I want to get things rolling as best I can. You may have heard
that doown here in New Orleans, we have a visitor named Gustave
we expect Tuesday, and we may have to evacuate. What follows are
some quick thoughts centered around the Easy Rawlins character.
Its been a while since I have read the material
Walter Moseley brings race and racism to the table for
consideration not only as the author himself, but his main
characters are African American. The Rawlins stories take
place in late '40's early '50's Los Angeles in the Compton
area. In ten years time, the neighborhood will erupt, but Moseley
writes aboout the period before Compton meant gangbangers, when it
was an upwardly mobile working class Black community.
Signficantly, this African American community developed mostly from
migrants seeking a better life who wanted a part of the
American Dream. In narration, Easy describes himself not as an
investigator, but as a person who finds things -- and people --
for others. He supports himself as a landscaper/maintenance man now
working for the School Board. Easy takes great pride in home
ownership, with Mosely showing him grdening the way Spenser
cooks. He also takes quite naturally to the parental role
thrust upon him by the presence of Jesus and Feather. The
stories concern a man trying to buy into an American Dream not
quite sure that it wants him, and the twists that dream can
take in segregated Los Angeles. Like James Elllrooy, a sense of
history helps the reader, though Elroy commented, when an
interviewer compared him to Moseley, "I write aboout the cops
who beat up Easy Rawllins."
I've got papers to grade and a class to prepare for. Hope
something I've written proves helpful, and I will join in when I
can.
Michael Jeter
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