I mentioned I was a sucker for a provocative title when I reviewed Nigger: The Strange Career of a Troublesome Word, and one of my friends (Hi, Dave!) pointed me toward this.

I was not very familiar with Dick Gregory before cracking the cover, and in many ways I feel I still am not since this autobiography only goes up through 1963 as he is first breaking big in his stand-up career and starting his involvement with the Civil Rights Movement.

Nearly half the book is given over to his childhood of poverty and his success as a high school and collegiate runner. It's often heartbreaking and disturbing, but sometimes suffers from that sort of old man embellished storytelling -- y'know, like, I went to and from school in a giant blizzard uphill both ways -- with Gregory frequently reminding us that he was a bullshit artist and hustler, casting a bit of doubt over the reliability of his narration.

The portion about his comedy routines is a bit lacking in the actual jokes he told but includes enough to make me want to seek out some of his recorded performances.

The final section is the most dramatic as he uses his fame to bring attention to the growing Civil Rights Movement, but he breezes in and out of events and locations pretty quickly, flying into a southern state for a protest and flying out to perform a show across the country. A personal tragedy gets twined awkwardly into this section, and then the book abruptly ends with a brilliant speech he gives in Selma to help promote a voter registration drive.

I don't think this is an ideal introduction to Dick Gregory for someone as ignorant of him as I was, but it has certainly whetted my appetite to learn more about him. ( )

Read this many years ago and remember portions of it vividly to this day. ( )

"Dear Momma- Wherever you are, if you ever hear the word "nigger" again, remember, they are advertising my book."

Before I lend this book to my boss and risk its disappearance, I thought I'd transcribe a few of my favorite parts. On meeting his wife:

"She was so nervous while she was writing it down, she kept tearing the paper with her pencil point. I rolled up the paper and put it in my pocket. Lillian Smith stayed through the second show and the Sunday evening show and she kept staring at me like no one in Willard, Ohio, would ever believe she had actually talked to this great man. When I left that night with the girl I was dating at the time, I went over and said good night to Lillian. I thought it might give her a thrill to call her, just because she was so sure I wouldn't.

That night, back at Ozelle and William's I lay in bed and thought about that face staring up at me, that soft, little-girl face so out of place in a night club. It suddenly dawned on me that my mother would have looked that way if she had ever been to a night club. I had a dream that night about Momma, and I was Richard again, and she came off the streetcar and ran into the house and said: "Richard, oh, Richard, I spoke to the star of the show, Harry Belafonte, I talked to Harry Belafonte" and I said: "No, Momma," and she said: "Yes, I did, I really did, and he's going to call me on the phone." When I woke up that Monday morning and I could almost see her expression over the phone. I just talked to her, and told her I'd call her back soon and we'd have lunch."

(!!!)

On meeting a convict after a show he plays in a prison:

"He was an artist, and he asked me if I'd like to see his work. I did. When I saw it I got weak in the knees. He had drawings of women, of what he thought women looked like. But every one had a man's face, a man's eyes, a man's nose, a man's jaw, a man's lips. They had long hair and they had breasts and they were wearing lipstick and dresses. But every one was really a man.

It was so weird that a man should think he was drawing a woman and he was really drawing a man. But that convict had only seen men for fifty years; those male faces were all he knew. And I talked to Lil about it and the more we talked and the more I thought about it, the more frightened I got. If you had told that old man that his drawings were all wrong he would have called you a liar and been ready to fight. And then Lil and I carried it one step further. If you were born and raised in America, and hate and fear and racial prejudice are all you've ever known, if they're all you've ever seen..."

On a call he gets after the death of his son:

"I started toward her and the phone rang. It was a long-distance call from Alabama, collect. I accepted the charges. It was a white woman.

"Mister Gregory?"
"Yes, ma'am."
"I just heard on the radio that your son died, and let me tell you it serves you right, I'm real glad that happened, you coming down here where you don't belong and stirring up all..."
"I'm glad, too. I had five million dollars' worth of insurance on him."
There was a long silence, and then she said: "I'm sorry, please forgive me."

Such an awe-inspiring, beautifully written and sincerely felt memoir. I hope I get this back. ( )

I read this book when I was in junior high. It had a huge impact on my thinking on racial issues. While I had dealt with this issues in some way, attending an integrated school and living in a multi-racial family, this was probably the first contact I had with the most ugly aspects of Jim Crow and our shameful racial history. ( )

I read this book when I was in junior high. It had a huge impact on my thinking on racial issues. While I had dealt with this issues in some way, attending an integrated school and living in a multi-racial family, this was probably the first contact I had with the most ugly aspects of Jim Crow and our shameful racial history. ( )