Exploring Racial Identity and a Notorious Word: Something We Said by Elizabeth Stordeur Pryor

 Something We Said: Richard Pryor, a Notorious Word, and Me by Elizabeth Stordeur Pryor

Something We Said book cover

Historian, researcher, and author Dr. Elizabeth Stordeur Pryor

Many thanks to Simon & Schuster and NetGalley for sharing an advanced copy of Elizabeth Stordeur Pryor’s heartfelt and thoughtful book Something We Said: Richard Pryor, a Notorious Word, and Me. While the book is categorized as a memoir, it’s much more, as Pryor, a professor of US history and race at Smith College, shares her reflections growing up as a multiracial daughter of Richard Pryor and Maxine Silverman in the 1970s and 1980s, navigating her Black and Jewish identities as she forged a deeply loving, but complex relationship with her famous father. Blended between these childhood and adolescent memories are more recent recollections of Professor Pryor’s teaching and research and how she grapples with the notorious n-word, which her father made a staple of his comedy routines during the 1970s, reclaiming a complicated and racist term, and according to her research, shifting the term into another direction, creating a bifurcated meaning and usage. It’s a fascinating look at not only growing up multiracial at a time when racial identities seemed to be either/or, but also examining how Professor Pryor’s racial identity evolved as society and racism shifted and evolved in the 70s and 80s, helped along by her father’s fearless and groundbreaking comedy addressed race head on.

First, I’ve always loved Richard Pryor. Although my introduction to him was in some of his more forgettable 80s films (I wasn’t allowed to see his concert films until I was older), I didn’t appreciate his comedic genius until more recently, especially after reading Becoming Richard Pryor by Scott Saul. This book is more of a critical biography of Pryor’s evolution from his attempts to be the next Bill Cosby to a revolutionary comedian who embraced Black power and challenged racism and inequality through his routines and movies. While the book is excellent, it also details Pryor’s messy personal life, which in the 70s and early 80s included many relationships with women, addiction, and run-ins with police. Although Pryor became tabloid fodder, he also became the highest paid Black actor at the time, and signed studio deals that were unheard of for Black actors and writers, opening the doors for more Black creatives in Hollywood. While Professor Pryor’s book examines a similar time period, it paints a much different picture of Richard Pryor as a loving, doting father, who despite growing up in Illinois with an abusive, brutal father and a stern grandmother who served as his mother, tried his best to be an attentive and engaged father to his many children. I was nervous reading about her initial visits to Pryor, meeting him and staying at his house when she was young, and one story about bringing home the class pet was a little wild, Stordeur Pryor’s experiences show that Richard Pryor was a caring father who made many efforts to take care of Elizabeth, or Dizzy as she was called, and his other children. As their relationship develops and she spends more time with him, I was moved by how Richard involved his daughter (and other children) in his life. There are some great stories about Elizabeth playing around the house with Rain, her sister from another mother, or going to Georgia to be with Richard while he filmed Greased Lightning.

Although Professor Pryor presents a touching and heartfelt view of her father, showing how he cared for his children, she also remains observant about the racial and class differences that she experienced moving between her white Jewish mother in Boston (and later LA) and her father’s extended family and friends who also were in the house. Professor Pryor also notes that at school, her complexion and hair were different from her peers, leading to questions and occasional name calling about her racial identity. One word, whose use in her father’s home among his friends and family and on the playground directed at Professor Pryor, seemed to raise many questions for her. Professor Pryor recounts how her father (and her great-grandmother, Mama) taught her lessons about being Black in America and to be proud of her racial identity.

Nevertheless, Pryor recounts the confusion in understanding the difference between the n-words usage among her father’s friends and family and when it was directed at her on the playground or in one unfortunate recollection, from her mother. While the n-word continues to remain a complicated word with a fraught history, it wasn’t until Professor Pryor was teaching and a white student deployed the n-word in class quoting a line from Blazing Saddles that her father wrote that rekindled the complicated feelings and questions about the word. As a teacher, I loved reading these challenging classroom moments when we may have to challenge students’ misconceptions, biases, or attitudes, and show solidarity and support for students’ whose voices may be misrepresented or misunderstood. Professor Pryor not only shares this incident, but also the challenges she grapples with in trying to call attention to the word, support the Black students in her class, and establish rules and procedures for the word’s usage in class. The incident seemed to not only serve as the catalyst for Professor Pryor’s research into the history of the n-word but also reconnects her to her relationship with her father (who had passed away at this point) and listen to some of his groundbreaking comedy from the 1970s that directly confronted racism with humor and satire. Furthermore, Professor Pryor includes these interludes that trace the impact of the n-word in US history, society and popular culture. These range from examples of Frederick Douglass and Booker T. Washington to the Harlem Renaissance, Gone With the Wind, and NWA. It’s fascinating to see how this word’s use evolved and split, largely because of Richard Pryor’s comedy. Interestingly though, Professor Pryor notes that her father eventually disavowed the word in the 1980s, refusing to use the n-word in his comedy anymore. As Professor Pryor notes, it was Richard Pryor’s visit to Kenya that brought about this epiphany realizing that the word was no longer necessary to define Black people. Her recollections and memories of her father also show the evolution of a Black man and his complexities and interests that were often hidden or shoved aside for more of the tabloid fodder that the public craved from Richard Pryor’s life. I loved learning how interested Richard Pryor was in African and African American history and culture, and how his racial pride as a Black man never wavered but gradually evolved to a different kind of appreciation and insight about his identity. Professor Pryor similarly experiences her own kind of evolution of her own racial identity, as the later chapters chart her journey through college, questioning her belonging to different friend groups and navigating relationships. While the later chapters move quickly through the 80s and 90s, it’s still fascinating to read her experiences about developing her racial identity in her late adolescence and early adulthood. While this book is not necessarily an academic treatise on the n-word and racial identity, it is written by an academic, and I couldn’t help but wonder whether Professor Pryor had encountered researchers like Drs. Kenneth and Mamie Clark, whose research was used in Brown vs. The Board of Education, or Beverly Tatum, whose book Why Are All the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria? addresses similar issues of society and racial identity development among Black children and adolescents. Nevertheless, Professor Pryor also recounts the challenges of young adults leaving college and searching for their professional identities, and it was exciting to read about her challenges and how she eventually ended up as an academic studying African American History.

While I wasn’t sure what to expect with this book, it’s more than just a straightforward memoir. Professor Pryor fearlessly recounts her search for love and acceptance from her famous father but also details her own questions and quests to define her racial identity, recognizing that it’s not always an either/or, but it can be an and/also. I also didn’t expect to be so emotionally moved by this book, especially the sections that present a more tender and loving side of Richard Pryor that rarely is discussed. It’s a beautiful book about parenting as well, showing how important that kind of interest and attention can be, especially as Elizabeth sought to learn more about and connect with her famous father. However, what makes this book stand out as a unique memoir is Professor Pryor’s research and insight into the history of America’s most notorious word, which her father helped to reshape and popularize, breaking the word off from its racist connotations and injecting it into mainstream Black and popular culture. Her experiences in the classroom only further add to the complexities of this word and highlight her own complicated relationship with her father. Something We Said is the best “memoir” I’ve read this year, and it is one of the best books I’ve read so far this year. I was unable to put this down not just because it’s about Richard Pryor, but because it’s about a Black and Jewish daughter’s experience connecting with her father and navigating her racial identity in an America that is still wrestling with the color line. Highly recommended! 

Lay Down Your Soul to the Gods Rock 'n' Roll: Dark Regards by Dave Hill and Artyom Topilin

 Dark Regards 

by Dave Hill and Artyom Topilin

Dark Regards book cover

Comedian and author Dave Hill

Cover art by Artyom Topilin

Many thanks to Oni Press and NetGalley for keeping it metal with Dave Hill’s hilarious and absurd Black Metal odyssey Dark Regards. I wasn’t exactly sure what I was getting into with these 4 issues that are now combined into one volume, but when I read the description about how a stand-up comedian’s attempts to promote his fictious black metal band Witch Taint by disparaging Norwegian black metal bands, I knew I had to check this out. I was glad to see that Lords of Chaos also serves as a reference point for this book, and that author Hill was able to find the humor in the book. When I first read Lords of Chaos, I couldn’t finish it. It was so bleak and dark, but I’m glad that I returned to it a few years later and was able to read through the cannibalism and Thanatos to find the humor in how extreme these Norwegians wanted to be. Ultimately, their pursuit of Mayhem (pun intended) led to violence, murder, and church burnings as a way to prove their metal/mettle. Hill focuses more on some of the absurdities of these Scandinavian scallywags like the desire to use torches for lighting in a record store. However, Hill also maintains the threats and extremes that these bands are willing to go to in order to be the bleakest, darkest, harshest sounding band around. Plus, he creates some killer band names like Rectal Heresy, Devil’s Snot, and Odin’s Pile.

The story is a little slow to start, but once Dave is turned on to Nachthammer, Viking Colon, and Misery Buffet (more realistic sounding bands) by uber-cool record store worker Tierny, he’s visited y Lord Abscess, one of the singers who died from self-cannibalism. Again, this sounds almost like something you’d read in Lords of Chaos. Just like Dave, I sometimes can go to extremes when I hear a new genre of music, especially music that’s hard and heavy. However, Dave goes even more extreme, developing a fake band and trolling real Norwegian black metal bands, which eventually brings them to the US to hunt him down. Dave eventually gathers a group of metal maniacs to form the band Witch Taint. However, with the arrival of the Nordic Warriors, Dave and Witch Taint will have to battle these true black metalheads to prove whether they are extremely extreme. This was a really fun story to read, with lots of great references to metal, not just Norwegian black metal. Also, the artwork by Artyom Topilin was great. It’s extremely colorful, and yet the artistry really captures some of the darker elements of metal. I loved the way the Norwegians are portrayed as big and hulking. Dave’s corpse paint is also well done. Sometimes with these kinds of absurd stories the art might be overdone or too comedic, but I found a nice balance between humor and horror that helps to capture these complementary tones of the story. I especially loved the alternate covers in the back of the volume that reference classic metal albums from the likes of Iron Maiden, Judas Priest, and Dio. This was just a fun read, although I wish there was more of Lord Abscess. Hopefully there are more stories in the works about this character. Dark Regards is a fun and wild ride. Highly Recommended!

Judas Priest cover by Brian Level

Killer Eddie Cover by Brian Level

Dio Cover by Brian Level

Documenting the Trials and Tribulations of Adolescence from a Native American Perspective: The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian

 The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie

The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian book cover

Author Sherman Alexie

I just finished Sherman Alexie’s The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian, and I’m so disappointed that I only just read this book now. A good friend of mine had recommended this book several times, and I used to teach Alexie’s story “This is What in Means to Say Phoenix, Arizona,” but I cannot believe that it has taken me nearly 18 years to encounter this book. The short story was definitely one of the highlights of my short story unit, as the two characters Victor and Thomas, share a strange journey to retrieve Victor’s father’s body. There’s so much great dialogue and humor for a story about death and fractured family relationships. My students would often laugh at Alexie’s word play between the two characters and the critiques of history and racism he routinely lobs throughout the story. I didn’t even realize that this was the basis for Smoke Signals until I started reading the story to prepare for class. Nevertheless, there’s definitely some shared themes and tones between the story and the book. However, I kept thinking that Junior and Rowdy were the kinds of characters I would have loved to encounter when I was a younger reader, and I think this would be a great book to teach, especially for some reluctant male readers, who I would also imagine that they might identify with Junior’s thoughts and experiences throughout the book. I actually read it along with my son, who was looking for a book to read. I got tired of him reading the same Diary of a Wimpy Kid and Big Nate books. The book has some controversy about it—Junior is an adolescent boy who experiences a lot of challenges with his growth and development. Some of the passages were a little cringeworthy with allegations leveled at Alexie. Nevertheless, Junior’s story of leaving the Rez to attend a predominantly white and affluent school speaks to a lot of adolescents’ experiences with leaving the comfort of their family to search for their identity. However, Alexie’s perspective as an Indian allows readers to learn and attempt to understand how Junior’s own experience and the racism, both casual and overt, he experiences impacts his encounters with the white world. I loved his resilience and his continued efforts to be authentic, having others accept him as is. We also learn about Junior’s thoughts and emotions as he encounters some particularly challenging aspects of life that not all adolescents face. There are several deaths throughout the book, and as Junior notes, like many Indians, he’s attended more than 40 funerals. Despite all of these challenges, Junior faces them with humor and acceptance, often leaning on his community, whether it is his family or his newfound community of friends at Reardon, his new high school. One of the coolest points of the book is when Junior is confused about his feelings for Penelope, a popular and pretty white classmate. He asks another white friend, Gordy, to do some research about being in love with a white girl. Gordy’s search yields information about the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women Movement, and it’s a great way to raise awareness about how society often overlooks crimes against women of color, and how there are so many missing and murdered indigenous women in areas like Washington state, as well as Mexico, where Gordy is researching. I loved how Alexie enables Junior’s presence to raise awareness and learn more about people and cultures that are often left out of headlines and textbooks. The sections detailing Junior’s basketball games and his friendship and eventual competition with Rowdy are also some of the best parts of the book, and it’s also some of the elements that will be most appealing to reluctant male readers. Alexie captures some great aspects of the games and presents them in an entertaining and exciting manner.

This edition comes with great illustrations that allow readers to better understand Junior’s worldview. I loved the illustrations and how they complemented Junior’s thinking and perspectives about the world he encounters. However, the 10^th edition that I read also included a moving note from Alexie about the inspiration for the character of Rowdy. I won’t spoil too much about it, but if you happen to be able to read this edition, please do read this bonus content, especially this note from Alexie about his friend Randy J. Peone, who inspired the character of Rowdy. It’s a beautiful, funny, and elegiac piece of writing that was both touching and sad to read after this book. I highly recommend Alexie’s The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian. It’s one of those essential adolescent texts like Cisneros’ House on Mango Street and Saligner’s Catcher in the Rye, that presents the challenges and struggles of adolescence in a touching, natural and relevant manner, providing some reassurance for teens and some reminders to adults, parents, and teachers about what a difficult but important time this can be. 

Hilarious, Absurd, and Truly Trashy

 Liarmouth: A Fell-Bad Romance 

by John Waters

Liarmouth book cover

John Waters is one of the people who I have always wanted to meet. I love his movies, growing up with Cry-Baby, Hairspray, Serial Mom, and Pecker. Later on, it was so much fun watching his earlier films with friends. However, I always wanted to ask him about Polyester, which I remember my dad renting on beta when I was like in 3^rd grade. I think I watched some of it, not really knowing about Divine, and was just really confused about it. It's something that has haunted me for some time, and I’d love to know more about the making of that film and what it means to Waters. In any event, I loved this book, although it does get a little repetitive towards the end. Marsha Sprinkle is a con artist who steals luggage, and despite getting caught, continues her conning ways. The characters in this book are so ridiculous and hilarious, I’m just laughing thinking about them. As I was reading, I was laughing and giggling at how absurd some of the elements of this book were. Marsha’s mother is a pet plastic surgeon, while her daughter Poppy runs a trampoline group for adults. Beyond being completely hilarious and absurd, Waters brings his director’s eye to the novel, often describing people and events in unique and memorable ways. Like some other books by directors I’ve recently read (Anna Biller’s Bluebeard’s Castle), I think directors bring a wonderful perspective to their writing, especially creating memorable characters who display their unique personalities through their actions, looks, and clothes. I’m excited that this book is going to become a movie because I can’t wait to see how over-the-top and absurd this movie is. I’m also looking forward to a return to the big screen for John Waters. 

The Importance of Sketch Comedy- Bob Odenkirk's Memoir

 Comedy Comedy Comedy Drama 

by Bob Odenkirk

Comedy Comedy Comedy Drama book cover

Bob Odenkirk by Gage Skidmore, CC BY-SA 3.0  via Wikimedia Commons

Mr. Show

“Do something hard, something that you will probably fail at, something that tests you and excites you and take syou places you didn’t know you would ever go to. But the little brown bottle with the label worn off and swallow (metaphorically speaking).”—Bob Odenkirk’s interpretation of advice from Del Close.

Many thanks to Random House Publishing and Netgalley for making the Bob Odenkirk book Comedy Comedy Comedy Drama available to preview. I am a huge Bob Odenkirk fan, going back to his standup days and his time on the Ben Stiller Show in the early 90s. I really enjoyed reading this book because it was not only funny in Odenkirk’s absurdist style, but also made me realize how similar tastes in humor are to Odenkirk’s. I was a little surprised to see that this book wasn’t as highly rated, but I suspect that readers were more familiar with his work on Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul, or more of the dramatic parts of the book. Reading about the comedy was fun for me because I love the kind of absurdist and surreal humor he learned from Monty Python. I suppose that more readers are probably fans of Benny Hill and Hee Haw, but to each their own.

Odenkirk takes readers through his early influences, providing a brief overview of his childhood. I found his description of his father both bittersweet and funny—it was kind of sad that it sounded like his dad was not the best father, but it also seems like a lot of great comics, Odenkirk was able to use his family experiences as a source of humor and material for some of his other characters, especially the more manic and angry men from his sketch work in Mr. Show. I also really liked learning about his experiences in college and developing his writing and love for sketch comedy with a radio show. I remember making comedy tapes and audio sketches with friends in high school, so this was like a relevant, rite of passage for me. Some of the best sections were about the improv classes he took with Del Close, someone who I wasn’t familiar with, but apparently was really influential on the initial cast of SNL. I loved the lesson Odenkirk took from Close, who, according to Odenkirk, would buy old bottles of prescription medication and try them, unsure of what they were.

It was also really amazing to learn about Odenkirk’s experience on different sketch comedy shows—which, in my opinion, is always the best kind of comedy. I didn’t know too much about his time on SNL, but I realized that this was about the time I was in middle school and high school, when SNL was like a can’t miss show. I also didn’t know that he was responsible for one of my favorite characters, Matt Foley, Chris Farley’s motivational, scared straight speaker. I also didn’t know that Odenkirk was a writer for Get a Life, one of my all-time favorite Fox shows. In fact, reading this book made me remember how funny Fox used to be—with so many great, cutting edge shows like Get a Life and The Ben Stiller Show, as well as another ground breaking comedy show—In Living Color. In any event, it was exciting to learn that Odenkirk was a part of so many shows that I really enjoyed and made me laugh so much in adolescence.

However, I have to say that I really got to know Odenkirk from his work with David Cross on Mr. Show. I remember having video copies of the show since it was on HBO and I didn’t have cable at the time; we would have viewing parties with the same episodes—like the Mountain Man Olympics and New San Francisco. These were probably my favorite chapters to read in the book since Odenkirk takes readers into the creative process, as well as exploring how the show came about and how other actors on the show became involved. I also loved reading about how he got involved with directing and producing, showing how he took Del Close’s advice on taking risks and not being afraid to fail. One of the other sections I really liked was learning about his involvement with Tim and Eric, another sketch comedy duo who share the kind of absurdity and strange dad humor that Odenkirk has. I remember hearing Cinco ads for the first time and thinking the voice sounded familiar.

The later chapters on Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul are also really enlightening. It was interesting to learn about how Odenkirk became involved in the show, and how popular Jimmy/Saul became. Again, I think it shows that Odenkirk is really a creative artist who is unafraid of risks and trying things that are different. It is kind of surprising that this is what he is known for now. However, I still love his comedy work, going back to the “Lincoln, Lincoln” routine. This was a really fun book, and I loved that he included the asides to readers and the kind of anger directed to his haters throughout the book. The alternate titles at the end are also hilarious. This was such a great, fun read. Can’t wait to read more and see more from a true comic genius.

 PS - For the past 12 years, around the time that Saul Goodman appeared on Breaking Bad, I have been stopped by random people who ask me if I am Bob Odenkirk. It's become something kind of humorous between me and my wife. When someone says-- "Has anyone ever told you..." I'm able to predict what they will say. In fact, on a recent trip to Hawaii, a tour guide said "You look familiar"-- so I said-- "People always say I look like Bob Odenkirk-- Saul Goodman" and he was like "Yeah! That's it..." It ended up that the tour guide was from the same state and general area that we were from Really weird. But like 4 people asked me about Bob Odenkirk on the trip, so I was also excited to read this book since I share a resemblance to him. What do you think? 

Me in Chicago, home of Bob Odenkirk