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Quote by Ishmael Reed

“We not only grew up on Be-Bop; Be-Bop raised us. For my generation, Be-Bop came on like a light bulb going flash behind the eyes.For us, it was not only an intellectual movement, but a way of life. We walked, dressed, and rapped Be-Bop.”

Quote by Ishmael Reed

Book:Airing Dirty Laundry

Work

Airing Dirty Laundry

This book delves into the lives of individuals as they confront the repercussions of exposing their private struggles and vulnerabilities to the public eye. The narrative examines themes of trust, betrayal, and the human desire for connection amidst the chaos of personal revelations. more

Author

Ishmael Reed is an American poet, novelist, and playwright. Known for his unique literary style and profound exploration of racial, class, and gender issues, Reed was born on February 22, 1938. more

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“I'm beginning to believe that Killer Illiteracy ought to rank near heart disease and cancer as one of the leading causes of deathamong Americans. What you don't know can indeed hurt you, and so those who can neither read nor write lead miserable lives, like Richard Wright's character, Bigger Thomas, born dead with no past or future.”

Source: Writin' is fightin': thirty-seven years of boxing on paper

“The last publicized center of American writing was Manhattan. Its writers became known as the New York Intellectuals. With important connections to publishing, and universities, with access to the major book reviews, they were able to pose as the vanguard of American culture when they were so obsessed with the two Joes--McCarthy and Stalin--that they were to produce only two artists, Saul Bellow and Philip Roth, who left town.”

Source: God made Alaska for the Indians: selected essays

“If the British prose style is Churchillian, America is the tobacco auctioneer, the barker; Runyon, Lardner, W.W., the traveling salesman who can sell the world the Brooklyn Bridge every day, can put anything over on you and convince you that tomatoes grow at the South Pole.”

Ifs World America Literature Grows Style Sells South British Bridges Prose Convince Tobacco Brooklyn Salesman Tomatoes American Literature Brooklyn Bridge

Book:Mumbo Jumbo: A Novel

Source: Mumbo Jumbo: A Novel

“I've always wondered why European politicians as a group seemed brighter than American politicians as a group. Maybe it's becausemany American politicians have the race issue to fall back on. They become lazy, suspicious of innovative ideas, and as a result American institutions atrophy.”

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Book:God made Alaska for the Indians: selected essays

Source: God made Alaska for the Indians: selected essays

“Few white citizens are acquainted with blacks other than those projected by the media and the so--called educational system, whichis nothing more than a system of rewards and punishments based upon one's ability to pledge loyalty oaths to Anglo culture. The media and the "educational system" are the prime sources of racism in the United States.”

“American cultural institutions seem so bent on preserving the values of "Western civilization," the mythical "Whitetown," that welearn about one another's cultures the same way we learn about sex: in the streets.”

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Author:Ishmael Reed

“The treatment of African and African American culture in our education was no different from their treatment in Tarzan movies.”

Different Culture Race Education African American Treatment American Culture African American Culture Tarzan Movie

Book:Airing Dirty Laundry

Source: Airing Dirty Laundry

“Currently, U.S. society has been encouraged by its political and subsidized mass-media intelligentsia to view U.S. life as a continual "morning in America" paradise, where the only social problems occur in the inner cities. Psychologists call this denial.”

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Book:Airing Dirty Laundry

Source: Airing Dirty Laundry

“statistic: the us bureau of missing persons reports that in 1968 over 100,000 people disappeared leaving no solid clues nor traceonly a space in the lives of their friends.”

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Book:New and collected poems

Source: New and collected poems

“Regardless of the criticisms I receive from the left, the right and the middle, I think it's important to maintain a prolific writing jab, as long as my literary legs hold up.”

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Book:Writin' is fightin': thirty-seven years of boxing on paper

Source: Writin' is fightin': thirty-seven years of boxing on paper