Heads of the Colored People: Stories
黒人中産階級の生活、学校、職場、オンライン文化を、風刺と不穏さを交えて描く短編集。自己表象、人種的ステレオタイプ、家族や共同体の期待が絡み合い、登場人物たちの痛みと可笑しさが鋭く浮かび上がる。
作品情報
鋭い風刺とユーモアで、現代の黒人アイデンティティを多面的に描く短編集。
『Heads of the Colored People』は、いわゆるポスト人種社会のなかで黒人であることがどのように見られ、演じられ、誤読されるのかを、複数の短編で描く。日常的な会話やネット上のふるまいの細部から、階級、教育、身体、親子関係にひそむ緊張を浮かび上がらせる作品である。
書籍情報
- 出版社
- 37 Ink
- 発売日
- 2018-04-10
- ページ数
- 224ページ
- 言語
- 英語
- サイズ
- 13.97 x 2.29 x 21.27 cm
- ISBN-13
- 9781501167997
- ISBN-10
- 1501167995
- 価格
- 6815 JPY
- カテゴリ
- 洋書/Literature & Fiction/Short Stories/Single Author
Longlisted for the National Book Award for Fiction and Kirkus Prize Finalist Calling to mind the best works of Paul Beatty and Junot Díaz, this collection of moving, timely, and darkly funny stories examines the concept of black identity in this so-called post-racial era. A stunning new talent in literary fiction, Nafissa Thompson-Spires grapples with black identity and the contemporary middle class in these compelling, boundary-pushing vignettes. Each captivating story plunges headfirst into the lives of new, utterly original characters. Some are darkly humorous—from two mothers exchanging snide remarks through notes in their kids’ backpacks, to the young girl contemplating how best to notify her Facebook friends of her impending suicide—while others are devastatingly poignant—a new mother and funeral singer who is driven to madness with grief for the young black boys who have fallen victim to gun violence, or the teen who struggles between her upper middle class upbringing and her desire to fully connect with black culture. Thompson-Spires fearlessly shines a light on the simmering tensions and precariousness of black citizenship. Her stories are exquisitely rendered, satirical, and captivating in turn, engaging in the ongoing conversations about race and identity politics, as well as the vulnerability of the black body. Boldly resisting categorization and easy answers, Nafissa Thompson-Spires is an original and necessary voice in contemporary fiction.
Nafissa Thompson-Spires earned a doctorate in English from Vanderbilt University and a Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing from the University of Illinois. Her work has appeared in Story Quarterly, Lunch Ticket, and The Feminist Wire , among other publications. She was a 2016 fellow of the Callaloo Writer’s Workshop.
レビュー
-
A literary blast of a book!
Wow! What a fabulous book. I generally don’t like short stories, but to me this read like a book with not quite stand alone chapters. The writing is sharp, clever, funny, sometimes dark and macabre, always edgy. I am thrilled to have stumbled across a ‘new’ author with so much to say and exceptional skills and intellect with which to say it. As a black American writer writing about black Americans the stories are of course about race, but never JUST about race. The characterization of even the unlikeable characters, is so thorough, so empathetically explored, that we inhabit their heads, hearts and bodies in a few pages. I can’t wait for more!
-
Read, read and be surprised
Enthralling and still reading but grateful for purchase
-
Mind opening and altering in the best way
A tapestry of stories that will weave together understanding, insight and humor. It's hard to pick a favor with so many stories to pull from but I would have to say my favorite so far is suicide watch. I recommend this to all my friends that love to get lost in the pages.
-
so sharp and clever
Okay, wow. This is a phenomenal collection about people struggling to forge a sense of identity in a modern world. The characters are all black, and so the topic of black identity (and black bodies) is front and center. The subjects are all contemporary, a mix of cutting satire and poignant realism: the two mothers exchanging passive aggressive notes via their daughters, a family of new age fruititarians filming a reality show, a high school girl who records ASMR videos, a narcissistic woman contemplating suicide for the Facebook likes, a funeral singer struggling to cope with the number of black bodies lost to gun violence. I’m always thrilled when I pick up a book blurbed by George Saunders. These stories certainly have echoes of Saunders’ and David Foster Wallace’s post-modern fiction, but they never, ever come across as derivative. Thompson-Spires plays around with form and structure in such a sharp way while never losing site of the subjects of each story. I loved this collection to the point of giddiness.
-
Excellent book
This was very well written and allowed the reader to delve in to the depths perspectives and perceptions that exist but are never mentioned. It highlighted the racial stereotypes that subtly and sometimes not so subtly exist in the undertones of society.
関連する文学賞
- ロサンゼルス・タイムズ ブック賞 第39回（2018年） ・Winner