A review by saroz162
My Song: A Memoir by Michael Shnayerson, Harry Belafonte

4.0

Great memoir. I knew very little about Belafonte beyond his famous performances and a few civil rights headlines, so I was really pleased that the majority of the book focused on his activism and the relationships he built or burnt in a somewhat single-minded pursuit of equality. (I particularly enjoyed his unconventional, and very human, portrait of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.) He doesn't shy away from his own ego, but he's smart enough, in most places, to admit where he made mistakes. It starts to feel a bit glossy and shallow toward the end, post-1970s, when Belafonte seems to have mostly mutated into a celebrity ambassador and producer; he's less willing to be critical of his own stance, and more interested in knowing how long his influence was felt in both the activism and entertainment communities. By that point, though, the rest of his story has been so strong, he's earned it.