Reviews tagging 'Slavery'

Call Us What We Carry, by Amanda Gorman

10 reviews

natashaleighton_'s review against another edition

emotional inspiring reflective medium-paced

4.0

I don’t usually read or enjoy poetry all that much, but Amanda Gorman’s collection was eloquent and emotional in a way that I wasn’t expecting. 

Her words perfectly capture the spirit and emotions that pretty much everyone has felt at some point in the past few years and I can’t imagine anyone not finding at least one poem that will deeply resonate. Even if you don’t like (or enjoy) poetry, I still urge you to pick this up—you may be surprised how much you enjoy it. 

And if your curious, some of my faves were:

At First 
The Shallows 
Lucent 
Fury & Faith
The Truth In One Nation
What We Carry 
(And of course) The Hill We Climb

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Grief, Racism, and Police brutality

Moderate: Death, Violence, and Slavery

Minor: Colonisation and Mass/school shootings

pointeshoebookworm's review against another edition

emotional hopeful inspiring reflective sad medium-paced

3.0

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Content Warnings

Moderate: War, Slavery, Racial slurs, Racism, Police brutality, Gun violence, and Hate crime

lahars_little_library's review against another edition

emotional inspiring reflective medium-paced

5.0

After listening to Amanda Gordon's collection of poems on audio, I am wishing I had a paper copy to mark all my favorite poems and quotes. As with all collections or anthologies you may not connect with every single poem. But I found that those I did (which was the vast majority) were so throught-provoking and had such exquisite use of language that I cannot help but give 5 stars. The Poem Survey followed by Gated should be required reading. It was so striking.  

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Racism, Slavery, Violence, Death, Grief, and Police brutality

Minor: Mass/school shootings

readandfindout's review against another edition

emotional reflective medium-paced

4.5

Style/writing: 5 stars
Themes: 4.5 stars
Perspective: 4 stars

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Police brutality

Moderate: Racism, Grief, Death, Slavery, Violence, and Medical trauma

greenlivingaudioworm's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional lighthearted mysterious reflective sad

4.0

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Grief, Slavery, Violence, Colonisation, Death, Police brutality, and Racism

thereadingnurse2021's review against another edition

challenging emotional hopeful informative inspiring reflective tense fast-paced

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Grief, Racism, Slavery, Death, Gun violence, Hate crime, and Police brutality

Moderate: Chronic illness, Classism, Mass/school shootings, Colonisation, and Medical trauma

There are many content warnings for this set of poems, but that is because it is a cry for change. How can we ever make the world a better place if we do not first confront the wrongs that have been put into it? Yes, this text hurts. Yes, it will make you angry. But that’s because it’s supposed to. It is meant to inspire action.

rosalind's review against another edition

hopeful inspiring reflective slow-paced

1.5

I saw a review on Goodreads where someone called this collection ‘unbearably didactic,’ and that about sums it up for me. I can always respect someone who loves language and likes to play with words, but these linguistic games don’t always bequeath some revelatory truth. Sometimes it’s just a spoonerism, babes.

Also, for the love of Lady Gaga’s dove brooch, Amanda, please put yourself on an alliteration ban. Sometimes stylistic selections succeed, but soon a surplus can sully the savour and royally f*** off your reader. Sorry.

There are some really lovely moments in this collection, but ultimately comes across as a monopolisation on a moment, which is fine, get that dollar. I wish AG so well, and I hope her craft flourishes. But for my taste, a lot of ‘Call Us What We Carry’ should have stayed in drafts. Like, a lot.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Grief, Racism, and Police brutality

Moderate: Slavery

bookwormenthusiast's review against another edition

emotional informative reflective fast-paced

5.0

I've never been a big fan of poetry. I've always found it difficult and had horrible teachers who would not encourage my interpretation or writing of it. However, "Call Us What We Carry" has been the first poetry book that has made me fall in love with poems. I went through so many emotions while reading these poems, but above all, this book made me reflect a lot about society and history and was one of the few books that made me cry. Perhaps it's because I'm the same age as the author or because I experienced much of the same things she did (as we all did), but I found myself relating a lot to the poems, in terms of how I've been feeling throughout the entirety of this pandemic and just through life in general. It was amazing to see my emotions reflected on these pages, to finally have the words that expressed my feelings. Another reason I liked these poems was that they were also able to teach me something. To incorporate writing from history into poetry was something I have seen little of, but it offered me a new perspective of these situations.  The way Amanda Gorman writes is not only thought-provoking but allows readers to express themselves through their experiences. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Slavery and Racism

nickiholmes's review against another edition

challenging hopeful inspiring reflective medium-paced

4.5

In the future, when someone asks me to give a sense of what 2020 and 2021 were like, I'll recommend that they read this.

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Content Warnings

Minor: Slavery and Racism

liwolf's review against another edition

emotional hopeful inspiring reflective medium-paced

4.5

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Content Warnings

Minor: Colonisation, Chronic illness, Death, Grief, Gun violence, Hate crime, Mass/school shootings, Murder, Slavery, Violence, and War