"Manchild In The Promised Land" by Claude Brown

"Mama Black Widow" (oh my GOD YEAH!!! The black gay experience in the 40's & 50's). : by Iceberg Slim


honorable mention: "Down These Mean Streets" by Piri Thomas. I liked this one a little more than Manchild...

Have any of u guys read these!!!??? Oh my god...

Please tell me if u hav i would love 2 discuss!!!

I just read The Cat in the Hat.

iceberg slim

Oh god, please tell me im not the only 1!!!

Catsume said:

I'm even surprised you were able to read this much...

Natsume said:

LOL!!!

paisleypark4 said:

I read Manchild in the Promised land a long time ago so I'd have to go back and reread it. I like James Baldwin's work.
Although it's more of an essay than a novel, his work "The Fire Next Time" is really good.

"The Invisible Man" by Ralph Ellison is one of my favorites of all time. Of course there's "The Autobiography of Malcolm X." You can never go wrong with that.

what are black ghetto books?

sawatdiikhrap said:

Life in the ghetto slums of Chicago, Deep South, New York in the 20's - today.

paisleykids4 said:

Okey doke.

So are there certain famous writers of these novels, what are their names?

Is there much scope for subject matter? What did/do they write about?

Iceberg Slim is a good author! He gives a lot of life to some interesting scenerios!

TruthBTold said:

Cool. Are these books easy to get hold of? This would be something different for me. I'm getting a little staid in my choices of reading at the moment.

Years ago I read some writings of W.E.B. DuBois (e.g., The Souls of Black Folk), Eldridge Cleaver's Soul on Ice, Ralph Ellison's The Invisible Man, & others. I'm sorry to say I couldn't summarize these now (I'm that old - LOL). Malcolm X is one of my heroes; I just re-watched the 2-set video recently, which I think was well-done. Iceberg Slim (aka Robert Beck) sounds vaguely familiar; I just looked up a website about him so I'll read up on him.

Thanks, PaisleyPark4 - good thread!

Here's a few sites interested parties might want to check out:
http://www.bunchecenter.u...index.html

http://www.keele.ac.uk/de...black.html

http://falcon.jmu.edu/~ra...online.htm

http://www.popsubculture...._slim.html

---

I love Iceberg Slim books, that's how I learned all about the game
First book I ever read was pimp by Iceberg Slim, I still got it somewhere around my house

Read all eight Iceberg Slim books, also enjoyed the "Kenyatta" series by Donald Goines. "Innocent Hoodlum" too...

Try to balance the blaxploitation vibe with reading some positive, progressive works too though people.

The Holy Bible

...NAH! I just wanted to annoy someone.

IceBerg Slim&All of DOnald Goines Books,Invisible Man,Malcolm X,also Nathan Mccall "Make Me Wanna Hollar" TOni Morrison's "The Bluest Eye"

A 'ghetto' book? Not too sure about that, but 'When Chickenheads Come Home to Roost---My Life as a Hip-Hop Feminist' by Joan Morgan, although it has the word 'feminist' in it, young people, men and women can relate to it, it's all nicely expressed what goes on in some of the minds of the inner-city youth growing up with hip-hop culture...
[This message was edited Tue Mar 11 21:00:37 PST 2003 by Starmist7]

sawatdiikhrap said:

look 4 em at the library. ESPECIALLY MAMA BLACK WIDOW. The transvestite life in the ghetto in the 30's 40's, damn damn that is some scary shit!!!

Pimp - Iceberg Slim
Sula - Toni Morrison

Ghetto Books.. I thought it was just plain good reading...

ummm...black = Ghetto...Oh my, wasn't aware ghetto had a color and now its gone and made its way to being a book

I don't exactly know what a "Black ghetto book" is, but "Coffee Will Make You Black" by April Sinclair is brilliant.