BLACK WHITE AND JEWISH Autobiography of a Shifting Self by Rebecca Walker

Finished Fr 6/16/17 This trade paperback I found abandoned on the Nautilus floor at Club West. The book at been there for over a week so I liberated it; late Spring, 2017

The author is the daughter of Alice Walker, Pulitzer, THE COLOR PURPLE, and Melvyn Roseman Leventhal, a civil rights attorney. They married in 1967 and Rebecca was born in 1969, and she retained the last name of Leventhal until late in her teen years (this is covered in the book).

At her birth the Leventhal's were living in Jackson, MI where Alice Walker was a writer in residence and Mel was working in the Civil Rights Movement. The couple divorced in 1976 and Rebecca lived with her parents in a split custody arrangement- two years with each parent. That struck me as very odd, and I don't think I've ever heard of two years in one household and then two years in another.

Rebecca lived in-
Jackson, MI
Washington, DC
San Francisco, CA
Bronx, NY
In her late teens she traveled extensively with her mother and on her own. A visit to Bali is mentioned in the book.

Mel married Judy and Judy became Rebecca's step mother. This was a Jewish household and after the Bronx, they settled in Larchmont, NY which is an upper middle class suburb.

The book documents her feeling of 'not fitting in'. She was too Black for the Whites, and too White for the Blacks.

When she was born, it was illegal to have an interracial baby, but her parents thought that Rebecca would inherit the best of both worlds, however this apparently didn't happen. I guess Rebecca understands their optimism, but realizes that it was a bit misguided.

For marrying a black woman her father was disowned and for marrying a white man her mother was called a traitor.

The core thesis of the book-

"What do we become when we put down the scripts written by history and memory, when each person before us can be seen free of the cultural or personal narrative we've inherited or devised?" p.307

Alice Walker's page at wikipedia-

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alice_Walker

Rebecca Walker's page at wikipedia-

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rebecca_Walker

The book at amazon-

https://www.amazon.com/Black-White-Jewish-Autobiography-Shifting/dp/1573229075