Classic 11: I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings

I have at least 3 classics ready to read, and was torn between which one to start next. But when I was home (to Oregon) recently this book was sitting on the bookshelf and I grabbed it knowing it would be exactly the right next classic to read. It was.

I started the book and sank into her melodic words, assuming I knew what I was getting myself into. I was ... mildly right. A young black girl moving to the South. From there, I was swept away to some unexpected stories and insights and into a child's (then teenager's) perspective that was simultaneously relatable and foreign.



I was a bookworm as a kid too - but not like Maya Angelou.  In fact, because I read this very book as a part of my desire to improve my reading repertoire, so I felt viscerally aware that I wasn't up to snuff with this 8 year old protagonist's literary exploits. A Tale of Two Cities might be on my possible reading list ... but I've reserved that tome for when I have the mental capacity to digest it. But ok, Ms. Angelou, I now feel humbled all the more by your reading that book in grade school! Not offensively, just matter of factly humbled.

The story was good, if mildly predictable and a lot slower than I expected it to be. Maya was brave but also beautifully naive in ways. Learning book smarts quickly, but life lessons when they are forced on her. I kind of loved how even in her reflections of that, she was almost scientifically assessing her behavior. Picking it apart for self-analysis, and we were all just allowed a peak in.


It's easy to see why this book is so often required reading - allowing a window into racism and societal norms in a historical context that's also timeless. We experience those pressure points and truths in the rural south, the urban south, and then the west coast. But her story also takes us through personal tragedies and traumas to pull us along with her insistence on perseverance.

Recommended for? Those looking for a dip back in time. Those looking to refresh their perspective on the depth of race relations in the US. Those who want to be told a story (As an autobiography, this book felt more like a long conversation with Maya rather than a book with a beginning/middle/end).