selketjewett 's review for:

King: A Life by Jonathan Eig

4.5

informative medium-paced

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Filled in some of the gaps in my knowledge about the Civil Rights movement. King emerges as a complicated, multifaceted, and very human character. A lot of it made me think about how in our social media age, King would very likely not be allowed near the leadership of a movement, which makes me think about the decline of boots on the ground activism in our digital age and all of the discourse that happened then about him and how if King were active today the discourse would be overwhelming. Also the role of the U.S. government and how everything is always so much more complicated than anyone wants it to be and that’s what makes everything, including and especially positive change, so hard.