i checked out jacqueline woodson's
brown girl dreaming after i read that it won the national book award for young people's literature. i remember seeing articles about someone making an offensive joke at the awards ceremony but regardless was still excited for
it's win and couldn't wait to read it.
this book was truly amazing. it is a collection of poems which made me weary, because i am not good with poetry. however, it was free verse and read more like prose then poetry. as a whole, the poems are a memoir, sharing woodson's life growing up in both the north and south during the civil rights era. the poems also share woodson's childhood dream of becomig a writer.
i initially considered getting this book as a gift for my friend tiffany but figured i should read a book first before i gift it. i really wish i had just given it to her. the beginning of the book reminded me of her parents. her father grew up in the south and her mother in california and just like jacqueline's parents, their experiences with discrimation and racism in america differed. papa gibson is always telling us stories about how it was in the south and mama gibson shares how she never experienced any of that. woodson's father's family in the north lived in a very different america then her mother's family in the south. it was inspiring to see how woodson's family from the north had a long string of professionals in their family which fueled a desire for success for the younger generations. yet at the same time it was frustrating to see her mother's family still suffering from discrimination due to jim crow laws.
brown girl dreaming is more then just a memoir because through her poems woodson tells a part of america's history that normally goes untold or unstudied. her poems covered the meetings held by marchers, the training necessary for lunch counter sit-ins, the rise of the black panther movement, choosing to wear one's hair natural, there was even a poem about angela davis. woodson gave voice to the black experience in america.
her poems also shared woodson's personal history, her time as a baby in ohio, then in the south when her parents divorce and finally in new york. due to this i connected to the poems personally. since woodson was raised by her grandparents in the south, i related to the poems about them. some of her poems reminded me of my grandma bea and grandpa jimmy. "the blanket" woodson shared how when her mom first left for new york, they were not sad because:
. . . the weight
of our grandparents' love like a blanket
with us beneath it
safe and warm.
though my mother was a single mom, i never felt at a disadvantage because my grandparents' love was greater than i would have had from my father.
"two gods, two worlds" reminded me of my grandpa jimmy. he was a muslim and i was raised mormon. as i have shared before, i didn't understand why we would be separated in heaven simply because of our faiths shouldn't our love for each other be more important? in this poem, woodson who is jehovah wondered what will happen to her grandfather based in lessons she learned about armageddon. the poem ended with
but i want the world where my daddy is
and don't know why
anybody's God would make me
have to choose.
"bubble-gum cigarettes"
this is exactly how i felt when i realized that my grandfather and i could never be sealed together as the lds church believes is the way for families to stay together in heaven. i couldn't believe god could be so heartless in dividing up families when we have no choice in who we are sent to and then develop love for each other only to be split up in heaven based on faith.
and since jill was technically my grandpa's favorite all of the poems woodson shared about her grandpa reminded me of my sister and my grandpa.
the other poems i enjoyed were:
"south carolina at war" in which her grandfather explained to woodson and her siblings why the protesting was going on in the south. it closes with
Because you're colored, my grandfather says.
And just as good and bright and beautiful and free as anybody.
and nobody colored in the South is stopping,
my grandfather says,
until everybody knows what's true.
"ghosts" which shared how "whites only" signs were painted over in greenvills except for the bathrooms when a lot of paint wasn't used so the words were "like a ghost standing in front still keeping you out."
"lessons" about how woodson's mom never learned to cook because instead of learning, she wanted to play outside like the boys. mama realized it wasn't fair that the boys played while the girls were inside, a step forward for feminism though a step back for mom (because know she doesn't know how to cook.)
"stevie and me" in which at the library, woodson discovered stevie which featured characters that looked like her. she shared:
I'd never believed
that someone who looked like me
could be in the pages of the book
that someone who looked like me
had a story.
"learning from langston" in which woodson demonstrated how she mimicked hughes' poems to learn how to write.
"music" which shared how woodson's mom didn't let them listen to songs that had the word funk, so they listened to white radio stations.
how too listen #8
do you remember . . .?
someone's always asking
and someone else, always does.
"the revolution" which likens the revolution to a merry-go-round.
"every wish, one dream" in which woodson wishes on everything to be a writer. (which we all know comes true!)
reading this book was a wonderful experience and i learned so much from it, i can only imagine what young adults will gain. i highly recommend this book and hope you enjoy it as i much as i did.
