Things I Have Withheld

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Book Hero Magic crafted this summary to help describe this book. While it's new and still learning, it may not be perfect - your feedback is welcome! Summary
Things I Have Withheld by Kei Miller is a compelling collection of essays that explore the power of silence and the unspoken truths within society. Through personal anecdotes and thoughtful reflections, Miller examines themes of race, identity, and belonging, unravelling the complexities of what is left unsaid in both personal and collective histories. The book offers a nuanced perspective on the intersections of history and personal narrative.
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Format: Paperback / softback
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Book Hero Magic created this recommendation. While it's new and still learning, it may not be perfect - your feedback is welcome! IS THIS YOUR NEXT READ?

You might enjoy this collection if you appreciate poetic essays that explore cultural tensions and the power of silence. It delves into the complexities of identity, history, and personal experiences, offering thoughtful reflections that resonate on both personal and universal levels.

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Things I Have Withheld

Award-winning poet and novelist Kei Miller explores the meanings of silence in this collection of provocative and lyrical essays.

Book Hero Magic formatted this description to make it easier to read. While it's new and still learning, it may not be perfect - your feedback is welcome! Description

In this moving and lyrical collection of essays, the award-winning poet and novelist Kei Miller explores the silence in which so many important things are kept. He examines the experience of discrimination through this silence and what it means to breach it: to risk words, to risk truths. And he considers the histories our bodies inherit - the crimes that haunt them, and how meaning can shift as we move throughout the world, variously assuming privilege or victimhood.

Through letters to James Baldwin, encounters with Liam Neeson, Soca, Carnival, family secrets, love affairs, white women's tears, questions of aesthetics and more, Miller powerfully and imaginatively recounts everyday acts of racism and prejudice.

With both the epigrammatic concision and conversational cadence of his poetry and novels, Things I Have Withheld is a great artistic achievement: a work of beauty which challenges us to interrogate what seems unsayable and why - our actions, defence mechanisms, imaginations and interactions - and those of the world around us.

Book Hero Magic summarised reviews for this book. While it's new and still learning, it may not be perfect - your feedback is welcome! HOW HAS THIS BEEN REVIEWED?

Kei Miller's Things I Have Withheld is praised for its powerful essays that explore the permanence of racism through moving letters and reflections, with comparisons to James Baldwin’s concise honesty. The collection is considered lyrical and insightful, offering compelling storytelling that educates on racism and racial bias while drawing on Miller's global experiences. His writing, both arresting and expansive, is recognised for courageously confronting these themes and is celebrated as a significant literary contribution.

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Book Details

INFORMATION

ISBN: 9781838852825

Publisher: Canongate Books

Format: Paperback / softback

Date Published: 05 May 2022

Country: United Kingdom

Imprint: Canongate Books

Edition: Main

Audience: General / adult

DIMENSIONS

Spine width: 14.0mm

Width: 129.0mm

Height: 198.0mm

Weight: 154g

Pages: 224

About the Author

Kei Miller was born in Jamaica in 1978 and has written several books across a range of genres. His 2014 poetry collection, The Cartographer Tries to Map a Way to Zion, won the Forward Prize for Best Collection; his 2017 novel, Augustown, won the Bocas Prize for Caribbean Literature, the Prix Les Afriques and the Prix Carbet de la Caraibe et du Tout-Monde. In 2010, the Institute of Jamaica awarded him the Silver Musgrave medal for his contributions to Literature and in 2018 he was awarded the Anthony Sabga medal for Arts & Letters. Kei has an MA in Creative Writing from Manchester Metropolitan University and a PhD in English Literature from the University of Glasgow. He has taught at the Universities of Glasgow, Royal Holloway and Exeter. He was the 2019 Ida Beam Distinguished Visiting Professor to the University of Iowa and is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature.

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