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A Detroit Anthology (Paperback)
A unique perspective of the Motor City, this anthology combines stories told by both longtime residents and newcomers from activists to teachers to artists to students. While Detroit has always been rich in stories, too often those stories are told back to the city by outsiders looking in, believing they can explain Detroit back to itself. As editor, Anna Clark writes in the introduction, “These are the stories we tell each other over late nights at the pub and long afternoons on the porch. We share them in coffee shops, at church social hours, in living rooms, and while waiting for the bus. These are stories full of nodding asides and knowing laughs. These are stories addressed to the rhetorical “you”—with the ratcheted up language that comes with it—and these are stories that took real legwork to investigate . . . You will not find ‘positive’ stories about Detroit in this collection, or ‘negative’ ones. But you will find true stories.” Featuring essays, photographs, art, and poetry by Grace Lee Boggs, John Carlisle, Desiree Cooper, Dream Hampton, Steve Hughes, Jamaal May, Tracie McMillan, Marsha Music, Shaka Senghor, Thomas J. Sugrue, and many others.
Anna Clark is a freelance journalist, director of applications for Write a House, and the founder of Literary Detroit. Her writing has appeared in publications such as The American Prospect, The New Republic, The New York Times, and Vanity Fair. She is the author of Michigan Literary Luminaries. She lives in Detroit, Michigan.
“Offers from-the-heart and on-the-ground views of life in America’s Motor City.” —Boston Globe
“While many books have been written on and about Detroit by writers who have visited, this anthology of prose, poetry, and essays is written by the metro area’s residents themselves . . . it’s the wide ethnic array of voices that truly shows the facets of Detroit life.” — Ebony Magazine
“In a city that often pits people against each other based on race, class, and geographic location (although this is often linked more closely with the other two factors), [A Detroit Anthology] brings everybody to the table to have a voice. —The Urbanist Dispatch
“What these writers share, despite their differences of age, race, gender, and temperament, is the understanding that one has to know Detroit’s history before even beginning to imagine how the city might move forward.” —The Daily Beast
“There is no cheap nostalgia or breathless boosterism . . . the book is a thrilling success. It gives voice to people who now live or once lived in this fascinating, tortured place, the survivors, good people who know what pain is, people who understand that the city exerts an undying pull on them.” —The Millions
“Anna Clark’s writing has always impressed me, and she proves herself a talented editor as well with A Detroit Anthology. These essays, stories, poetry, and photographs from a diverse group of writers offer a mesmerizing portrait of the city’s past, present, and future.” —Largehearted Boy
“While many books have been written on and about Detroit by writers who have visited, this anthology of prose, poetry, and essays is written by the metro area’s residents themselves . . . it’s the wide ethnic array of voices that truly shows the facets of Detroit life.” — Ebony Magazine
“In a city that often pits people against each other based on race, class, and geographic location (although this is often linked more closely with the other two factors), [A Detroit Anthology] brings everybody to the table to have a voice. —The Urbanist Dispatch
“What these writers share, despite their differences of age, race, gender, and temperament, is the understanding that one has to know Detroit’s history before even beginning to imagine how the city might move forward.” —The Daily Beast
“There is no cheap nostalgia or breathless boosterism . . . the book is a thrilling success. It gives voice to people who now live or once lived in this fascinating, tortured place, the survivors, good people who know what pain is, people who understand that the city exerts an undying pull on them.” —The Millions
“Anna Clark’s writing has always impressed me, and she proves herself a talented editor as well with A Detroit Anthology. These essays, stories, poetry, and photographs from a diverse group of writers offer a mesmerizing portrait of the city’s past, present, and future.” —Largehearted Boy