Book Review: Between the World and Me

I recently reread this book as part of a travel study done through the University. The theme of the course was "Slavery, Freedom, and Civil Rights," with the goal of understanding the ongoing legacies of racial conflicts. I attempted to synthesize some of my thoughts on Coates' work in an academic review of the book:

Book Review: Coates, Ta-Nehisi. Between the World and Me. New York: Spiegel & Grau, 2015.

In his timely work Between the World and Me, national correspondent for The Atlantic Ta-Nehisi Coates examines a black man’s place in a modern world plagued by a legacy of racial oppression. In light of recent high profile events and modern racial tensions, Coates perfectly captures the struggles faced by African Americans in today’s America. Framing the work as a letter to his son, Coates’ prose has a poetic imperfection that lends to the creation of an aching poignancy. The father’s love for his son lives on the page. The fear he feels for his child’s life, the pain he feels at the loss of so many other children, gives the work an intensely personal appeal. Between the World and Me is a deeply insightful examination of how the legacies of slavery and Jim Crow have resulted in a continued economic, social, and intellectual segregation in modern America. In the book, Coates illustrates with painful clarity the insidious dangers faced by black men and women in the Untied States now more than ever.

One part autobiography and one part a defiant reckoning, Between the World and Me is Coates’ attempt to convey to his son a haunting legacy of violence intrinsically tied to their very identity. Taking inspiration from the works of Richard Wright, James Baldwin, and other African American writers, Coates seeks to succinctly synthesize four hundred years of oppression while capturing a specific modern political moment. His outlook is bleak. His prose is not cluttered by sentimentality, and, unlike many of those who write on similar issues, he does not suggest the inevitability of justice. Between the World and Me is painfully aware that significant progress is neither inevitable nor likely.

Coates attempts to convey this harsh reality to his son, in order that his son might safely navigate a world that resents his existence. Though at many points Coates tends towards poetic abstraction, he centers his letter on a physical theme of the body. The brutal reality that Coates confronts can be seen in this motif. As Coates puts it, amongst all the economic, social, and historical issues, it is the physical, worldly vessel that suffers. Here, we see the titular implication, that the black body and the world around it are entirely separate. In a sense, there is something solidly between Coates and his son, and the world around them; thus, because they are not truly a part of the world, they are inherently endangered by it.

Coates’ bleak but realistic outlook is seen in this theme of physical danger, and illustrated poignantly in his discussions of the issues of domestic discipline and police brutality. For African Americans, both matters are inherently physical problems informed a multitude of factors. These physical problems are illustrated by the high profile killings of black men such as Treyvon Martin and Tamir Rice, to name a few. These deaths, Coates says, are emblematic of the systematic devaluation of the black body, both economically, socially, and, ultimately, physically. Simply put, it is less costly for a police officer to accidentally kill a black man than a white man because the world values one body over the other. This suggestion is the lynchpin of what Coates tragically conveys to his son. He wishes his son to understand this reality, so that he may best protect himself in the wider world. Indeed, Coates suggests that this is all that African American parents can do in a hostile world: prepare their children for how best to deal with that hostility. As Ta-Nehisi Coates painfully illustrates, the black mother beats her child so the child knows how not to be beaten by the police. Such brutal illustrations abound in the book.

Framing the work as a letter to his son is, perhaps, the most effective literary choice made by Coates. This gives the reader a sense of Coates’ personal investment that might otherwise have been missed. The theme of childrearing and parental love is a widely accessible one, and provides the author a method of reaching those outside of his frame of experience. This stylistic choice is one way Coates attempts to reach an audience outside of the African American community. Indeed, it is one way in which he attempts to bridge the gap to which the work’s title refers, between himself and the world.

However, the intensity of Coates’ investment should give the reader pause. It is important to acknowledge that, as poignant and effective as the work is, it is ultimately a conveyance of Coates’ own opinions. These opinions are, of course, coloured by the biographical details that Coates mentions. As such, the book cannot necessarily be read as an introduction to the study of race relations. Coates is not a neutral voice, and his own biases seep into how he addresses these issues. Once this fact is understood, however, Coates’ biases ultimately work towards the book’s purpose. Between the World and Me is an attempt to capture a unique perspective. To understand that perspective, one must understand the historical and social connotations it entails. In order to appreciate the work fully, the reader must be at least somewhat familiar with the subject of race relations. If the reader is well informed, Coates’ biases matter little, as he does not try to hide them. Ultimately, Between the World and Me is an attempt to illustrate the experience of a specific segment of the American population and convey that experience to an audience largely incapable of understanding it.