Looking for Lorraine
The Radiant and Radical Life of Lorraine Hansberry
by Imani Perry
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Pub Date Sep 18 2018 | Archive Date Jan 31 2019
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Description
Winner of the Lambda Literary Award for LGBTQ Nonfiction
Winner of the Shilts-Grahn Triangle Award for Lesbian Nonfiction
Winner of the 2019 Phi Beta Kappa Christian Gauss Award
A New York Times Notable Book of 2018
A revealing portrait of one of the most gifted and charismatic, yet least understood, Black artists and intellectuals of the twentieth century.
Lorraine Hansberry, who died at thirty-four, was by all accounts a force of nature. Although best-known for her work A Raisin in the Sun, her short life was full of extraordinary experiences and achievements, and she had an unflinching commitment to social justice, which brought her under FBI surveillance when she was barely in her twenties. While her close friends and contemporaries, like James Baldwin and Nina Simone, have been rightly celebrated, her story has been diminished and relegated to one work—until now. In 2018, Hansberry will get the recognition she deserves with the PBS American Masters documentary “Lorraine Hansberry: Sighted Eyes/Feeling Heart” and Imani Perry’s multi-dimensional, illuminating biography, Looking for Lorraine.
After the success of A Raisin in the Sun, Hansberry used her prominence in myriad ways: challenging President Kennedy and his brother to take bolder stances on Civil Rights, supporting African anti-colonial leaders, and confronting the romantic racism of the Beat poets and Village hipsters. Though she married a man, she identified as lesbian and, risking censure and the prospect of being outed, joined one of the nation’s first lesbian organizations. Hansberry associated with many activists, writers, and musicians, including Malcolm X, Langston Hughes, Duke Ellington, Paul Robeson, W.E.B. Du Bois, among others. Looking for Lorraine is a powerful insight into Hansberry’s extraordinary life—a life that was tragically cut far too short.
A Black Caucus of the American Library Association Honor Book for Nonfiction
A 2019 Pauli Murray Book Prize Finalist
A Note From the Publisher
This is a fresh and grounbreaking look at Hansberry's life. Perry accessed Hansberry's papers at the Schomburg Center, only made available since 2010. This is the first book to analyze her queer themed short stories and how her sexuality impacted her artistic work. Many only know her through her play but this book shows her as a full person, and how her intellect, activism, influences, and relationships worked together.
Advance Praise
“[A] richly dimensional portrait of a
brightly blazing artist, thinker, and activist…Mining writings private and
published, collecting memories, tracking the reverberations of Hansberry’s
personality, words, and actions, and, at times, entering the narrative, Perry
illuminates with arresting impact Hansberry’s thoughts, feelings, and
revolutionary social consciousness…Perry’s ardent, expert, and redefining work
of biographical discovery brings light, warmth, scope, and enlightening complexity
to the spine-straightening story of a brilliant, courageous, seminal, and
essential American writer.”—Booklist, Starred Review
“An intimate portrait of the artist as a black woman at the crossroads . . .
Perry infuses the narrative with a sense of urgency and enthusiasm because she
believes Hansberry has something to teach us in these ‘complicated times’…Throughout
this animated and inspiring biography, Perry reminds us that the ‘battles
Lorraine fought are still before us: exploitation of the poor, racism,
neocolonialism, homophobia, and patriarchy.’”—Kirkus Reviews, Starred
Review
“Phenomenal. I didn’t know how
hungry I was for this intimate portrait until now. It feels as though Ms.
Hansberry has walked into my living room and sat down beside me.…The writing is
whip-smart, yet lovely and clear-eyed. What gifts this book, Ms. Perry, and
Lorraine Hansberry are to the world.”—Jacqueline Woodson, National Book Award
Winner for Brown Girl Dreaming
“This is one of those books you need to read…Lorraine Hansberry left us way too
soon, and yet the gift of her presence, so briefly among us, is still felt in
the art she left behind. But not only in the art, but in the life. A life at
last made comprehensible by this loving, attentive, thoughtful book.”—Alice
Walker
“Magnificently written and extremely well researched…Though Hansberry’s life
was brief, her powerful work remains vital and urgently necessary. One can say
the same of this phenomenal book, which hopefully will lead more readers to
both Hansberry’s published and unpublished works.”—Edwidge Danticat, author of Brother,
I’m Dying
“This powerful and profound book is the definitive treatment of a literary
genius, political revolutionary, and spiritual radical—Lorraine Hansberry.
Imani Perry takes us beyond the widespread misunderstandings of Hansberry’s
complicated text into the zone of artistic greatness and moral courage—where
Lorraine Hansberry belongs!”—Dr. Cornel West
Marketing Plan
Advertising: national print and online advertising campaign
Reader Buzz Campaign: ARC and finished copy giveaways through social media and Goodreads
Academic promotion History, African American Studies
Promotion during Black history month (Feb 2019) and Women's history month (March 2019)
Library Promotion: Black Caucus of the ALA, GLBT roundtable of the ALA
Promotion at Regional Trade Shows
Outreach to national and regional NPR shows
Book review attention in major newspapers
First serial excerpt placement in literary and culture magazines
Coverage in AfAm print and online media; attention in history, feminist, and LGBTQ media
Events in Chicago, D.C., Boston, NYC, Princeton, and Philadelphia
Available Editions
| EDITION | Other Format |
| ISBN | 9780807064498 |
| PRICE | $26.95 (USD) |
| PAGES | 256 |
Links
Featured Reviews
Vicky p, Reviewer
Although I haven't quite finished Looking for Lorraine (I'm at the 80% mark), I've decided to set out a few thoughts today to coincide with the publication of the book.
I first became aware of the name "Lorraine Hansberry" while watching Raoul Peck's powerful documentary I Am Not Your Negro, which explores racism in the US through the writings and reminiscences of James Baldwin. Referencing a meeting in 1963 with then Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy to discuss the state of interracial relations, Baldwin talks about a resplendent presence at the meeting, who stunned RFK with her determination about what needed to be done (not that RFK wanted to hear those things), but who unfortunately died young. That woman was Lorraine Hansberry and, having looked her up, I jumped at the opportunity to receive an advance copy of Looking for Lorraine for review purposes.
This biography is beyond good. Imani Perry does a wonderful job dragging Hansberry from the shadows, where her premature death confined her, and out into the array of black writers and activists that helped shape the struggle for racial equality in the 50s and 60s. As Perry says, James Baldwin and Nina Simone (both close friends of Lorraine's) were after the 60s criticised for saying uncomfortable things, however both were reinstated recently as important figures of the history of black struggle. This biography serves the purpose of allowing Lorraine to join them, take the place that she rightfully deserves, and be 'remembered fully' (p. 114), as she would have wanted.
The book touched me with its sensitive portrayal of Lorraine, a woman the writer never met (as she was born long after Lorraine's passing), but who she grew up feeling very close to partly due to her own interest in black history but also, importantly, due to her adoptive father's interest in and love for Lorraine Perry. So young Imani had privileged access to Lorraine in a way; her father's interest fuelled her own passion, which led to further research for the purposes of this book. One can also see several parallels between Lorraine and Imani: loyalty to the race; a passion of equality; a sharing of radical politics. Imani never obliterates her self from her account of Lorraine without, however, using the book as an opportunity to promote her own agenda. One gets the sense of the younger woman responding to Lorraine's work and life choices, as if the older woman was another self or role-model. The result is a wonderfully written book which carried me away with its rhythm and tenderness, but which is also thoroughly researched and effectively organised into chapters covering the following: Lorraine's childhood and university years, her radical politics, her marriage to a Jewish intellectual but also her sexual interest in and relationships with women, her plays and literary work, her friendship with James Baldwin and other important figures of the Black movement, and finally her death of cancer at the age of 34.
A timely and wonderful book that's worth more than five stars. Read it.
Thanks to netgalley and Beacon Press for the advance review copy.
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