A Little Devil in America : In Praise of Black Performance

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Winner of the Gordon Burn PrizeWinner of the 2022 Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence in NonfictionFinalist for the National Book Critics Circle AwardFinalist for the Pen/Diamonstein-Spievogel Award for the Art of the EssayShortlisted for the National Book AwardA New York Times, Financial Times, New Statesman, TIME, Vulture, Chicago Tribune and Pitchfork Book of the Year ‘Gorgeous’ – Brit Bennett’Pure genius’ – Jacqueline Woodson’One of the most dynamic books I have ever read’ – Clint SmithAt the March on Washington, Josephine Baker reflected on her life and her legacy. She had spent decades as one of the most successful entertainers in the world, but, she told the crowd, “I was a devil in other countries, and I was a little devil in America, too”. Inspired by these words, Hanif Abdurraqib has written a stirring meditation on Black performance in the modern age, in which culture, history and his own lived experience collide.

With sharp insight, humour and heart, Abdurraqib explores a sequence of iconic and intimate performances that take him from mid-century Paris to the moon — and back down again, to a cramped living room in Columbus, Ohio. Each one, he shows, has layers of resonance across Black and white cultures, the politics of American empire, and his own personal history of love and grief — whether it’s the twenty-seven seconds of ‘Gimme Shelter’ in which Merry Clayton sings, or the magnificent hours of Aretha Franklin’s homegoing; Beyonce’s Super Bowl show or a schoolyard fistfight; Dave Chapelle’s skits or a game of spades among friends.