Living Room

by June Jordan

Poems explore subjects such as political conditions in the United States, the Nicaraguan civil war, and Black culture

Genres: Poetry

136 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1985

About the author

June Millicent Jordan (July 9, 1936 – June 14, 2002) was a Caribbean-American poet and activist.

Jordan received numerous honors and awards, including a 1969-70 Rockefeller grant for creative writing, a Yaddo Fellowship in 1979, a National Endowment for the Arts fellowship in 1982, and the Achievement Award for International Reporting from the National Association of Black Journalists in 1984. Jordan also won the Lila Wallace Reader's Digest Writers Award from 1995 to 1998 as well as the Ground Breakers-Dream Makers Award from The Woman's Foundation in 1994.

She was included in Who's Who in America from 1984 until her death. She received the Chancellor's Distinguished Lectureship from UC Berkeley and the PEN Center USA West Freedom to Write Award (1991).

(from Wikipedia)

Reviews

[TheCalloftheLibrary · Rating 5 out of 5]

dedicated to the children of Atlanta and to the
children of Lebanon

[Tasha · Rating 5 out of 5]

Written during the Reagan era, these poems could have been created today. It's remarkable how much and how little has changed.

[Laila · Rating 5 out of 5]

These poems are as relevant today as they were in 1985

[Lulu · Rating 3 out of 5]

Im a fan of June Jordan but her poems can be really hit and miss. Let’s goooooo coursework reading

[Maryam · Rating 4 out of 5]

Love June Jordan.

[Patricia N. McLaughlin · Rating 4 out of 5]

This searing condemnation of war, police brutality, and the despicable ways in which humans dehumanize each other should be required reading for all recruits in military boot camps and police academies, not to mention public schools, because all of us could use a little more “living room.”

Favorite poems:
“Sing for Soweto”
“Richard Wright Was Wrong”
“Menu”
“Addenda to the Papal Bull”
“Poem for Guatemala”
“Poem Towards a Final Solution”
“Apologies for All the People in Lebanon”
“Poor Form”
“Relativity”
“Moving Towards Home”

[Cat · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is one of a number of poetry collections that washed up into my life unexpectedly, and I really liked it. June Jordan has a very strong voice with a lot of force. I felt like I was in a room watching a performance while reading some of these poems. Others didn’t quite land for me. Published in 1985, Living Room feels more relevant now than ever considering current events. In her poem, “Apologies to All the People in Lebanon: Dedicated to the 600,000 Palestinian men, women, and children who lived in Lebanon from 1948-1983” she says this, and it sent chills through me:

Yes, I did know it was the money I earned as a poet that paid
for the bombs and the planes and the tanks
that they used to massacre your family

But I am not an evil person
The people of my country aren’t so bad

You can’t expect but so much
from those of us who have to pay taxes and watch
American tv

You see my point;

I’m sorry.
I really am sorry.

[Sagavica · Rating 4 out of 5]

Powerful poetry from an amazing author that more people should read

[Matt Miles · Rating 5 out of 5]

Living Room is a shocking and stunningly surgical look into the soul of a nation that demands dehumanizing war and death for its own benefit. This collection is haunting and necessary.

[Sydney Fallon · Rating 5 out of 5]

Rereading this I love it so much.

[Robert Beveridge · Rating 1 out of 5]

June Jordan, Living Room (Thunder's Mouth, 1985)

Note to self: never mix up Judy Jordan, author of the fantastic Carolina Ghost Woods, and June Jordan, author of the execrable Living Room, again. I detested this book so much I cut the other June Jordan books I had on my to-be-read list and substituted this for the Jordan title I had on my goal list for the year. I can't stand the idea of reading another June Jordan book.

As with most books of poetry that I end up detesting as much as I did this one, it's simply not poetry. It's political screed chopped up into little lines to make it look more artistic. That doesn't make it any more poetry than putting it in the fiction section would make it fiction. Its true home is on the editorial page of the local newspaper.

“helicopters grating nutmeg trees
rifles shiny on the shellshocked sand
the beautiful laundry of the bombs falling into fresh air
artillery and tanks up against a halfnaked girl
and her boyfriend”
(“Another Poem About the Man”)

Yeah, yeah. Another would-be poet with a point to get across who forgets that the medium is far more important than the message. One hundred thirty-four pages of this hammer smacking into my head over and over again is enough to make me swear off for life. (zero)

[Kyle]

Rhythmic, Angry and Aware this book of political poems is an interesting time capsule of the Left during the Reagan years. We often have trouble tying even the recent political past to the present but reading Jordan's poems about the pain of Black Communities torn apart by Police and Insitutional Violence and the innocents caught in the corssfire of US intervention rings incredibly true today. A great read.

[Camille · Rating 3 out of 5]

a microscope to the dirt under all of our fingernails