Reviews - The Message | The StoryGraph

5.24k reviews for:

Do yourself a favor and read this book. I am flabbergasted by the humility of such a genuinely talented author and his ability to enlighten without belittling the reader. This is a grouping of writings mostly focused on his self realization that what we read is not always as it is. We follow him to Senegal, an African American man visiting his family's native land. His journey while there but mostly the realization that his preconception was not fully accurate. There is a section about book banning and in particular his journey with this and how this both affects him as a purveyor and what he believes our reasoning for doing so are. But the power of this novel lives in it's final act, his trip to Palestine.

As an American that was born in the 1980s and having grown up alongside the invention of many social platforms, I can profess that facts are secondary but most importantly the power of the pen is real. His trip was litered with enlightenment about the hard reality of the Palestinian people but most acutely the fact that our writers who inform us of the troubles within their border walls are almost entirely penned by journalists who they themselves are not Palestinian. I am not going to be able to bring the brevity and voice Ta-Nehisi delivers us in these pages but it was quite a journey for me to second guess what I believe to be true and lean in to diligence in the consumption of our world's most pressing issues.

Coates' voice is poignant and narrow. His beliefs are always teeming on the pages he writes but it is his willingness to exemplify humility that makes this book so powerful. If our leaders could think as critically as this man the impact on our social constructs would be immeasurably changed.

sonofatreus's review against another edition

4.0

reflective fast-paced

I've been reading Ta-Nehisi Coates for a while, starting with his work in The Atlantic, then his books and comics. When it comes to his journalism, he tends to be an author who I like to read for his prose more than anything. While I can be sympathetic to a lot of his ideas, I don't always agree with him or the way he gets to his conclusions. But the dude knows how to string words and sentences together.

For this book, I saw Coates do some interviews as part of the media tour for the release of this book. At the time, he was being questioned about his stance on the ongoing Israel/Palestine conflict (and the relationship more broadly). At the time, it seemed like most of the interviewers were coming at him in bad faith, asking questions that clearly revealed their own preferred answers. It gave me the sense that the people interviewing him didn't even understand the book he wrote.

Having read the book now, it's obvious not only that people didn't understand the book but that they probably didn't even read it. Now, I'm not naïve enough to think that some morning show newscaster reads every line of every book whenever an author comes on the show, but it's astonishing how easy some of his ideas are and how widely people missed the mark. First, there are other chapters/essays in the book that, while related, are about other parts of Coates' life and trips he's made, before his trip to Israel/Palestine. These chapters effectively position Coates within his relationships to journalism, history and historical narratives (or myths), and narratives of power. By the time it gets to the final essay, when he goes to the Middle East, it should come as no surprise that he wants to give voice to people who are otherwise left out of the broader discussion. It also shouldn't be a surprise how he gets there (he openly picks up on and moves away from his famous essay, "The Case for Reparations").

Again, I can't say I agree with every point he makes are every word he writes, but it got me thinking.

lillypowell's review against another edition

3.75

informative reflective medium-paced

scaraway1's review against another edition

4.75

challenging informative reflective sad fast-paced

heybrownberry's review against another edition

3.75

challenging emotional reflective

haweyaaaa's review against another edition

5.0

i wanted to sit with this for a bit of time before i made my (extremely insignificant) review. as a muslim who grew up partially in the middle east, i’ve not been unaware of israel and it’s genocidal government. but over the past year, i’ve learned a whole lot more about it, and it’s been emotionally devastating. the same feelings i’ve had in the last year is what ta-nehisi discusses at length, with a decent amount of research behind it, connecting colonial powers to one another, revealing how they prop and aid each other in positions of power. i wouldn’t come to this novel expecting to learn everything about Palestine or israel. i’d turn to Palestinian authors, journalists, scholars instead. The Message, i think, will just help you feel less alone in your search for knowledge and justice.