Faces at the Bottom of the Well: The Permanence of Racism

In nine grim metaphorical sketches, Bell, the black former Harvard law professor who made headlines recently for his one-man protest against the school's hiring policies, hammers home his controversial theme that white racism is a permanent, indestructible component of our society. Bell's fantasies are often dire and apocalyptic: a new Atlantis rises from the ocean depths, sparking a mass emigration of blacks; white resistance to affirmative action softens following an explosion that kills Harvard's president and all of the school's black professors; intergalactic space invaders promise the U.S. President that they will clean up the environment and deliver tons of gold, but in exchange, the bartering aliens take all African Americans back to their planet. Other pieces deal with black-white romance, a taxi ride through Harlem and job discrimination. Civil rights lawyer Geneva Crenshaw, the heroine of Bell's And We Are Not Saved (1987), is back in some of these ominous allegories, which speak from the depths of anger and despair. Bell now teaches at New York University Law School.
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Here, as he did in And We Are Not Saved, Harvard Law School professor Bell offers dramatized accounts of the dilemma of race relations in America. Bell uses stories and fables to examine such themes as desire for homeland; the role of violence; interracial relationships; and scapegoating. He argues that ``racial nepotism'' on the part of whites allows de facto discrimination to exist even without animosity: ``When whites perceive that it will be profitable or at least cost-free to serve, hire, admit, or otherwise deal with blacks on a non-discriminatory basis, they do so. When they fear- -accurately or not--that there may be a loss, inconvenience, or upset to themselves or other whites, discriminatory conduct usually follows.'' Such racism will be with us forever, Bell contends. In the face of this, he calls for blacks to ``fashion a philosophy that both matches the unique dangers we face, and enables us to recognize in those dangers opportunities for committed living and humane service.'' Bell's method of making his points through stories allows for a certain moral complexity: Thoughtful persons work menial jobs; a dynamic black leader who has dedicated his life to his people and worries about his place in history falls in love with a white woman; space aliens who speak English with Reagan's voice arrive with gold, safe nuclear power, and ``special chemicals capable of unpolluting the environment''--and all they ask in exchange is that America's black citizens be turned over to them. But the stories, for all their fablelike power, are laden with great chunks of orotund exposition and numerous overworked adverbs. By using them, Bell forfeits the polemical passion of his introductory essay, while their simplistic dramatizations jar with the impressive legal erudition apparent elsewhere. Still, despite his lackluster writing, Bell offers insight into the rage, frustration, and yearning of being black in America. -- Copyright ©1992, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

Bell, in the news because he is on leave from Harvard Law School to protest its never having hired a tenured black woman, has written a provocative and creative book that nicely follows his And We Are Not Saved ( LJ 8/87). His "interweaving of fact and fiction" and an "unorthodox form" make for stimulating reading and clarify for white readers the obstacles continually faced by black Americans and the miseries they endlessly endure. No other book features, as does this one, a Racial Preference Licensing Act, Racial Data Storms, Afroatlantica Emigration, Space Traders (guess who they are coming to take away?), the Anne Frank Committee, and White Citizens for Black Survival. Bell's thoughts about Minister Louis Farrakhan and Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas are a contribution to the public dialog on those figures. An especially important and relevant publication for public and academic libraries.
- Katherine Dahl, Western Illinois Univ., Macomb
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc.