This collection of fourteen essays is written in an ornate style that shouldn’t obscure their enduring relevance, one hundred twenty years after the book appeared. Not that everything has remained the same since then—even Du Bois developed and changed his thinking over time. Perhaps conditions are not precisely as rendered in the two essays based on his sociological fieldwork in Dougherty County, in southwest Georgia. Nevertheless, they brought to mind and helped me understand what my child’s eyes took in uncomprehendingly sixty-five, seventy years ago as we drove the pre-Interstate Georgia roads.
Perhaps the felt relevance indicates that material change can outpace change in attitude and perception.
One of my favorite essays dealt with the history of the Black church. Another, on the death at eighteen months of his firstborn, was a poignant, bitter expression of the divided soul of the Black man.
Reading this book, I was struck again by the thought that accompanied me throughout my visit to the Smithsonian African American History and Culture Museum. No matter which side of what Du Bois calls “the Veil” we find ourselves on, this is our story. This is a book about and for all of us. ( )

second edition

While interesting to see what has changed (and sadly note what has not), I found that these essays didn't impact me the way [a:Zora Neale Hurston|15151|Zora Neale Hurston|https://d.gr-assets.com/authors/1194472605p2/15151.jpg]'s [b:Their Eyes Were Watching God|37415|Their Eyes Were Watching God|Zora Neale Hurston|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1368072803s/37415.jpg|1643555] or [a:Alice Walker|7380|Alice Walker|https://d.gr-assets.com/authors/1406752585p2/7380.jpg]'s [b:The Color Purple|11486|The Color Purple|Alice Walker|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1386925078s/11486.jpg|3300573] did. I guess I relate to the more intimate personal lives shown in novels than the same situation shown in aggregate form in nonfiction. The parts I liked best were the ones that dealt with individuals, such as 'Of the Coming of John'. ( )

See the Kindle edition for my review of the content. For this audiobook edition, I might give 2½ stars.

Mirron Willis's narration may have played a role in my feelings for the book, as his deep slow voice was soporific. I had to speed up the narration to 2x to get what felt like normal speed to me. Even at that speed, I had difficulty focusing on the narration and frequently ended up reading along to force my attention to the text. ( )

Sometimes a book just blows my mind. This is one of them!

To think that this book, with the most cogent explanation of the race situation in the US, was written over one hundred years ago is just astounding. That a black man was so well educated in the US at the start of the twentieth century was a surprise. That any person, surrounded by such prejudice, could produce such an honest book leaves me almost speechless.

Du Bois is honest about the failings of his fellows, both black and white. He manages to write without the venom that I know that would fill my prose, were I to live under such injustice.

And yet, and yet... I have still to pronounce its greatest achievement. When one reads a book and thinks, "I should have known that": it indicates that the facts are self evidently true.

How can this book be so little known? Were it a set book - not just in America, but in England and probably every other country too, then racism would become a thing of the past in no time. ( )