I decided to read The Origin of Others by Toni Morrison because I needed wisdom to ground me in this time of chaos. Morrison’s nonfiction is always relevant and it pushes me into deeper understandings of the world around me. Playing in the Dark is one of the most important books I’ve read, and The Origin of Others, which is based on her Norton Lectures, builds on some of the ideas in Playing in the Dark. As an English teacher, I love reading literary analysis, especially when that analysis challenges interpretations of the canon. Morrison helps me view texts through the lens of race, and in this text, the broader concept of othering. My goal is to teach more works by Morrison this year, especially “Recatitif.”
Now for shelf #26!
I will be reading all the books by Nnedi Okorafor that I haven’t read yet. I’m proud to say that the only reason some of her books are unread is because I turned one of my students into a fan, and I let her borrow all of them! She read through all the books in my classroom library, and then the ones on my personal shelf.
Books I’ve read:
- Haruki Murakami Kafka on the Shore
- Haruki Murakami Men Without Women
- Vladimir Nabokov Lolita
- Sequoia Nagamatsu How High We Go in the Dark
- Solomon Northrup 12 Years a Slave
- Omolola Ijeoma Ogunyemi Jollof Rice and Other Revolutions: A Novel in Interlocking Stories
- Nnedi Okorafor Noor
- Michael Ondaatje Anil’s Ghost
- Michael Ondaatje Divisadero
- Michael Ondaatje The English Patient