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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I wanted this forum created so that I could talk about books I didn't like. Maybe I'm just not understanding some of these books and maybe they're not written for me but there are still he popular books I really don't like. I won't make them all because that would likely give my identity away.

One I haven't mentioned to anybody is Maya Angelou's 'i know why the caged bird sings". Not to trivialize what she went through but I really finished the book like  seemed like what did I just read. How critical can I be of an autobiography? Especially if it made her who she is? But seeing this put in the same leagues or above invisible man, black boy, native son. I just don't see it.

They're are several others and I hope this doesn't turn into a bash me or bash Maya because I love her other works (especially poetry) but I'm not a fan of that book. [/quote]

I don't get what you didn't like about it.  Be more specific.    I didnt like Invisible man.  I couldn't even finish it while I know why a caged bird sings was very engaging.[/quote]

Even Anonymous, I don't want to do too much of criticizing the GOATs. I respect her too much but it just didn't do any thing for me. Same with Color Purple. That did move me more though, like I had hatred for some characters from that book, but not to the extent of some friends who worship that book.

Maybe it's that when I'm looking for something uplifting, I can't read a book that has r@pe in it and still be uplifted by it. But that's not the worse about Caged Bird. It's more that the why's of the story don't seem to connect to me.

Maybe this is a me problem because they're are certain authors who I gravitate towards and certain ones who confuse me. Baldwin confuses me more than Wright. And Angelou is the same. It seems like there's an expression they want me to get, and I can convince myself to think that way, but my natural reaction is either nah I wouldn't do that or something more confusing. Adventure stories that don't look into the souls of people are much easier to read and interpret because it's either spelled out or not meant to be that deep. [/quote]

For the “I wouldn’t do that” situations, could you reframe to try and figure out why THEY made the choices they did? I always think that’s the more interesting question anyway. I already know my own mind, but others’ can be so surprising.

But I get where you’re coming from because I respected I Know Why… but couldn’t get through even half of All God’s Children Got Traveling Shoes. But some of that may be that I learned the story of Angelou’s son and grandson in between. The story is a kind of “he said, she said,” but I personality believe that the “kidnapped” grandchild’s mother was fleeing from Angelou’s son’s abuse. So I couldn’t find it in myself to care much about him after his car accident. [/quote]

I will admit that I'm not the brightest bulb in the barrel. I wish I had the ability to read minds, but I don't. I never did well on those essay questions in class asking me to explain some imagery or motivation behind something. The way my mind works can think of a thousand things that could be true, and while I could reason myself into thinking that one is likely true, it's only because that's how society wants me to think. Maya herself has spoken against this type of thinking because people act like they don't have their own skeletons in the closets.

Now that I'm older, and have lived through a few things, I may look into her life more to see if I can find what I was looking for when I started reading her autobiography. But what I'm more interested in now reading wise is more good autobiographies of women. Most of the ones that I look back upon that I loved have all been by men. This is kinda where Caged Bird vines into play because of it's rawness and lack of a filter. But I'll look into others like Sonya Sanchez and Nicki Giovanni to see if they connect with me better. [/quote]

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