Friends of the Library Book Discussion - February 15th

The next event in the The Friends of the Michael Schwartz Library 2022/2023 Book Discussion Series is Wednesday, February 15th at 12 noon - in person or via Zoom.  Our book discussions are free and open to all: faculty, staff, students and the general public. Register here for location or Zoom link. Join us!
 

Recitatif: A Story by Toni Morrison
February 15, 2023 
12:00 pm - 1:30 pm 
Location: TBD (includes in-person and Zoom options). Please register here to receive location and Zoom details.

A beautiful story about race and the relationships that shape us through life by the legendary Nobel Prize winner - for the first time in a beautifully produced stand-alone edition.

In this 1983 short story—the only short story Morrison ever wrote—we meet Twyla and Roberta, who have known each other since they were eight years old and spent four months together as roommates in St. Bonaventure shelter. Inseparable then, they lose touch as they grow older, only later to find each other again at a diner, a grocery store, and again at a protest. Seemingly at opposite ends of every problem, and at each other's throats each time they meet, the two women still cannot deny the deep bond their shared experience has forged between them.
 
Another work of genius by this masterly writer, Recitatif keeps Twyla's and Roberta's races ambiguous throughout the story. Morrison herself described Recitatif, a story which will keep readers thinking and discussing for years to come, as "an experiment in the removal of all racial codes from a narrative about two characters of different races for whom racial identity is crucial." We know that one is white and one is Black, but which is which? And who is right about the race of the woman the girls tormented at the orphanage?
 
A remarkable look into what keeps us together and what keeps us apart, and how perceptions are made tangible by reality, Recitatif is a gift to readers in these changing times.   —Amazon

Discussion Leader: Richard Fox, Member, Friends of the Library

Wednesday, February 15th, 2023
12:00 noon - 1:30 p.m.
IN PERSON or VIA ZOOM - Register here for a Zoom link

Friends of the Library book discussions are free and open to all CSU faculty, staff, and students and the general public.
Contact Barbara Loomis at b.i.loomis@csuohio.edu for more information.

Visit the Friends of the Library Events Page for details about the full series, and other Friends events
Download our brochure (PDF) for more information about the Friends.