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Hilton Als

Hilton Als Biography

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“Toni’s greatness as a novelist had a lot to do with her skill—her great ability—to show how we mucked up the landscape, not just in the world, but in ourselves. Slavery was one way we mucked it up, of course, and the enormous wound at the center of “Beloved” (1988) has to do with how slavery not only killed bodies, but made a mess of our minds, thus creating a particularly American way of thinking.”

AmericaSlaveryNovelistsWritersAuthorsToni MorrisonMessing Up
Author:Hilton Als
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“Claudia Rankine's Citizen comes at you like doom. It's the best note in the wrong song that is America. Its various realities-'mistaken' identity, social racism, the whole fabric of urban and suburban life-are almost too much to bear, but you bear them, because it's the truth. Citizen is Rankine's Spoon River Anthology, an epic as large and frightening and beautiful as the country and various emotional states that produced it.”

CountryStatesWholeRealityAmericaBeautifulSongSocialToo MuchIdentityEmotionalBearsCitizensRacismRiversNotesVariousFrighteningFabricUrbanEpicMistakenDoomSpoonsAnthologyClaudiaMistaken Identity
Author:Hilton Als
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“The artist’s memory is a dangerous, necessary thing. Never disavow what you see and remember-it’s your brilliant stock-in-trade: remembering, and making something out of it. Artists remember the world as it is, first, because you have to know what it is you’re reinventing; that’s a rule, perhaps the only one: being cognizant of your source material.”

KnowsWorldFirstsRememberArtistMemoriesDangerousMaterialsSourceTradeBrilliantReinventingCognizantNecessary Things
Author:Hilton Als
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