I'm Black So You Don't Have to Be: A Memoir in Eight Lives

by Colin Grant

A memoir told through a series of intimate portraits, which build into a poignant, insightful and unforgettable testimony of West Indian British experience'An important and timely book'GUARDIAN'Grant writes with the mischievous, dramatic flair of a natural storyteller'BERNARDINE EVARISTO, Booker Prize-winning author of GIRL, WOMAN, OTHER'Refined yet unflinching'SUNDAY TIMES'I'm black, so you don't have to be,' Colin Grant's uncle Castus used to tell him. For Colin, born in Britain to Jamaican parents, things were supposed to be different. If he worked hard and became a doctor, he was told, his race would become invisible. The reality turned out to be very different.This is a memoir told through a series of intimate intergenerational portraits. We meet Grant's mother Ethlyn, disappointed by working-class life in Luton, who dreams of returning to Jamaica; his father Bageye, a maverick and small-time ganja dealer with a violent temper; his sister Selma, who refashioned herself as an African princess.Each character we meet is navigating their own path. Each life informs Grant's own shifting sense of his identity. Collectively these stories build into a poignant and insightful testimony of the black British experience - an unforgettable exploration of family, identity, race and generational change.

Genres: Memoir, Biography, Nonfiction, Race

256 pages, Hardcover

Published January 26, 2023

About the author

The author of Negro with a Hat, a biography of Marcus Garvey, Colin Grant is an independent historian who works for BBC Radio. The son of Jamaican immigrants, he lives in London.

Reviews

[Danielle · Rating 5 out of 5]

‘I’m black so you can do all of those white things. I’m black so you don’t have to be’

This is a brilliant memoir, not told in the usual chronological order, Grant gives us 8 portraits of people who have played an important part in his life. Through them we learn not only about his life, but what it is to be second generation when your elders have put in the work so you can live a ‘white life’, the expectation that comes with this and if it is something that is actually possible.

Brilliant story telling here, enjoyed every word of it.

[Amy Dora · Rating 5 out of 5]

Colin Grant trained to be a doctor, moving from his home town of Luton to live in London with his uncle allowing him to try and make his own identity in the world and explaining throughout how he has had to adapt and change to enable him to succeed in a world run by white privilege, by learning how to adapt behaviours depending on who you are with. Although I am white british myself, my husband is Nigerian (grew up in Nigeria until he came to the UK with his family when he was 12 and still has strong roots and connections to Nigeria) and in the 8 years we have been together (and with friends prior to being with him) I have witnessed first hand the changes in treatment and behaviours people will exhibit to him compared to me which saddens and disgusts me. I also feel sad after discussions with my afro caribbean friends who explain similar situations and also sadly working as a nurse when my black colleagues have suffered racism from patients not wanting to be treated by them amongst other things. Now we are parents to 2 beautiful daughters and I am having to learn and adapt my way of parenting and learn how to navigate them through life when I know that unfortunately as some point they will be on the receiving end of racism and I know I won't always be there to protect them.

This book is beautifully rounded off when Colin's own children reunite him with his roots and his caribbean identity by taking him back to Jamaica.

There needs to be more awareness and more education on racism especially in schools, as I remember in school the only thing we were taught was one lesson on slavery tied in with the english history - almost as though it was fine and part and parcel of the english history - and classified as 'black history' - that is not black history - that is history that happened to black people. There needs to be more positive education on the endless and extensive black history and all the amazing black people that have made history that are overlooked and not acknowledged due to the white privileged world we live in.

Thanks again to Netgalley and the publisher and of course, Colin Grant ,for sharing his story.

[Lady Fancifull · Rating 5 out of 5]

When the personal becomes collective

Colin Grant’s wonderfully structured, non linear autobiography is both a laying out of his own story, as a black Briton, whose parents came from Jamaica, in the late 50s, and a laying out of the experiences of his parent’s generation, his own, and onwards.

It is a joyous, bleak, celebration of individual lives, and also a story which demands that white readers pay attention. From time to time events happen which make us do just that, but then, perhaps, we forget the petty, daily, evidences of our colonial thinking.

Colin Grant tells the stories of others, primarily his parents, a sibling, and the extended family of his parent’s generation, but also, of a stranger whose life crossed his during his training as a doctor. The first story starts as he leaves Luton, where he grew up, and stayed for a while with an uncle in London, when he started his medical training. So this is a young man, leaving home, beginning to find his identity outside his family. The final story is that of his own children, who beautifully bring him home to embrace his Caribbean identity.

The whole point about this journey being that – to succeed in a white world, black Britons have to learn to ‘code-switch’ There is a way to be within a white world, and a different way to be with other black people.

I have read a few books this year, by other black writers exploring their own personal journeys, but, depressingly, there are these common experiences of white privilege everywhere and all around.

This is a fabulous read, and, by revealing through showing and celebrating individual lives, the messages land more precisely and devastatingly – including for Grant himself – than any polemic could do

[CR Spencer · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have mixed feelings about this book. I enjoyed it but there are one or two aspects of te book that I found uncomfortable. It is a memoir in eight lives and I enjoyed meeting the characters as the author recounts his life and relationships particularly with his estranged father, Bageye, his mother and siblings. These relationships are frught with challenges.

The author recounts his somewhat chequered time at the BBC. He freely admits he only got in through a diversity initiative after dropping out of medical school as he couldn't be botherd to attend...or so it seems...I was astonished to read that he was somewnt surprised he was up on a disciplinary after a rather crass remark to his line manager who was trying to reorganise the news desk. To pass her a comment about comparing her plan to an overseerer on a slave plantation is astonishing to say the least.

However, I did enjoy the book but it amy not be for everyone.

[Jen Burrows · Rating 5 out of 5]

I'm Black So You Don't Have To Be is easily my favourite memoir of the year.

I love how Grant puts different people from his life at the heart of each vignette: it's such a smart way to add depth and perspective to autobiographical writing. There is real warmth and honesty in his narration, even through the complex subjects he touches upon, such as domestic abuse, institutional racism and familial alienation. And his storytelling is wonderful - so immediate and well-paced that I found myself reading carefully so as not to skip a word.

It's rare to read a memoir so well-crafted; this is an astute and absorbing read.

*Thank you to Netgalley for the arc in exchange for an honest review*

[Mke McEvoy · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is a poignant, intimate memoir. There were passages that were deeply moving. I felt quite emotional at times. Not only is it a very personal self portrait told through the interactions with family and close relationships, but also a window into the author's life as a child of parents from the Windrush generation. The challenges faced while negotiating identity and belonging between two cultures is heart wrenchingly articulated in beautiful descriptive language. I loved this book, and after reading it felt I knew the characters who peopled it. I highly recommend it!

[Carol Painter · Rating 5 out of 5]

ABSOLUTELY RECOMMEND THIS TO EVERY HUMAN BEING WHO IS WHITE...
This is not a tirade on racism...this is a perfectly (wonderfully written) normal memoir...
and it is true lessons of the life of a boy from Jamaica who grew up in England. Any one of us who believes that we really understand what it means to be black in a white world will find how much we have to learn...
All I can say is "Thank you, Colin"...and sending love and blessings to all of your family.

[Lara A · Rating 4 out of 5]

Despite the format of the eight lives, this is essentially a sequel to Bageye Takes The Wheel. Due to that format, it is somewhat more meandering than its preceeding book and there are more than a few unanswered questions. But I love the wit and level of observation in Grant's writing. I want to read everything he writes.

[Jo · Rating 5 out of 5]

A deeply engaging biography written with a powerful sense of honesty combined with wit and sensitivity. Makes you laugh but also feel compassion and grapples with raw and complex emotions filtered through a wise, reflective lens.

[Lydia Caslin · Rating 3 out of 5]

Wasn’t my favourite read

[Meep · Rating 3 out of 5]

The random animal cruelty reported by the author that he perpetrates without any acknowledgement of it as such is awful to read. One incident but it coloured the whole book for me.

[Yevgeniya · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is written as a collection of stories about people in author's life. Although I love the way this author writes in general, some of the stories were written so well they really touched me, while the others seemed to lack some context for me to completely understand them. I feel like I need to read author's earlier memoirs to completely get it.