics class. While researching her first paper, she came across an essay written fifty years ago in the frosty beginnings of the cold war. The paper was stunning, bold, and intoxicating to a young mind. She cribbed the essay and handed it in as her own.

She knew she wouldn’t be able to write anything better, and since the book was out of print, and hadn’t been checked out for decades, the risk of being caught was slim. What she didn’t anticipate was that the subject of the matter went far beyond the beauty she perceived. A young student might see value without understanding the political delicacies that can exist in linguistic analysis. Straight out, the paper was fascist propaganda. 

What follows is a brilliant story about language, oppression, and cold war politics. It’s all wrapped up in a very real stage of campus debate, full of stubborn arrogance and youthful naivte. How much should we be punished for the ideas we espouse in our youth? What about the decisions we make while our lives (or reputations) are at risk?

The symbolism here is strong and powerful, and not very subtle. This passage of Margaret burning the book that would act as evidence against her I found particularly striking:

Notable Passage: “As the flame approached my hand, I arched the book into the murky water. It looked spectacular, a high wing of flame rising from it. Inside, in one of its luminous chapters, I had read that the ability to use language and the ability to tame fire arose from the same warm, shimmering pool of genes, since in nature they did not appear one without the other.”

Rating: 9-9-10-9 Total= 37

#663 It’s Life and Death at the Slush Puppie Open- Toure

#663 It’s Life and Death at the Slush Puppie Open- Toure

This is a political science lesson played out on the tennis court. Two teenagers who attend the same junior tennis academy in Harlem are playing each other at the Slush Puppie Open tennis tournament. The favorite is Kwame Christmas:

“Kwame had been abandoned by his dad, and for him, tennis was about roaring back at the world. It allowed him to exercise the anger inside him through using his arm like a bullwhip, swinging hard and free.”

The director of the academy liked Kwame because he played like Malcolm X would have played:

“Attack the weak…We’re not here to have points given, we’re here to take them! To attack those whiteboys with a fury! You must play this game the way Malcolm would’ve played it! He would’ve hit the ball hard because he was all about acquiring power for the black community! He would’ve always held serve because holding serve is like controlling your community.”

Kwame was entangled in a heated contest with a lesser player from the academy, Paul Flambe. The director did not like Paul’s game, and considered it akin to Booker T. Washington:

“Paul talked proper. He used big words and pronounced everything crisply…[he] could sit on the baseline for hours and retrieve  almost any ball…he never felt the need to crush his opponents, never wanted to attack the net, never wanted to end points suddenly.”

This practice of wearing his opponents down aggravated the director, calling it “Uncle Tom Tennis.” But this day it won, he beat the top ranked Kwame. And that was sin enough to get all the other boys at the academy to see him as an enemy. They attacked him for beating their Malcolm X:

“Paul struggled the whole time. Especially when we slipped the noose over his neck. We held him up the way people hold people in victory. Then we dropped him.”

Toure is not subtle nor does he parse his symbolism. But the stories are so well done and packed in a clever delivery system that somehow makes the lesson entertaining. However the lessons are harsh and grave and need to be discussed. Why do we treat those political opinions slightly different than ours to larger penalties than those diametrically opposed? Those who agree with the teachings of Malcolm X should not be the enemy with those who agree with the teachings of Booker T. Washington. Not at all!

Rating: 8-9-9-8 Total= 34

#313 The Marchers- Henry Dumas

#313 The Marchers- Henry Dumas

As always, Dumas delivers a powerful piece, this one a parable about power, protest, and freedom. As marchers gather, and speakers speak, a prisoner is roused from servitude, and darkness and despair.

“In the dome the silence was stirred by the sound of legions of feet marching. The rumble sifted through the years. The prisoner heard…and waited.”

“Outside, the cheers grew louder. The dome trembled. Specks of dust leaped up from centuries of rest and wandered like souls in limbo. Suddenly a passion seized the prisoner.”

“From the ground he came up slowly, as if he were a lost seed in a sunless cave, a seed that had sprouted into a pale limp stalk trying to suck a bit of precious sunlight into its impoverished leaves.”

“Today was a great day. Freedom had come to them…at least for a while…the marching of their feet was the song of their freedom.”

But the story comes with a warning, that all freedom doesn’t last as long as its only in a march. Shackles aren’t actually broken and centuries of oppression aren’t wiped away because of one day of exuberance. As hope fades, the prisoner falls back into darkness.

Rating: 9-9-10-8 Total= 36