Overview
Continuing the candid autobiography begun in Mary, this book is an uncompromising account of what it was like to be black, highly educated, and independent in the South during the 1950s and 1960s. Mary Mebane recounts her years as a high school teacher, college instructor, Ph.D. student, and finally, professor. Despite her achievements, she believes that she will never really be accepted in any community, black or white.
Mary, Wayfarer chronicles Mebane's struggle to create meaning in her life, her pride as a participant in and observer of the black freedom struggle, her encounters with such important figures as Ralph Ellison, James Baldwin, and Malcolm X, and her joy upon finally discovering what she calls "the gulf stream" of her life, writing.
Synopsis
Continuing the candid autobiography begun in Mary, this book is an uncompromising account of what it was like to be black, highly educated, and independent in the South during the 1950s and 1960s. Mary Mebane recounts her years as a high school teacher, college instructor, Ph.D. student, and finally, professor, her encounters with such important figures as Ralph Ellison, James Baldwin, and Malcolm X, and her joy upon finally discovering what she calls "the gulf stream" of her life, writing.
Library Journal
Mebane's two-volume autobiography "is told through a series of vignettes of life in a rural black community and of [the] struggle to rise above her environment without repudiating it." LJ's reviewer found that while the "prose is simple, the concepts expressed are complex," giving the duo "historical as well as literary value" (LJ 1/1/81). Copyright 1999 Cahners Business Information.
Editorials
From the Publisher
Not romanticizing the black world nor anathematizing the white, Mebane's memoir exposes hard realities of both.Los Angeles Times Book Review
[Mebane's story is] told honestly and poignantly.
Hornbook