Thank you to the publisher for allowing me to read and review this ARC. Full review to be found on Goodreads and on my website.

I'm a huge fan of Smith's one-woman shows and her HBO special that this book was drawn from is absolutely incredible. Smith is able to bring to life people's unique perspectives that are crucial to better understanding issues of race, school-to-prison pipelines, police brutality, etc.

Although the book is not as riveting as seeing Smith perform the material, it is still powerful. A super quick read, it allows the reader to ponder important aspects of our current culture. I'd probably recommend someone check out the film as well to get the full picture of Smith's work, but this book is a nice companion piece.

Anna Deveare Smith created this one-woman show and mixed media performance based on her personal interviews and research on the school to prison pipeline. As a high school counselor, this subject is one that is very near and dear to heart and I found this to be brilliantly executed, specific, and authentic. What Smith has comprised here is a comprehensive study and research uncensored by the oppressive forces that drive racism. I would even go so far as to recommend this to counseling programs in the subject of mUlticultural counseling and social justice advocacy. I simply cannot praise it enough.

I appreciate the author's documentation of any issues related to our young people in this country, particularly the school to prison pipeline. However as a foster parent, I work to prevent another pipeline and that is the foster child to prison pipeline. Both these stories start with the environment that these children are growing up in, and I can tell you even when they are removed from that environment they seek it out because that is what is they know. You can call it an "adjustment disorder" or whatever label psychologists want to put on it but the kids boomerang back to poverty and violence even when they have a choice. I can't say having work in a school from a poverty stricken area that these kids are all angels. They are not. Some of them are headed to prison no matter what interventions are in place, and some of them are just mean, disrespectful kids. The ones that get hurt are the good kids that are in the line of fire. I will watch the HBO special, but I didn't find the book all that enlightening.

Very good book of the play by the same name. Thought provoking and stays with you long after you finish it. Kudos to this talented woman. Job well done. Thanks to Netgalley, the author and the publisher for the arc of this book in return for my honest review. Receiving the book in this manner had no bearing on this review.

NOTES FROM THE FIELD by Anna Deavere Smith, a native of Baltimore, focuses mostly on the school-to-prison-pipeline. This work was originally performed as a one person play and is the most recent installment in what Smith, an award-winning actress and activist, considers her "life's work:" a series of plays titled "On the Road: A Search for American Character." Smith says "central to my creative process is active listening" and she therefore interviewed about 250 people from around the country (Maryland, South Carolina, Northern California, and Pennsylvania). The monologues that she performs represent about seventeen voices selected to "reflect the variety of people caught up in the school-to-prison-pipeline: students, parents, counselors, administrators, prisoners, preachers and politicians." The first features Sherrilyn Ifill, President and Director-Counsel of NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund. Others are meant to voice views about the death of Freddie Gray or comments from James Baldwin, Bryan Stevenson and Congressman John Lewis, all of which are incorporated later in the work. First performed in 2015, NOTES FROM THE FIELD was subsequently made into a movie for television by HBO. Since this work can actually be performed with any number of actors, I have already spoken with faculty members about possible projects for our students. Anna Deavere Smith herself hopes that her work "can usefully contribute to an ongoing debate;" she makes a call for "a reimagining that requires courage, empathy and action."
4.5 stars

This is a transcription of Smith's stage show of the same name about the school-to-prison pipeline, along with introductory comments, notes about Smith's process, and performance notes. It's an excellent way of getting to know Smith and her work, although, given the important role of the musician on stage, I'd have liked to have had more material about the music.

Thanks NetGalley for the ARC. This well written and thoughtful adaptation of the play by the same name deserves a place on your bookshelf. I strongly recommend it.

This short book version of Smith’s latest play packs a punch. It offers multiple perspectives on contemporary US society addressing the question of race, of white privilege, of a long and painful history of underserving the black community. Some of these voices seemed more familiar, others rarer and more shocking. This debate rages in many forms these days and Smith adds useful and seriously to it.

Notes From the Field
Book Review | 📚📚📚📚 1/2 4.5/5
Anna Deavere Smith (writer) | Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group

From the artistic mind of an incredible observer, documentarian, and storyteller of the human condition comes the new book, Notes From the Field, by Anna Deavere Smith.

Why I was interested in this book:
I’ve known of Anna Deavere Smith and her work for many years. Her plays, her films, her essays. She’s a maverick storyteller.

My assessment:
Smith has done it again. This time, her keen observations of life, best described in the book blurb, “she renders a host of figures who have lived and fought the system that pushes students of color out of the classroom and into prisons.” Each “chapter” is a mini-story of a real person interviewed by Smith. In her film, of the same name, she portrays each of these people, herself. Story by story, we learn further about the intricacies of her subjects, in their own words.

Stories of the human condition:
This book captures the epitome of stories of the human condition. It is what we have come to expect from Anna Deavere Smith and it is what she has brought forward. She has truly put herself into the shoes of those she interviewed, personifying them in their own words, and her own emotions.

Note:
I received an advance copy of this book from NetGalley.com in exchange for an honest review. Had I not been interested in this book and have high respect for the author, I would not have chosen to read it.

TAGS:
#NotesFromTheField #review-book #book review #Play #KnopfDoubledayPublishingGroup #AnnaDeavereSmith #TuggleGrassBlues #Tuggle Grass Reviews #TuggleGrassReviews

I received a copy from NetGalley for review purposes.

This was an interesting yet short read. I never think about the direct link of school to prison, so this was eye opening for me. I didn’t realize that this book is the script for the one woman show.

I will be rereading this.

Notes from the Field by Anna Deavere Smith is a short read, but I promise it packs a punch. This one-woman play written by Smith dives into the school-to-prison pipeline, justice system and issues surrounding class and race.

The play consists of vignettes, acted out exclusively by Smith and based, verbatim, on interviews with 17 people who’d somehow been touched by the school-to-prison pipeline. They include Allen Bullock, a young Baltimore protester dressed in a hoodie and kicks; Michael Tubbs, a popular Stockton, California, councilman who was recently elected the city’s mayor; Abby Abinanti, the chief judge of the Yurok tribe; Linda Wayman, the principal of Strawberry Mansion High School in Philadelphia; and Congressman John Lewis.

Each story pretty much broke me, so get your tissues ready. Thank you, netgalley & Anchor Books/Knopf Doubleday, for the advanced copy in exchange for an honest review.

I did not realize that this is actually the script for a play in which Deavere Smith played all the parts. If you are at all interested in how people of color are experiencing life, this is a valuable and important work that will make you think. You might have read about some of the individuals who tell their stories here but here they tell the story, not someone else. It's sad, it's hopeful, it's occasionally hard to read but all in all, it's an important work. Thanks to Netgalley for the ARC.

I can’t even begin to tell you how much I loved this. What an amazing project and concept turned into a powerhouse of emotion and change.

I cried more than once while reading this and that’s something that a text rarely can make me do.

It’s a critical read

This book is basically the script for the play, which was also turned into a movie/documentary by HBO. I have read plays before, so I'm not completely unfamiliar to reading scripts. That being said, I almost did not finish this one. I'm not sure what I expected this to be like, but it was a hard read. It dragged on, and the switch between the characters was too much too fast. The moment I started to get invested in the character was typically the moment they moved on.

I read great things about the actual stage performance. I have no doubts that this would be an excellent movie or documentary. I fully plan to track it down and watch it. I didn't want to give this 1 star because I liked the idea of this book. The execution just didn't work for me. The idea was brilliant and I think it's a really important message. I just don't think the message was as moving when translated to solely reading the script.

Notes from the Field is essentially the script from the stage play of the same name. Anna Deavere Smith toured, interviewing numerous people about their roles in life in the USA. They include the woman who climbed the pole to tear down the South Carolina rebel flag, the girl involved in the roughing up and arrest of a classmate who refused to leave her seat, the man who taped the Freddie Gray murder, the Congressman who marched in Selma, as well as people who try to help people. Her focus is the school-to-prison pipeline the country is becoming famous for.

This book is a complement to the HBO special the play has also been made into. Anna Deavere Smith plays all the roles, speaking the storytellers’ words and assuming their personas. It expands the litany of persecution, racism, neglect and injustice in the United States today. The book is immensely moving.

It is far more moving than the play, which four of us saw at Second Stage in New York in 2016. We were underwhelmed, for all the wrong reasons, it turns out. Smith was less than convincing and authentic. She is after all, a middle aged white woman. She played black teenagers, protestors, a Congressman, a convict, whites, blacks, and a Salvadoran, and all with truly minor additions to costume. We found ourselves trying too hard to appreciate her effort. She adopted accents and cadences, mimicked their postures and attitudes, and reproduced the hand and head movements of her storytellers. We wanted to appreciate how she and the bass player who was the only other person onstage, worked with each other as the stories unfolded.

We watched all those details in an attempt to assign kudos if not genius to the effort, because it reflected a huge amount of work by Smith. But it wasn’t all that impressive. Worse, we thereby missed the impact of what the storytellers had to say through her, which was the point of it all. We left unsatisfied.

So I’ve never thought about it again, but was curious to read what I might have missed when this book was offered.

The book notes all those postures and attitudes, and recreates the cadences and linguistic styles in print, so that readers can be right there, and appreciate the storytellers for who they are, what they have to say and how they say it. To me, it is more valuable than seeing it live. Unlike the play, the book is valuable, informative and unforgettable.

David Wineberg