About this item
"Lordes words - on race, cancer, intersectionality, parenthood, injustice - burn with relevance 25 years after her death." - O, The Oprah MagazineWinner of the 1988 Before Columbus Foundation National Book Award, this path-breaking collection of essays is a clarion call to build communities that nurture our spirit. Lorde announces the need for a radical politics of intersectionality while struggling to maintain her own faith as she wages a battle against liver cancer. From reflections on her struggle with the disease to thoughts on lesbian sexuality and African-American identity in a straight white mans world, Lordes voice remains enduringly relevant in todays political landscape. Those who practice and encourage social justice activism frequently quote her exhortation, "Caring for myself is not self-indulgence, it is self-preservation, and that is an act of political warfare." In addition to the journal entries of "A Burst of Light: Living with Cancer," this edition includes an interview, "Sadomasochism: Not About Condemnation," and three essays, "I Am Your Sister: Black Women Organizing Across Sexualities," "Apartheid U.S.A.," and "Turning the Beat Around: Lesbian Parenting 1986," as well as a new Foreword by Sonia Sanchez. "You dont read Audre Lorde, you feel her." - Essence"Lordes timeless prose in this collection provides contemporary social justice warriors the language, strategies, and lessons around resistance, through the power of intersectionality, a Pan-African vision, and - ultimately - through the power of love and radical self-care." - NBC News"When I dont know what to do, I turn to the Lorde." - Alexis Pauline Gumbs, Bitch Media"Whenever my mind is heavy with questions and my heart thirsts for nourishment, I turn to the writing of Audre Lorde. Every time I revisit the words of Audre Lorde, I marvel over how relevant they continue to be." - AfterEllen.com"The self-described black feminist lesbian mother poet used a mixture of prose, theory, poetry, and experience to interrogate oppressions and uplift marginalized communities. She was one of the first black feminists to target heteronormativity, and to encourage black feminists to expand their understanding of erotic pleasure. She amplified anti-oppression, even as breast cancer ravaged her ailing body." - Evette Dionne, Bustle Magazine "This was my first time reading Audre Lorde (finally!) and now I cant wait to devour everything she ever wrote. This was the kind of book that you end up highlighting so many great quotes, words you want to memorize, apply, breathe. Empowering read." - Litsy
About the Author
Audre Lorde was a revolutionary Black feminist. Lorde's poetry was published very regularly during the 1960s - in Langston Hughes' 1962 ; in several foreign anthologies; and in black literary magazines. During this time, she was politically active in civil rights, anti-war, and feminist movements. Her first volume of poetry, (1968) , was published by the Poet's Press and edited by Diane di Prima, a former classmate and friend from Hunter College High School. Dudley Randall, a poet and critic, asserted in his review of the book that Lorde "does not wave a black flag, but her blackness is there, implicit, in the bone. "Her second volume, (1970) , which was mainly written during her tenure at Tougaloo College in Mississippi, addressed themes of love, betrayal, childbirth and the complexities of raising children. It is particularly noteworthy for the poem "Martha", in which Lorde poetically confirms her homosexuality: "[W]e shall love each other here if ever at all. " Later books continued her political aims in lesbian and gay rights, and feminism. In 1980, together with Barbara Smith and Cherríe Moraga, she co-founded Kitchen Table: Women of Color Press, the first U.S. publisher for women of colour. Lorde was State Poet of New York from 1991 to 1992.
