Down on The Shore: The People and Place That Forged a Poet's Voice - Hardcover

Holden, Adele V.

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1891521047 ISBN 13: 9781891521041

Publisher: Woodholme House Pub, 1999

Synopsis

Book by Holden, Adele V.

About this title

From Publishers Weekly

Brought up in a rural African-American community on the Eastern Shore of Maryland, Holden was the second of five children raised during the Great Depression by parents who, despite the crippling burdens of poverty, segregation and discrimination, fought for their children to have an education. The emotional power of her story offsets the occasionally awkward writing and Holden's heavy reliance on verbatim representations of conversations that took place decades ago. Holden's father, Snow, was angered because the local "colored school" ended at the ninth grade. After he suggested to the mayor that black children be permitted to continue at the white school, Holden's mother, Jane, dreamed that he was forcibly abducted by several white men who threatened to drown him in a nearby river. Despite this terrifying vision and the lynchings of several black men in the area, Snow courageously persisted, eventually winning a compromise in which 15 children stayed on for an additional year at the "colored school" on a one-time only basis. Holden effectively conveys the climate of fear that suffused her childhood, while also emphasizing the parental love that sustained her (her portrait of a family Christmas is particularly evocative). This is a moving tribute to two unsung heroes: Holden's mother, who took in washing, and Snow, an auto mechanic who spent hours driving Holden (who later became a teacher and a poet) back and forth to the nearest segregated school so that she could finish high school. B&w photos. (Nov.)
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal

In the early pages of this Depression-era memoir of life on Maryland's Eastern Shore, Holden's Uncle Ray tells her that "old folks use t'say if ever last Negro 'round here up and told all they know about all the meanness white folks done to us, not even the short-half'd be told." Holden's parents, auto mechanic Snow Holden and his wife, Jane, decided that they wanted three things in lifeAa home of their own, college educations for their children, and racial equalityAand this is the inspiring story of their struggle to achieve all three. The author is an inactive poet (her sole collection, Figurine and Other Poems, appeared in 1961), and despite the misleading subtitle, this is more a story about the value of education than the making of a writer's life. It is also a book that should be strenuously avoided by dieters; sumptuous family meals were another key component of the Holdens' strategy for collective success, and phrases like "after second helpings of lemon meringue pie" occur distressingly (or seductively) often.ADavid Kirby, Florida State Univ., Tallahassee
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Edition details

• Publisher: Woodholme House Pub
• Publication date: 1999
• ISBN 10: 1891521047
• ISBN 13: 9781891521041
• Binding: Hardcover
• Language: English
• Number of pages: 272