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mer_lovestoread2023's review against another edition
adventurous
funny
hopeful
lighthearted
reflective
medium-paced
4.25
Anita Reynolds might have been lost to history were it not for the assiduous research of George Hutchinson, also known for his wonderful biography of Nella Larsen. Hutchinson found a reference to Reynolds in Larsen's correspondence, and then tracked down the draft of her memoir in the Howard University Library. Reynolds is a fascinating figure, an "American Cocktail" of identities raised in a middle-class black family in LA; a social butterfly who enjoyed her light-skin privilege yet never hid her blackness when asked (you should hear her when she's asked how she got so tan); a cosmopolitan traveler who lived in Europe and North Africa, who hung out with white modernists and Harlem Renaissance cultural elites; and a woman not afraid to discuss--and act upon--her own erotic urges. This description shouldn't mask her radicalism; when confronted with tales of discrimination in her home country, Reynolds wants to get a gun.
This is a deliciously name-droppy story--there's almost no one Reynolds didn't know. Reynolds was fearless as well as fun, though; when the invasion of France rolled around Reynolds devoted herself to nursing and helping refugees make their escape across the border. Reynolds ultimately became a clinical psychologist and taught in the US Virgin Islands, where she lived the rest of her live after her early twentieth-century adventures. Her memoir, exquisitely researched and annotated by Hutchinson, with a preface by legal scholar Patricia Williams, complicates our understanding of the Harlem Renaissance and of modernism.
This is a deliciously name-droppy story--there's almost no one Reynolds didn't know. Reynolds was fearless as well as fun, though; when the invasion of France rolled around Reynolds devoted herself to nursing and helping refugees make their escape across the border. Reynolds ultimately became a clinical psychologist and taught in the US Virgin Islands, where she lived the rest of her live after her early twentieth-century adventures. Her memoir, exquisitely researched and annotated by Hutchinson, with a preface by legal scholar Patricia Williams, complicates our understanding of the Harlem Renaissance and of modernism.
arisbookcorner's review against another edition
funny
lighthearted
relaxing
3.25
"How long did it take you to get that wonderful tan?'
'I [Anita] gave out the slightest sigh and answered by rote: 'About four generations.'" (Foreword, 57)
AMERICAN COCKTAIL is an effervescent, gossipy memoir about a fascinating artsy young Black socialite. It's cosmopolitan and glamourous but lacks a whole lot of depth, her focus is on parties and the famous people she's met throughout her life. Anita is a bon vivant who was drawn to the arts and artists, posing for pictures and secondary roles as an actress in some early 1920s films. Honestly the forward was the best part, it contained so many great one liners;"However, I bit my tongue and said nothing; they were, after all, guests at my husband’s hotel. But it did enter my mind to tell them of the fate of the last white man who called my father “Nigger.” He was killed by a blow from a shoe." But it does give a breezy glimpse into the life of a member of the 'talented tenth' who led a charmed life, primarily due to her very light skin color and wealth. At the same time she shunned respectability politics while still relishing the privilege her family life provided her. I'd love to read a biography of Anita with some of her memories mixed in, she focuses often on the superficial and that left me wondering about some of the bigger moments she lived through, moments that a biography might spend more time excavating. Still it was an utterly delightful romp and is a great read for those who want something light, quippy and set in the Jazz Age.
“I feel a little guilty saying how much fun I had being a colored girl in the 20th century.”
'I [Anita] gave out the slightest sigh and answered by rote: 'About four generations.'" (Foreword, 57)
AMERICAN COCKTAIL is an effervescent, gossipy memoir about a fascinating artsy young Black socialite. It's cosmopolitan and glamourous but lacks a whole lot of depth, her focus is on parties and the famous people she's met throughout her life. Anita is a bon vivant who was drawn to the arts and artists, posing for pictures and secondary roles as an actress in some early 1920s films. Honestly the forward was the best part, it contained so many great one liners;"However, I bit my tongue and said nothing; they were, after all, guests at my husband’s hotel. But it did enter my mind to tell them of the fate of the last white man who called my father “Nigger.” He was killed by a blow from a shoe." But it does give a breezy glimpse into the life of a member of the 'talented tenth' who led a charmed life, primarily due to her very light skin color and wealth. At the same time she shunned respectability politics while still relishing the privilege her family life provided her. I'd love to read a biography of Anita with some of her memories mixed in, she focuses often on the superficial and that left me wondering about some of the bigger moments she lived through, moments that a biography might spend more time excavating. Still it was an utterly delightful romp and is a great read for those who want something light, quippy and set in the Jazz Age.
“I feel a little guilty saying how much fun I had being a colored girl in the 20th century.”
caitietatey's review against another edition
3.0
This lady was some cookie and what makes her so fascinating also makes her memoir so frustrating. She lived in the middle of the most exciting times of the twentieth century - the birth of the movie industry in la, the New York of the Fitzgerald's, the Paris of Hemingway , Biarritz during the French surrender in 1939, and she did so as a mixed race independent woman. the events she describes are mind boggling - being offered a slave in Morocco, speaking to Man Ray before the fall of Paris, saving refugees from the Nazis, and all she seems to have to say about any of this was 'and then we had cocktails on the terrace, which was nice'. She seems like a very 'nice' person but one who had little ability to analyse what was going around her. She has a unique viewpoint and the opportunity to really say something interesting but she stops at describing slightly dull love affairs and the social standing of the hotels where she stayed. I was ultimately disappointed with her to the point of wishing to shake her by the shoulders and scream 'yes, but what was it actually like?????'.
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