Books in the news; Soul On Ice

Alex Boyd on books in the news. A quick look at newly published material and books of current interest. Your host is Alex Boyd in the cereal department at the University of Illinois Library. Back in 1965 a young author began writing essays letters and critiques that were to go largely unnoticed by the majority of the reading public. This can perhaps be attributed to the fact that he was writing of the rising desires aspirations needs and demands of the black man in America and a period when the writings of James Baldwin were still dominating most thinking in this area. It could also be because he was at the time a member of the Black Muslims thought by many to be the most radical and dangerous of the black separatist groups. Its more likely was because this writer was at the time in California's Folsom State Prison serving a sentence for the possession of marijuana a condition which would tend to restrict the size of a writer's audience. With the publication of solar and ice by McGraw-Hill Eldridge Cleaver is no longer in need of an audience. The book demands to be read. This collection of essays and open letters is one of the most

thoughtful perceptive and incisive views of the current racial struggle going on in America currently available. Taken together these vignettes provide a pivot to trail of what it's like to be young black and aware in the America of 1960s. It is awareness that is at the heart of these disparate voices. In part autobiographical Clipper follows a progression of his own growth to the spiritual and intellectual discovery of his blackness thereby shedding light on why it was not till the 1960s. After some 400 years the black man in America decided to move to take by force otherwise his place in the society. Took leave of the prayer and the stage lasted to 1954 during which time black people lived in that most fair of novacaine finding it necessary in order to maintain the sanity to remain aloof and detached from the problem leaving him to leave himself was 18 and just a month in prison in 1054 when the Supreme Court outlawed school desegregation. To him this was the watershed he describes the

struggle to gradually overcome the novacaine just as many other blacks over the next decade had to do. The result of course is change the complection attitudes of the country. Sometimes people peaceably oftentimes violently but not nearly an up or nearly as quickly as cleaver and many others feels it should have. The author examines at length the myths held by both whites and blacks that have nourished and sustain their unnatural relationship. This is been done before perhaps even better literally but not with the freshness and feeling the cleaver uses. These attributes in fact permeate the whole book. Kleber. This plays a genius and emotional response to religious socio economic historical and cultural aspects of our society that could and could only have been learned through their spirit as well as to the intellect. He takes to task. Prison life. The SAS nation of Malcolm X. The writings of James Baldwin. The entrenched conservative far rightist views the black man in Vietnam the black man police and some of the lesser

points of contention in the Struggle for Racial Equality. His writings have not characterized by a revengeful bitterness on your list of views. Instead Cleaver has somehow been able to adopt the most extreme militant attitudes without being captured by them. Therefore he does not believe the overthrow of the present system to necessarily include destruction of the country. He does see the solution to to lie in the generation of young mites that are now becoming more visible and vocal. He believes that the student rebels using the techniques learned from the early struggles of blacks and attacking the problem structure can and will cause a revamping of the old beliefs. Allegiances missed symbols moral standards and values that have bolstered a society that will not put into reality its professed ideals. It is probable the clip of clipper will have altered his views in the years since he first espoused them but must be remembered that he is now a fugitive from the law in self-imposed exile. Without judging on the rightness or wrongness of his views his actions are his place in the Negro movement. So when

I should be perused by all thoughtful Americans seeking a perspective on convulsions that have shook and will continue to shake the foundations of this society. This has been books in the news prepared and presented by Alex Boyd and sponsored by the Illinois State Library. This program was distributed by the national educational radio network.