Summary Of Between The World And Me

Between The World And Me is a contemporary essay written in the form a letter to his son, Samori, from the author Ta-Nehisi Coates. In this letter, Coates, goes to extreme lengths to share certain aspects of what it is like to grow up with a black body in America. Inspired heavily by James Baldwin’s The Fire Next Time, Coates interprets what it means to navigate the landscape of being black in America. Like Baldwin, he brings a harsh critique to light as he explores the meaning of black bodies that are subject to injustice. In his exploration of black bodies, The Mecca and the death of his classmate, Prince Jones, he locates black life in a perspective that is unique but yet troubling. Throughout the entire text Coates makes intentional efforts

It was at the Mecca, known to most as Howard University that Coates began to see and experience culture. It was in this plethora of minds where he begins to experience people that were searching for something bigger than the block that they lived on. Interestingly, it was not in the classroom where he found a familiar solace but it was on the Yard and the library where Coates would find his calling. It was on the Yard where he began to see that his “black world was expanding” and the “world was more than a photonegative of that of people who believe they are white.” Simply stated, it affirms to him that black people came in different shades with different backgrounds. Coates shares that his time in the Mooreland-Spingarn Research Library was another entity of “The Mecca” that was part of his overall formation. He writes, “I was made for the library not the classroom. The classroom was a jail of other people’s interest.” It was through these places and people that he began honing his skills of interrogation of black life in

It is very noticeable as he attends the funeral of his murdered comrade, Prince Jones. He sees other in grief but he cannot find it in himself to share in the same “grieving rituals” that would lead to some form of forgiveness for the police officer. He later writes, “The killer was the direct expression of all his country’s beliefs. And raised conscious, in rejection of a Christian God, I could see no higher purpose in Prince’s death.” For Coates this death was illogical because he believed that Jones embodied the very essence of what a Christian should resemble. Jones displayed characteristics that Coates’ could identify as godly as he labeled him a “one of one.” This death thus made it impossible for him to offer forgiveness because even the forgiveness he did not think could feel the