And yes, I recommend Eight Years in Power SO highly! I'd read one or two of the essays before, but having them all put together in an arc like that (it's one essay for each year of Obama's presidency, essentially) was really powerful. Ta-Nehisi Coates is an amazing combination of brilliant, terrifyingly insightful, extremely clear-eyed about everything that's wrong with the world, but also somehow not giving in to nihilism. Have you read Between the World and Me, also?
(I also can't help being really curious what it would be like to read Eight Years in Power as not an American... For an American, it's a sickening gut punch of, oh god, this is everything we're still doing so deeply wrong. For a European, I wonder if it would feel as visceral, or if it would feel a bit more anthropological? You certainly don't have to answer that, though I'd also be curious to know what you think of the book if you do read it!)
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And yes, I recommend Eight Years in Power SO highly! I'd read one or two of the essays before, but having them all put together in an arc like that (it's one essay for each year of Obama's presidency, essentially) was really powerful. Ta-Nehisi Coates is an amazing combination of brilliant, terrifyingly insightful, extremely clear-eyed about everything that's wrong with the world, but also somehow not giving in to nihilism. Have you read Between the World and Me, also?
(I also can't help being really curious what it would be like to read Eight Years in Power as not an American... For an American, it's a sickening gut punch of, oh god, this is everything we're still doing so deeply wrong. For a European, I wonder if it would feel as visceral, or if it would feel a bit more anthropological? You certainly don't have to answer that, though I'd also be curious to know what you think of the book if you do read it!)