Reviews with content warning for War - I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings

Reviews tagging 'War'

I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou

14 reviews

jalexpulliamkepler's review against another edition

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challenging slow-paced

4.0

Interesting and often moving but sometimes felt more like a series of essays than a memoir

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theelliad's review against another edition

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3.5

I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings is Maya Angelou’s autobiography, exploring the challenges and triumphs of her life.

This was required reading for my module last year and despite really enjoying what I read of it, I never got round to reading the full book until now. Angelou’s writing is so beautiful and captivating, especially when read by herself, I literally had to finish this in one sitting! I’m not typically a non-fiction reader and so the narrative exploration and descriptive attention to detail felt as immersive and entertaining as any fiction. Her coming to terms with herself, her trauma and the struggles of those around her is made both painful and relatable even for those who have never or will never experience the things she did. This is a case study in self writing and Angelou truly is someone to be studied and remembered. I don’t however understand the purpose of making an autobiography 7 <200 books? Perhaps that is just how storygraph classifies it but this book alone definitely didn’t feel complete which was annoying, I would happily have endured a longer cohesive piece instead of having to spread the reading across multiple books. (note post finishing: apparently there is audio editions of all 7 in one so that’s my bad i just didn’t realise it had 7 parts so didn’t think to look) Overall an enjoyable read :))

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brynalexa's review against another edition

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emotional reflective sad fast-paced

5.0

It’s hard to give a poet anything but five stars on their autobiography. I can’t imagine having such a strong memory of my formative years after going through so many transitions and traumas.

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wickedgrumpy's review against another edition

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challenging emotional hopeful reflective sad tense slow-paced

3.75

Difficult to read, but in the way that it challenges how you think about things.

In particular this made me consider the times it took place during, the "good ole days" and how shitty they were for a lot people. I make it a habit to not read much about a book before I pick it up to give everything a fair chance and the reason why I picked those one up was because I saw it on a list of commonly banned books. While it contains some mature(-ish) content, it is much tamer than many things I read as a youth and the value of showing other-ing on a personal degree is unmatched.

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katydied's review against another edition

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adventurous emotional hopeful inspiring reflective sad medium-paced

5.0

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bookishlittleme's review

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challenging emotional hopeful informative inspiring reflective sad tense medium-paced

5.0

Maya Angelou is an incredibly significant figure in the arts and this is definitely a must read!

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a_bloom's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional funny informative reflective sad tense medium-paced

4.25

It took a little while for me to get used to the writing and actually interested in the story, but within a hundred pages it REALLY captured my attention. Her writing is beautiful and descriptive and painfully aware of how her younger self perceived the situation of her birth and life. However, the last few chapters come off awkward as it strays from the usual pacing, but considering she had more autobots it makes sense.

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