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A Little Devil in America: Notes in Praise of Black Performance
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About This Book
A stirring meditation on Black performance in America from the New York Times bestselling author of Go Ahead in the Rain At the March on Washington in 1963, Josephine Baker was fifty-seven years old, well beyond her most prolific days. But in her speech she was in a mood to consider her life, her legacy, her departure from the country she was now triumphantly returning to. "I was a devil in other countries, and I was a little devil in America, too," she told the crowd. Inspired by these few words, Hanif Abdurraqib has written a profound and lasting reflection on how Black performance is inextricably woven into the fabric of American culture. Each moment in every performance he examines—whether it's the twenty-seven seconds in "Gimme Shelter" in which Merry Clayton wails the words "rape, murder," a schoolyard fistfight, a dance marathon, or the instant in a game of spades right after the cards are dealt—has layers of resonance in Black and white cultures, the politics of American empire, and Abdurraqib's own personal history of love, grief, and performance. Abdurraqib writes prose brimming with jubilation and pain, infused with the lyricism and rhythm of the musicians he loves. With care and generosity, he explains the poignancy of performances big and small, each one feeling intensely familiar and vital, both timeless and desperately urgent. Filled with sharp insight, humor, and heart, A Little Devil in America exalts the Black performance that unfolds in specific moments in time and space—from midcentury Paris to the moon, and back down again to a cramped living room in Columbus, Ohio.
Reviews
"Music, [...] in the work of Hanif Abdurraqib, is more like a vehicle for getting closer to what it means to be feel joy, and history, and shame, and anger, and lonesomeness ..."
"Another winner from Abdurraqib, a writer always worth paying attention to."
"The author also calls out the use of blackface and the sanitization of race relations in today's films and laments the exploitation of violence against and by African Americans ..."
"his prose is reliably razor-sharp."
"Overall, Little Devil in America is reminiscent of the brilliant scholarship of Robin D.G."
"In his mind it becomes not so much a discrete event or object but rather any attempt to bridge the questions who am I?"
"Paying attention to culture also sharpens one's sensitivity to the social shape of the world; it allows Abdurraqib to clarify the many 'miracles' that have been performed by artists who shone in a universe not made to their measure."
"Where it falters are the moments when he yanks the reader from one pop culture reference to the next at breakneck speed ..."
"Clayton's chapter may be the best in the book, if only because it gives her the recognition she deserves for her ethereal voice ..."
"Whether pondering the dynamic life and contributions of Josephine Baker or meditating on his own various performances, the author's ruminations are an invitation to think deeply about Black performance on both cultural and individual levels."
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