Interesting Development

So, listen:

Our man in D.C., Lindsay Robinson, it turns out, is buddies with Eugene Robinson (no relation), the regular guest on MSNBC, the Washington Post columnist and the man who wrote "Disintegration." As you'll recall, "Disintegration" lost by one vote to Tom Burrell's "Brainwashed" leading up to our last meeting.

Well, Lindsay wrote this in an e-mail to me moments ago: "BTW. I spoke Eugene Robinson about BMR and his book and he would be down for being a part of a meeting with us. What do ya think? Just putting it out there..."

So I'm throwing it out there, as well. If you go back to the tally for the vote http://blackmenreadva.blogspot.com/2010/11/time-to-vote.html , almost everyone who voted for "Brainwashed" also voted for "Disintegration"---and since it was so close, might we want to read "Disintegration" for our January 15, 2011 meeting instead so that the author might sit amongst us?

But then again, this was an official vote and tally---and "Brainwashed" won, fair and square. How do you guys feel about this? Should we exercise our right to flexibility and swich? Or should we stick with what we've done, no matter what....?

Please give your views on the matter in the comments section. (By the way, there's no guarantee that Eugene Robinson can actually MAKE a January 15 meeting, only that he's willing to try to do so...)

Test

Aubrey

TIME TO VOTE!

Here, below, are the nominated books. You may vote for THREE (3) of the books below. In the case of a tie, we will hold a secret-ballot vote for the deadlocked books at our meeting on Saturday.

Tom Burrell, Brainwashed

Gwen Ifil, The Breakthrough

Walter Moseley, Workin’ on the Chain Gang

Eugene Robinson, Disintegration

Thomas Sowell, Intellectuals and Society

NOMINATIONS ARE OPEN

Brethern:

Nominations are hereby open for our January, 2011 selection. Nominated books should focus on topical or “issues” nonfiction this time. You are free to nominate two (2) books. Nominations will stay open until Wednesday night. On Thursday and Friday we will vote on the nominated books.

Talking About "For Colored Girls..."

Sounds like there's sufficient interest to get together and chat after we individually see For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide When the Rainbow Is Enuf.

Now, look---EVERYBODY is invited, of course. And yet, what makes sense to me is that since Aubrey, Mark, Rodney and myself have publicly declared interest, we should have right of first refusal in terms of the actual talk-date that get's chosen. Only seems fair; I hope you guys agree.

So. Let me throw out the two dates that seem ideal to me: Wednesday, November 10th or Thursday, November 11th. Best times seem to be 6-7:30 or 6:30-8, since the meeting would start after the workday, but would still deliver brothers back to their homes early in the evening.

What say you?

The Grave Danger of Conservative Blindness

Mr. Ellis has penned an interesting article which should be explored.

For Colored Girls...

Back when Precious was a hot topic, me and a few other BMR?! members were at a restaurant after one of our meetings, and we thought it might be interesting and fun to invite anyone who's interested to view upcoming "cultural event" movies and then gather together and talk about them.

It was too late to do it with Precious, but another film likely to be much talked about is For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide When the Rainbow is Enuf, directed by Tyler Perry. The film opens on November 5. What do you guys think of going to see it and then discussing?

There are a number of ways we could go about it, if there's sufficient interest. I think trying to organize one singular screening to attend and then floating to a restaurant afterwards is a bit too much to ask. Just seems unrealistic to me. What makes more sense is that brothers (and their significant others, perhaps) take that first weekend to see the film at their leisure, on that Friday, Saturday or Sunday, and then we pick a different day to meet and chat. That latter strategy would also mean we could meet earlier in the evening.

Now, I am out of town that first weekend of November, although I hope to see the film in Atlanta either the day it opens or the next day. If you brothers are, indeed, interested in getting together and informally chatting, is the preference to do it on a weeknight? On a weekend? Or am I wrong and you would, actually, prefer seeing it and then meeting directly after? If not, and we do separate the two, I wonder if, say, a 6-7:30 meet on a weeknight---or a 6:30-8 or a 7-8:30---would allow us to meet on, say, Wednesday, November 10th or Thursday, November 11th?

Anyway, I just thought I'd mention the possibility, since every now and then these cultural event films will arrive, and For Colored Girls... is surely the latest. If you guys're interested, express that interest below. If not, we'll see each other at our next regularly scheduled meeting on November 20th at UR at 5 p.m. Either way, I'm looking forward to it.

The Immediate Past and the Distant Future

Gentlemen—

With apologies to those who simply couldn’t make it, I really, really enjoyed our last meeting; I’m still kinda buzzing from it, actually. They’re all good, of course, but to have such a good one while discussing a novel? Well, let’s just say I, personally, left feeling especially good. And not only that, but in terms of the health of the group, something I’m always monitoring like an always-running EKG, the idea that we could, for one reason or another (all legitimate) have four (4) regular, committed members of the group unable to make it, and STILL have such a terrific, fulfilling discussion was like, was like… sprinkles on top of what was already a couple of delicious scoops of ice cream.

And then to have—surprise!—a guy who was originally invited a couple of years ago just show up, just materialize, like magic (I’m looking at you d.l. hopkins) and contribute so terrifically? Just great stuff. Doesn’t get any better than that.

Our next meeting is the third week of November, as usual: November 20, usual place (Ryland Hall, University of Richmond), usual time (5 p.m.). Our next book to be discussed is The Two Wes Moores: One Name, Two Fates, by Wes Moore. Our January selection, for which we’ll be voting the week before our November meeting, is “topics or issues non-fiction.” For March, we’ll be choosing memoirs, and May is wide-open, genre-free. Keep that in mind as you’re going about your regular reading lives.

Now, speaking of your regular reading lives, I find it really interesting that we have, through no particular intentional strategy, read several books having to do with racial indeterminacy: Charles Johnson, Oxherding Tale; Bliss Broyard, One-Drop; James McBride, The Color of Water; Philip Roth, The Human Stain; even the film for our summer screening, I’m Through with White Girls had, as the female lead, a “Canadian half-rican,” a character who was genetically biracial.

Well, let me suggest to you a terrific book called Caucasia, by Danzy Senna, that treads that familiar terrain, but in a slightly different way. And the author is coming to UR to give a talk in the spring. Note:

Danzy Senna, American novelist & memoirist
Wednesday, March 16, 2011 at 7 p.m.
Brown-Alley Room, Weinstein Hall, University of Richmond

Danzy Senna is the author of two novels and a memoir that focus on issues of race, gender and cultural identity. Her debut novel, “Caucasia,” the story of two biracial sisters growing up in racially charged Boston during the 1970s, became an instant national bestseller. It won the Book-of-the-Month Club Stephen Crane Award for First Fiction and an Alex Award from the American Library Association, was named Best Book of the Year by the Los Angeles Times and was a finalist for the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award. Of mixed-race heritage, Senna writes extensively on the experience of being mistaken for white. Her latest work is a collection of short stories.

It’d be great if you guys could read Caucasia in anticipation of her visit, and then attend her talk. It’d also be great for us to meet up and chat with her—I might (might) be able to wrangle a special meeting or dinner with her, like we did with her good buddy Trey Ellis, if there’s sufficient interest. Just a suggestion, a possibility.

In any case, happy reading, of whatever you’re reading, and we’ll all hook up in almost two months.

TIME TO VOTE!

Vote for no more than three (3) of the nominations below:

Brainwashed: Challenging the Myth of Black Inferiority, Tom Burrell

Outliers, Malcolm Gladwell

The Other Wes Moore: One Name, Two Fates, Wes Moore

Life Inc., Douglas Rushkoff

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, Rebecca Skloot

Bad Sports: How Owners are Ruining the Games We Love, Dave Zirin

NOMINATIONS ARE OPEN

Nominations are now open, Gentlemen,

for wide-open non-fiction, our selection option for our November meeting. Any book that is non-fiction can be nominated.

You may nominate no more than two books.

Nominations will stay open through Wednesday night, and on Thursday we’ll vote on whatever is nominated through Wednesday. On Saturday, September 18, we will meet at 5 p.m. in our usual place at UR and discuss The Human Stain, by Philip Roth, and then hang out afterwards and talk about whatever.

Looking forward to it,

B.

Oh Brothers...

I met with a guy named John Bryan. He is an uberadvocate for the arts in Richmond. He works for this advocacy through arts outfit called Culture Works (white guy). He likes to be up on all the happening artistic goings on and was intrigued about BMR. Dude wants to sit in on a book discussion and blog about us on his blog. You all game?

And the Movie Was...

I’m Through with White Girls directed by Jennifer Sharp!

The First Black Men Read?! Summer Screening was a resounding success. We got together at UR and screened and discussed I’m Through with White Girls, a film with a terrible title(so potentially inflammatory and misleading that I was reluctant to share it in advance), but in the end a film that was enjoyed by all, as well as gave us a lot to talk about afterwards.

Thanks to all who came.

We’ll resume our usual schedule with the beginning of our new season on Saturday, September 18, 2010 at 5 p.m. at the University of Richmond. We’ll be discussing Philip Roth’s The Human Stain. I’m looking forward to it.

Summer Film Discussion

Brothers:

REMINDER: We’ll meet exactly one month from today, on Saturday, July 24, 2010, for our first—and hopefully annual—Black Men Read?! Summer Screening. We’ll do it at the University of Richmond at 6 p.m. in a room to be selected. We’ll watch the to-be-revealed film (it’s 93 minutes long), take a quick break, and then we’ll reconvene in that same room and talk about what we just saw for another 90 minutes or so, more or less. At that point it’ll be 9 p.m. or so and those of us who are free can head to a local watering hole if so desired.

SIGNIFICANT OTHERS AND FRIENDS are enthusiastically invited. I’ll cast about for some kind of head-count only to get a sense of which room to use. I’m expecting that some of our number won’t be able to make it, it being summer and all. And yet, there’s also no telling how many folks brothers might want to invite (there’s no limit).

SO MARK YOUR CALENDARS, and spread the word amongst those you think might enjoy a screening and a good discussion.

In more familiar news, we'll meet to begin our fall season on Saturday, September 18, 2010 at 5 p.m. at UR—and it looks like our usual room will be all spiffy and remodeled for our pleasure, as well. We'll discuss Philip Roth's The Human Stain.

(Can you guys briefly confirm that you've read this? I’m curious whether I can get the word to everyone without sending out an e-mail warning that there’s a new blog-post.)

About Last Saturday...

Excellent meeting, men---

For those who missed our discussion of The Art of Manliness, or came late, hopefully Hobbs will have the audio up sooner rather than later.

We’ll read and discuss Philip Roth’s The Human Stain in September (Saturday, September 18 at 5 p.m., to be exact).

And on Saturday, July 24^th, at 6 p.m., we will hold our first Black Men Read?! Summer Screening! Bring your wives or significant others or interested friends. We’ll do it in at UR, exact location to be determined.

Have good summers---

Bert Ashe

TIME TO VOTE!

Here, in alphabetical order, are the choices for our September novel:

David Bradley’s "The Chaneysville Incident"

Edward P. Jones, The Known World

Ann McMillan, Chickahominy Fever

Philip Roth, The Human Stain

Please vote for no more than three (3).

NOMINATIONS ARE OPEN

Men:

We’re meeting to discuss The Art of Manliness: Classic Skills and Manners for the Modern Man on Saturday, May 15, in our usual room in Ryland Hall at the University of Richmond at 5 p.m. Leading up to the meeting, as per usual, we'll select our next book. This time our September 18 meeting is [cue fanfare] a NOVELS ONLY nomination situation.

Nominations are NOW OPEN for NOVELS you want to discuss in September. You may nominate TWO (2) novels from now until I go to bed on Wednesday night. On Thursday morning we’ll vote on the novels that have been nominated.

TIME TO VOTE!

Here are the nominations; please vote in the comments section below for THREE (3) of the following:

Helene Cooper, The House at Sugar Beach: In Search of a Lost African Childhood

Miles Davis, Miles: The Autobiography

Will Haygood, Sweet Thunder: The Life and Times of Sugar Ray Robinson

Jimi Izrael, The Denzel Principle: Why Black Women Can't Find Good Black Men

Robin Kelley, Thelonius Monk: The Life and Times of An American Original

Bret McKay, The Art of Manliness

Jackie McMullen, When the Game Was Ours: Magic Johnson & Larry Bird

Richard Pryor, Pryor Convictions: and Other Life Sentences

Sapphire, Push

NOMINATIONS ARE OPEN

Okay, BMR?!ers,

nominations are officially open for May's selection. May is, you'll recall, a "wide-open, wildcard, genre-free" selection. As long as your nomination exists on paper and between two covers, it's a valid nomination. Nominations will be open, as usual, from now until Wednesday night. As of Thursday morning, we'll be voting on whatever we've got.

Now, I went back into the archives and looked at the original book selection process http://blackmenreadva.blogspot.com/2007/01/book-selection-process.html and discovered I've been doing it wrong for some time now. In fact, we're supposed to nominate TWO books, and then vote for THREE, rather than the other way around, as I somehow transposed it.

So. You brothers can officially nominate two (2) books starting now, by replying to this blog post. On Thursday and Friday we'll each have three votes on whatever gets nominated. (Sorry about the mix-up.)

Then on Saturday, March 20, we'll meet and discuss James McBride's The Color of Water: A Black Man's Tribute to His White Mother at our usual place at our usual time.

Summer Film Discussion

I'm suggesting Saturday, July 24, 2010---

Since it's summer, I'm going to assume that someone will have to miss; summer schedules are iffy, at best. But I'm throwing that date out there in the hopes that if we place it on our calendars in early March, we can try and schedule around it if something comes up in the interim.

(Oh, and remember, the protests of one of our number notwithstanding, WIVES and/or significant others and/or friends of any gender who you think might be interested ARE INVITED to this screening/discussion. Ahem.)

How's this date work for you guys? Do we have quorum?

When Chickenheads Come Home to Roost: My Life as a Hip Hop Feminist.

Alright, we're set to meet with the ladies in April to review the book:

When Chickenheads Come Home to Roost: My Life as a Hip Hop Feminist.

I'll send out an update with the actual date in April along with the place to meet.

On to the Wimmens...?

So far, it sounds like the film discussion thing is winner. Hobbs, I can't see scheduling anything for this-coming February---too soon, man, way too soon. But I do think we might be able to do something for February, 2011, particularly if we have a successful film-discussion session in the summer---which we do have time to schedule. I'm going to assume those of you who may have read the post but haven't responded are expressing, er, quiet agreement with the idea. If not, speak now with whatever problem you might have. Otherwise, I'll get back with y'all about the choices for the whens and what not.

Now. Last Sunday, Hobbs and I were chatting after church and he suggested that it might be fun to approach the women’s group we met with last time specifically to discuss Joan Morgan’s When Chickenheads Come Home to Roost: My Life as a Hip Hop Feminist. I’ve read that book—I’ve taught that book, actually—and I hope you guy's'll trust me and Hobbs when we suggest that that specific book would be a terrific book to discuss at a joint men’s/women’s book group meeting.

Here's the problem: I HATE the idea of voiding one of our regular meetings in order to have a joint meeting with the women! While I am good for saying that the fact that we meet five times a year is a huge plus for us, I also very much feel like I want ALL FIVE of those meetings to be for US, y'know? Personally, I like the idea of shoehorning into our schedule an additional meeting with the women if, indeed, you guys want to go back there at all.

Discuss.

Second Anniversary

Gentlemen:

Congratulations. On this very day, January 20, 2007, a collection of black men met in Ryland Hall for an organizational meeting with the intent of beginning a book group in the Richmond area called Black Men Read?! We’ve been meeting regularly ever since, and from my perspective the future looks blazingly bright. Our members show up having uniformly read the book; they show up on time (well, most of us—ahem [trying not to look at a certain someone who’s always late]); and they cheerful arrive ready and eager to discuss the book pointedly and interrogatively, and yet with open minds. It’s that last I value almost as much as the first. Nothing is more wearying than a rigid ideologue, and a loud one at that. Being trapped in a room with one for a couple of hours would be more than I could bear, and I’m so happy we don’t have one. May it ever be thus.

No, I like our group; I like it a lot. I would change nothing about our group, and that’s why I’m wary of what I’m about to suggest, but will suggest it nevertheless. I hope we can have a good, long, sustained chat about it. And I especially like the blog format for this discussion, because it’ll hopefully allow us to hear a point and then immediately respond, or think for a while and respond. Or both.

Now, the bottom line reason I think our group is a successful? Simple: we meet every other month. That, more than anything else, is key. It allows us to jam a book that we may or may not look forward to reading into our regular reading rotation. I don’t know how those every-month groups do it, but just thinking about meeting every month makes me tired. Even if we eventually decide---sometime in the future---that we’re big enough to meet and discuss a book in the summer, we’ll still be meeting every other month.

But here’s the thing:

I keep having this impulse to occasionally meet—including our wives or friends or whoever we want—to discuss a FILM. After the November meeting, me, Nate, Hobbs and Daniel Selby kicked around the idea of meeting to discuss, for instance, Precious. I loved the idea, but did nothing with it because I knew the frantic Christmas season was staring us in the face, glaring at us—daring us; and trying to organize a meeting in December while Precious was still a hot topic of discussion seemed foolish and unrealistic. But I remain intrigued about the idea of inviting you brothers and your selected others to discuss a film. That sounds like big fun to me.

My question to you brothers is this: what do you think of the idea?

Other questions: if you do like the idea, can we set up some more or less standardized way of doing it? Suggestions on how we do this would be terrific. (I can handle “where” just fine: we’ll do it on campus in a bigger room.) Obviously everyone would go see the film on their own and then we’d meet and discuss. Now, me? My impulse would be to say something like, “I’m reserving a room at UR for Thursday, February 18 at 7 p.m. Show up and we’ll talk about the film.” It wouldn’t be until later, talking to my wife, that all sorts of questions would have to be confronted. I can hear her now: “How’re you gonna know how many people you’ll have? What if the room’s too small? What if it’s too big? Unlike you rough and tumble guys, women might like a little something to drink or munch on while they discuss the film—are you going to do anything to make these people comfortable? What about people who have kids? What about--- What about….?“

Well. Nothing is scheduled; there are no imminent plans. I like the idea of discussing this idea without the pressure of a specific date in the offing. I repeat: no film-discussion is scheduled, or about to be scheduled. I’m not suggesting you should confront questions of the sort my wife would ask—although she will likely ask all of the above, and more, should we decide to move forward. No, beyond the initial question—Do you want to?—is this all-important, subterranean question: Do you feel we’re strong enough as a group, after two solid years and heading into an ascendant third year, that we have such positive inertia that we can add an occasional film discussion including significant others and/or interested friends to what we have now? [‘Cause it the answer is “No,” then let’s call the whole thing off…]

But if the answer to that is, indeed, “Yes,” then I’d like to open a discussion of how: how often is “occasionally”? Would it be cool to schedule a film discussion for Black History Month every year? Might it be fun to have an opened-up film discussion during the summer, so that if a third or even half of the group can’t make it due to vacations or other summertime distractions, we could still meet and discuss a film sometime in between May and September?

What do you guys think of the above? Speak on it...

Come Ready to Vote...

Everyone has voted, folks,

and the result is a spectacular three-way tie: Joan Morgan's When Chickenheads Come Home to Roost, James McBride's The Color of Water, and Cornel West's Brother West: Living and Loving Out Loud, A Memoir are the finalists, each getting four votes each.

Come ready to vote your preference on Saturday at 5 p.m.---

easy,

B.

TIME TO VOTE!

Brothers,

This is our new selection schedule:

January: topical or “issues” nonfiction

March: memoir

May: wide-open, wild card, genre-free

September: novel

November: wide-open nonfiction

We’re still getting used to our selection schedule, so I’ve had to sift through the nominations in order to make sure that only those books that come close to memoirs comprise the nominations below (in alphabetical order). Some suggestions were novels, some were “issues” nonfiction, and while we’re only selecting memoirs for March, the good news is that ANYTHING can be nominated in May, as it’s our “wide-open, wild card genre-free” selection.

This is a good crop of nominations; depth and breadth, lots of choices. Each brother has two (2) votes, and we'll vote for the next two days, and if it’s close we’ll vote in person on Saturday, when we meet to discuss The Hip Hop Generation, our first “issues” nonfiction selection. Usual time, usual place. Peace.

David Carr, The Night of the Gun

George Dawson, Life Is So Good

Tony Dungy, Quiet Strength: The Principles, Practices, and Priorities of a Winning Life

James McBride, The Color of Water

Joan Morgan, When Chickenheads Come Home to Roost : My Life as A Hip Hop Feminist

Tracy Morgan, I Am the New Black

The Rza, The Tao of Wu

Anna Deavere Smith, Letters to a Young Artist: Straight-up Advice on Making a Life in the Arts-For Actors, Performers, Writers, and Artists of Every Kind

Karrine Steffans, Confessions of a Video Vixen

Cornel West, Brother West: Living and Loving Out Loud, A Memoir

NOMINATIONS ARE OPEN

Nominations are hereby open, gentlemen,

for the “memoir” selection for the Black Men Read?! March meeting. Members are, as always, invited to nominate three (3) books for consideration, and then next Wednesday vote for two (2). We’ll tally them up, and if it’s too close to call, we’ll vote for the winner at Saturday’s meeting.

Good weekend,

B.