6/1/2023 0 Comments The sellout book review![]() ![]() “Apartheid united black South Africa, why couldn’t it do the same for Dickens?” he asks. ![]() Due to its discriminatory treatment of black people, the law is shown to be an arbitrary, destructive force that has drifted far from its supposed goal of implementing justice. But clearly he takes some inspiration from it, hence his devilish plan to reinstate black pride by segregating the races. The Sellout explores the tense relationship between black people and legal authority, highlighting the often-absurd nature of the American legal system. ![]() They won’t admit it, but every black person thinks they’re better than every other black person.” One of the funniest characters is a permanently outraged academic called Foy Cheshire, who re-writes Huckleberry Finn replacing the “repugnant ‘n-word’” with “warrior”, and “slave” with “dark-skinned volunteer”.Īt one point, Bonbon confesses that he fell asleep while reading Toni Morrison’s Paradise, a novel about an all-black town in Fifties America. ![]() His painful comic riffs on what it means to be accepted by mainstream (in other words, white) culture are the book’s highlight: “I was the ‘diversity’ the school trumpeted so loudly in its glossy literature, but there wasn’t enough financial aid in the world to get me to suck the gristle from a leg bone in front of the entire freshman class.” Beatty is just as harsh on the foibles of black America: “I didn’t ruin his dreams by telling him that black people do all think alike. The Sellout is the first book by an American author to win the UKs prestigious Man Booker Prize. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |