The new memoir by Cornel West is a fascinating look at one of America's most controversial figures.
“I’m a bluesman in the life of the mind and a jazzman in the world of ideas.” With those words, Cornel West begins his long-awaited, music-saturated memoir, Brother West: Living and Loving Out Loud (SmileyBooks). Though at times rambling and unfocused, the book presents the brilliant, controversial Princeton professor in a completely original way. As a bluesman, he is determined to tell the whole story; refusing to “sanitize or deodorize,” he tells his story to “unapologetically reveal [his] broken life as a thing of beauty.”
West’s childhood in Sacramento had a deep impact on his life’s direction. Most profoundly, he says he “cannot overstate the importance of [his] relationship with Jesus Christ and my relationship to books in developing my character.” His faith was developed in the context of his family, another profound influence, neither of which fades into the background. His love of literature opens his mind to viewpoints beyond California conservatives (Reagan era) and the Black Panther Party, beyond American culture, racism and into a worldwide school of philosophy..
His journey to the East Coast to study at Harvard, then Princeton, and a long line of distinguished academics that he befriended kept his mind “running, always running.” The more recent the memories, the more effectively West wades through his personal and professional narrative. Musicians, academics and politicians all are characters in a vast drama of successes and failures: sleeping in Central Park (1979, after graduating from Harvard and Princeton), living in luxury at a hotel for his safety, bouncing between Ivy League schools, teaching on two continents in the same semester, three marriages and three divorces and two kids. To say West has lived a colorful life is an understatement, and trying to describe it in two paragraphs would be similar to reducing Da Vinci to finger painting.
Perhaps most fascinating is West’s unabashed love for Christ and how his faith has impacted each step he has taken. When his prose is at its best, he describes it like this: “My understanding of Jesus Christ went like this: Everything comes beneath the cross – nationalism, tribalism, patriotism, networks, even kinships. The cross is that critical juncture where catastrophe defines our condition and offers salvation, not in the name of a specific ideology or theology, but in the simple name of love.” His desire to follow Christ in service to the “least of these” has driven his political agenda and personal scholarship.
Never one to back away from controversy, West is outspoken in his critique of others, more specifically, political figures. He calls Gulf Oil a “colonialist exploiter and amoral force in the international marketplace.” He says “Reagan made it fashionable to be indifferent to the poor and gave permission to be greedy with little or no conscience.” The Bush “Ice Age” gets even harsher words. Yet, true to form, the Left gets critiqued as well; saying Clinton “blew it” with his neglect of the poor and calling out black leaders who made arguments solely based on skin color, while ignoring other marginalized groups.
When writing his memoir, West’s friend and publisher Tavis Smiley told him, “We want to get to know the real you … Explore the mystery, just tell us who you are.” The pages dive deeper than anyone in the general public and perhaps even West’s friends would know, yet the area of his love life was left under-explored. We get historical details on his relationships, but few true insights as to why they didn’t work. Often the silence speaks just as loudly as what was said.
The other weakness of the book is also one of its greatest strengths. While most of his works are written in an academic voice, this one strove to achieve a conversational tone. At times, this worked well, breaking down complex philosophical ideas and hosting a literary version of a “Kickin’ It With Cornel” radio show. Other times, it led to jumping between past and present tenses and adding superfluous adjectives and name-dropping, random stories that didn’t enlighten or provide insight.
“My story, like all of our stories, is a work in progress. At several junctures, in several ways, it breaks down. That’s because, as a cracked vessel, I break down. I try to love my crooked neighbor with my crooked heart. I try to rid myself of prejudices, but always fall short.” It is this sort of honesty and prose that ultimately makes Brother West not only a worthwhile read, but a book that we learn from and see pieces of our own story.
