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Harris lived in Harlem until he was ten years old, when his family moved to the suburbs. This separation enhances Harris's ability to write a critical memoir of Harlem, which he later describes as a "metaphor for black America," but this distance comes at a price. Much of Still Life in Harlem is concerned with the author's own alienation from the neighborhood, and at a deeper level, his alienation from himself. Harris returned to Harlem by choice, yet he cannot help but find the place in many ways disagreeable and disheartening. The situation again calls to mind the resounding words of DuBois, "Why did God make me an outcast and a stranger in mine own house?" Harris is possessed with the second sight DuBois called "double-consciousness" the means to know the world through the judgments of others, or the habit "of measuring one's soul by the tape of a world that looks on in amused contempt." Harris's book is not without its flaws in execution, but it tells an important story in a strong and moving voice.
From Publishers Weekly
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.
