Magically Black and Other Essays
Magically Black and Other Essays by Jerald Walker, published by HarperCollins Publishers in 2024, is a collection of 162 pages that explores Black life and culture through a blend of personal revelation and cultural critique. In this follow-up to How to Make a Slave and Other Essays, Walker employs candor and humor to address a range of topics, including incarceration, gentrification, and the complexities of identity within the African American experience.
Readers will find a thoughtful examination of various aspects of Black American life, as Walker approaches these subjects from multiple perspectives, including those of a husband, father, teacher, and writer. The titular essay encapsulates the collection’s overarching theme, reflecting on the culture of heroic action that emerged in response to historical oppression. This edition invites readers to engage with the nuanced discussions surrounding biography, history, and literary collections, making it a significant contribution to contemporary essays on African American experiences.
Official synopsis Publisher
*** Finalist for the PEN/Diamonstein-Spielvogel Award for the Art of the Essay****
In this engaging follow up to How to Make a Slave and Other Essays, the recipient of PEN New England Award for nonfiction and finalist for the National Book Award sharply examines and explains Black life and culture with equal parts candor and humor.
In Magically Black and Other Essays Jerald Walker elegantly blends personal revelation and cultural critique to create a bracing and often humorous examination of Black American life. He thoughtfully addresses the inherent complexities of topics as eclectic as incarceration, home renovations, gentrification, the crip walk, pimping, and the rise of the MAGA movement, approaching them through various Black perspectives, including husband, father, teacher, and writer. The collection’s overarching theme is captured in the titular essay, which examines the culture of heroic action African Americans created in response to their enslavement and oppression, giving proof to Albert Murray’s observation that the “fire in the forging process . . . for all its violence, does not destroy the metal that becomes the sword.”
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