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A review by seilahuh
Soul on Ice by Eldridge Cleaver
challenging
emotional
medium-paced
0.0
i can't believe so many people put their stock in a rapist because he could write and had read a few books. especially believing these acts changed him rather than gave him new material to cover his charges in, ameliorating, and diagnosing them as symptom of white supremacist sickness, as excuse for "past" crimes. the novel is supposed to be demonstration of how much his solitude in prison has changed him for the better, and yet first there is no real apology. which even still would be worthless cause there is no apology for rape and the misogynoirist, horrific violence he did to black women as "practice" for white women who he remains grossly obsessed with even through his supposed awakening. he's supposedly changed for the better, and the collection is supposed to be integral for this perspective of his, but the novel is laden with hatred even after this "growth". every black person more vulnerable—lesbians, gays, women—than cleaver is a target for this hate he covers as revolutionary critique or hand holding for these 'misled' people who just existing are more dangerous and helpful to white supremacy than himself, who was actually a rapist and terror to them.
there is no world where i give such a disgusting piece any rating but a zero. there is nothing to be taken from this but irrefutable proof that rapists are not redeemable. his later trajectory (which was predictable) only casts an uglier shadow onto so called revolutionaries who ever exalted, saved, and platformed a man so obviously self-concerned, individualist, and evil to the core not because of racism which is malignant and genocidal. but because he as a man desired to be a complete oppressor, from rape to presidency. his only inhibitor was blackness he felt kept him from his right to take and have and rape unrepentantly, just like the white man. this story should have never been freed from folsom, and neither should cleaver.
there is no world where i give such a disgusting piece any rating but a zero. there is nothing to be taken from this but irrefutable proof that rapists are not redeemable. his later trajectory (which was predictable) only casts an uglier shadow onto so called revolutionaries who ever exalted, saved, and platformed a man so obviously self-concerned, individualist, and evil to the core not because of racism which is malignant and genocidal. but because he as a man desired to be a complete oppressor, from rape to presidency. his only inhibitor was blackness he felt kept him from his right to take and have and rape unrepentantly, just like the white man. this story should have never been freed from folsom, and neither should cleaver.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Hate crime, Homophobia, Misogyny, Sexual assault, Violence, and Lesbophobia
Moderate: Rape
you will really not like this book, as i didn't, if you can't stand rapists.