Popular Author James McBride Shares His Insights at UK
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LEXINGTON, Ky. (Sept. 30, 2009) − Some might think "The Color of Water" is a unusual title for a
book, especially when its subtitle is "A Black Man's Tribute to His White Mother." But
James McBride, the author of this memoir that became
a two-year fixture on the New York Times bestseller list, is by no one's definition a usual
man.
In addition to being the author of a 300-page book that critics have praised as a new American classic, McBride is a musician (the talented saxophonist of his own jazz and R&B band); a screenwriter (his first book, "Miracle at St. Anna," became a Spike Lee-directed, Disney/Touchstone released film); a successful songwriter (of both music and lyrics); and a former staff writer/journalist/stringer (with The Boston Globe, People Magazine, The Washington Post, Essence, Rolling Stone, National Geographic and The New York Times).
The one thing McBride cannot do is dance. In fact, his Website biography freely admits, "James is the worst dancer in the history of African Americans, bar none, going back to slavetime and beyond. He is legally barred from dancing at any party he attends. He dances with one finger in the air like a white guy."
But it is McBride's poignant childhood search for racial identity and a deeper understanding of his mother, himself, his family and the world around him, that convinced the University of Kentucky to chose "The Color of Water: A Black Man's Tribute to His White Mother" as the book for its first Common Reading Experience.
A collaborative effort between the Office of New Student and Parent Programs in the Division of Student Affairs and the Office of the Provost, the Common Reading Experience program was designed to introduce new students to academic life at UK. The goal is to bring new students together before they even step foot on campus. All incoming freshmen were required to read the same book with the goal of sharing their impressions in a casually structured academic setting prior to the start of classes. A second goal is to engage the entire UK community in a common intellectual experience through year-long programming.
Now, after thousands of student, faculty and staff have read his book, after those same people spent an hour one hot and muggy August morning sharing their impressions of his work, and after hundreds of UK freshmen wrote one of their first collegiate papers about his book, McBride will visit the UK campus Oct. 1 to speak at the Singletary Center for the Arts Concert Hall from 7:15 to 8:15 p.m. His talk entitled "The Color of Water: Meditations on Identity" is free and open to the public.
What could one expect of an evening with author James McBride?
Perhaps it will be the popular recounting of how the book earned its name – how a painfully innocent James, walking home from Sunday service at their Brooklyn Baptist church, asked his Jewish mother "whether God was black or white." Every mother alive can identify with her sigh and her patient answers to a bright child's rapid-fire questions that culminate in her now-famous response. "God is the color of water. Water doesn't have a color."
The young, naive James "bought that" back then, and an older, wiser Mr. McBride obviously still does.
In addition to being the author of a 300-page book that critics have praised as a new American classic, McBride is a musician (the talented saxophonist of his own jazz and R&B band); a screenwriter (his first book, "Miracle at St. Anna," became a Spike Lee-directed, Disney/Touchstone released film); a successful songwriter (of both music and lyrics); and a former staff writer/journalist/stringer (with The Boston Globe, People Magazine, The Washington Post, Essence, Rolling Stone, National Geographic and The New York Times).
The one thing McBride cannot do is dance. In fact, his Website biography freely admits, "James is the worst dancer in the history of African Americans, bar none, going back to slavetime and beyond. He is legally barred from dancing at any party he attends. He dances with one finger in the air like a white guy."
But it is McBride's poignant childhood search for racial identity and a deeper understanding of his mother, himself, his family and the world around him, that convinced the University of Kentucky to chose "The Color of Water: A Black Man's Tribute to His White Mother" as the book for its first Common Reading Experience.
A collaborative effort between the Office of New Student and Parent Programs in the Division of Student Affairs and the Office of the Provost, the Common Reading Experience program was designed to introduce new students to academic life at UK. The goal is to bring new students together before they even step foot on campus. All incoming freshmen were required to read the same book with the goal of sharing their impressions in a casually structured academic setting prior to the start of classes. A second goal is to engage the entire UK community in a common intellectual experience through year-long programming.
Now, after thousands of student, faculty and staff have read his book, after those same people spent an hour one hot and muggy August morning sharing their impressions of his work, and after hundreds of UK freshmen wrote one of their first collegiate papers about his book, McBride will visit the UK campus Oct. 1 to speak at the Singletary Center for the Arts Concert Hall from 7:15 to 8:15 p.m. His talk entitled "The Color of Water: Meditations on Identity" is free and open to the public.
What could one expect of an evening with author James McBride?
Perhaps it will be the popular recounting of how the book earned its name – how a painfully innocent James, walking home from Sunday service at their Brooklyn Baptist church, asked his Jewish mother "whether God was black or white." Every mother alive can identify with her sigh and her patient answers to a bright child's rapid-fire questions that culminate in her now-famous response. "God is the color of water. Water doesn't have a color."
The young, naive James "bought that" back then, and an older, wiser Mr. McBride obviously still does.