My Grandfather's Son: A Memoir
by Clarence Thomas
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Book Summary Information
Author: Clarence ThomasBrand: Harper Collins Publishers
Edition: Hardcover
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 2007-10-01
ISBN: 0060565551
Number of pages: 304
Publisher: Harper
Book Reviews of My Grandfather's Son: A Memoir
Book Review: "Right is Right, Even Over a Penny"
Summary: 5 Stars
Justice Thomas's book, "My Grandfather's Son", was to me an enthralling and incredibly introspective story on how one of the most enigmatic public figures in our nation's recent history got to where he is today.
For a long time, Clarence Thomas has been a mystery to me (and I am sure to many others as well). In "My Grandfather's Son" though, Justice Thomas opens the shutters to his life (his words, not mine) and bares his soul. He talks openly about what it was like to be abandoned by his father and raised by his "Daddy" (his maternal grandfather). It was illuminating to read Thomas's feelings about his grandfather as he contemplated and compared his strict almost loathsome upbringing juxtaposed agianst his grandfather's affection for Thomas's own son, Jamal.
Thomas talks about his collegiate radicalism and the anger and rage that fueled his politics. Most impressively though, Thomas dicusses in detail the evolution of his ideology. He states that he had been "sneering at the simplemindedness of his [grandfather's] philosophy of self-reliance, but now it was making sense to [him] again." He also asked, "If I was truly serious about helping other people, I'd have started by helping myself, and the first thing I had to do was chain the beast of rage and resentment that threatened to wreck my acedemic career and my life. Of course I had every reason to be outraged by the experience of blacks in America, but I had no right to confuse their collective sufferings with my own personal experiences."
Maybe that is why I enjoyed reading about Justice Thomas's life ... I realized just how much of an individual he truly is. He talked about reading "Atlas Shrugged" and "The Fountainhead" and how Ayn Rand's philosophy of Objectivism (radical individualism) seared him to his core. He realized how hollow the leftist's "Do-Your-Own-Thing" mantra truly was, labeling it superficial and strictly limited. Thomas himself stated, "Merely because I was black, it seemed, I was supposed to listen to Hugh Maskela instead of Carole King, just as I was expected to be a radical, not a conservative. I no longer cared to play that game ... The black people I knew came from different places and backgrounds - social, economic, even ethnic - yet the color of our skin was somehow supposed to make us identical in spite of our differences. I didn't buy it. Of course we had all experienced racism in one way or another, but that did not mean we had to think alike."
Thomas's consevrativism does not make him an "Uncle Tom". In fact, his conservativism is an informed and thoughtful reaction to the true problems facing the African-American community. As far as I am concerned, the black community ought to revere Justice Thomas as a hero as well as other African-American individualists such as Thomas Sowell, Jay Parker, and even Juan Williams and Bill Cosby.
Some have viewed Justice Thomas's book as a personification of his bitterness. However, I believe it is much more complicated than that. It is clear from the last couple chapters that what Anita Hill did was despicable. But even more contemptible are those who put her up to it, the lefist special interest groups and women's groups. Simply put, the Anita Hill allegation was about abortion rather than sexual harassment. It is clear to me now that Thomas's assessment of Hill is undoubtedly true ... she was/is an ambituous woman marked by immaturity. Thomas states in his book that Ms. Hill touted her Yale Law degree as reason enough to qualify her for a promotion. This is noteworthy because in an October 2, 2007 editorial in the NYT written by Anita Hill she again refutes Thomas's claim that she was a below-average employee by balllyhooing again that she "had gone to Yale Law School" - as if that alone makes someone a qualified employee.
Bravo to Justice Thomas!!! He is an American Treasure. If I am ever in a Wal-mart parking lot late one night and I see a larger custom-built RV in the back corner of the lot, I may just knock on the door and shake his hand and tell him thank you to his face.
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