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Where Did You Sleep Last Night?: A Personal History

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Where Did You Sleep Last Night?: A Personal History

by Danzy Senna

3.64 · rating details · 190 ratings · 40 reviews

When Danzy Senna’s parents got married in 1968, they seemed poised to defy history. They were two brilliant young American writers from wildly divergent backgrounds—a white woman with a blue-blood Bostonian lineage and a black man, the son of a struggling single mother and an unknown father. They married in a year that seemed to separate the past from the present; tog

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Hardcover, 224 pages

Published May 12th 2009 by Farrar, Straus and Giroux (first published 2009)

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Dec 16, 2011

Thomas DeWolf rated it

Shelves: memoir

In one sense, reading memoirs is a bit like peaking through the curtains into someone's home under a shroud of darkness. In another sense, memoirs offer insight into how others deal with challenges that everyone invariably experiences in one way or another within our own families. This deeply personal story is the author's attempt to come to terms with her own history, which is, by extension, deeply connected to American history. The issue of "race" is complexly woven into the fabric o...moreIn one sense, reading memoirs is a bit like peaking through the curtains into someone's home under a shroud of darkness. In another sense, memoirs offer insight into how others deal with challenges that everyone invariably experiences in one way or another within our own families. This deeply personal story is the author's attempt to come to terms with her own history, which is, by extension, deeply connected to American history. The issue of "race" is complexly woven into the fabric of both.

I found Where Did You Sleep Last Night well-written, enlightening and disturbing. The marriage of her parents brought together a mother (poet/novelist Fanny Quincy Howe) who is the descendant of New England's elite, and whose wealth has its roots in American slave-trading, and a father (author/editor Carl Senna) who is the mixed-race son of an African American mother and an unknown father who may have been a Mexican boxer. She grew up surrounded by Boston privilege. He grew up in poverty in the South. Their marriage held the promise of overcoming history. It's ugly disintegration eight years later left trauma in its wake.

Danzy Senna weaves a compelling tale; one that is always engaging. It is also controversial. Her sister, Lucien Quincy Senna, claims that "this account of her family smacks less of history than character assassination of her father" and posted a press statement about the defamation lawsuit that Carl Senna filed against Danzy Senna and her publisher on her blog in January 2011.

One of the tragedies of so many fractured families is that each member has a story that she or he stands fully behind as "the truth" no matter that others from the same family have diametrically opposite versions of the same story. I doubt whether there is one "truth" in such Rashoman-like situations; only deep wounds that remain unhealed (much like our unhealed American wounds).

I must also disclose that in addition to my interest in memoirs, and that my own first book fits largely into that category, my interest in this book also springs from the fact that I am distantly related to Danzy Senna through her mother. Though I've never met either of them, we are related to the same slave-trading dynasty I wrote about in Inheriting the Trade. I met Danzy's father Carl during the first week of filming the documentary Traces of the Trade in Bristol, Rhode Island in late June, 2001.

I have no first-hand knowledge with which to measure the veracity of Danzy Senna's story or of her sister's and father's objections to it. When I finished the book I was left with feelings of sadness at the brokenness that each member of their family must surely feel. I was also left with feelings of hope - at least for one member of this family - in connection with Danzy's commitment to confront her pain through writing this book, and building a family of her own. Ultimately, it is this latter feeling that rises up at the conclusion of Danzy's memoir, and, I believe, offers hope for the future healing of our nation.

Make no mistake. This story is a tragedy. Do her family members each have a chance at healing? Does our nation? God, I hope so.(less)

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Jul 07, 2011

Charleen Merced rated it

Danzy Senna's books, "Where did you sleep last night? A personal Memoir" has a beautifully woven, beautifully written and deeply emotional prose. I found the writing style entrancing, albeit choppy and all over the place. I felt as if she subjectively trying to look from the outside in. She was trying to put all the pieces of her history together, which shows through the lack of cohesiveness in the narrative. In this book, Senna tries to find, regroup and recount her search for her fam...moreDanzy Senna's books, "Where did you sleep last night? A personal Memoir" has a beautifully woven, beautifully written and deeply emotional prose. I found the writing style entrancing, albeit choppy and all over the place. I felt as if she subjectively trying to look from the outside in. She was trying to put all the pieces of her history together, which shows through the lack of cohesiveness in the narrative. In this book, Senna tries to find, regroup and recount her search for her family's roots. More than a memoir, or a search for her family history (mostly paternal), this was more of a vehicle which made her feel close to her father. She explores and comes to terms with her relationship with her father, which is a troubled one.

It is ironic that she writes about her maternal side of the family: "This side of my family was above all else interested in their own narrative...They were invested in remaining the protagonist of the story." By definition, a memoir, is a book where you narrate your own story.

Danzy Senna is born to writers: Carl Senna, a black southerner with a troubled, mysterious and interesting childhood, whose origins are murky at best; and Fanny Howe, a white Bostonian whose ancestor line is full of writers and historical figures. Her parents divorced while she was still young and she narrates her troubled and disappointing relationship with her father. This book shows the childhood anger and resentment she still seems to foster toward her father. Yet, she clings to his roots as more than an integral part of her own identity, as well as her memories of their shared experiences (whether happy or disappointing memories).

She writes of her father, perhaps mirroring her own feelings about herself, "Every descriptive statement you could make about my father could be contradicted by the sentence that followed. He was half of everything and half of nothing." She searches fervently for her father's roots and retells her experiences through her expedition all over the south with great and telling emotion. It is as if she is finding a missing part herself.

Her maternal history is full of literary and history figures, it is a rich history indeed. Yet, she drily describes that she went to a public library to do research about her maternal side of the family. There is very little emotion, chapters involving her maternal side of the family are written in a prose that is observational and detached. She writes about her mother that:

"She was a Bostonian...She was a blue-blooded white Anglo-Saxon Protestant whose roots on one side linked her to the founders of this country, and on the other side to the most elite of the Anglo-Irish literary establishment. She had an identity so solid and so gilded that she was able to discard it, stomp on it, and endlessly make fun of it-and finally to renounce it in her marriage to my father."

This is a telling paragraph, I believe, because it presents us with a side of Senna where she is proud, yet tired of this heritage. Throughout the book she seems to yearns for a deeper connection to her father's roots, whose she seems prove to be a critical part of her own identity. It could have been more cohesive, but it was enjoyable and easy to read.

Frankly, I am surprised that this book is dedicated to Percival, her husband, when it is clearly a book written to explore her relationship with her father and her paternal roots. This is a great book. It is choppy and all over the place: the telling signs of a book that was difficult to write and experience. It could have been more cohesive, but it was still enjoyable and easy to read. (less)

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Oct 05, 2009

Joy rated it

Interesting memoir detailing the marriage of Denzy's white Bostonian
blue-blood mother and half-black Southern father in 1968. They were two
brilliant writers from wildly divergent backgrounds. The marriage only
lasted eight years, but produced three children. The book is "a potent
statement of personal identity, a challenging look at the murky waters of American ancestry, and an exploration of narratives - the ones we
create and the ones we forget." It's ...more

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Sep 02, 2009

Ciara rated it

Shelves: autobio-memoir, radical-non-fiction, read-in-2009

i may be a touch biased due to the fact that i am a big fan of danzy senna's fiction. donning my most objective hat for a moment, i will say that her fiction is better than this memoir/family history. but i still think this was a good book & i'm pleased to have read it.

danzy senna is mixed race, the product of an idealistic 1968 marriage between two writers--a white writer mother, daughter of the boston brahmin (the dewolfe/howe line, inter-married with the quincys & all the rest), ...morei may be a touch biased due to the fact that i am a big fan of danzy senna's fiction. donning my most objective hat for a moment, i will say that her fiction is better than this memoir/family history. but i still think this was a good book & i'm pleased to have read it.

danzy senna is mixed race, the product of an idealistic 1968 marriage between two writers--a white writer mother, daughter of the boston brahmin (the dewolfe/howe line, inter-married with the quincys & all the rest), & a half-black half-mexican writer father who grew up shuttled around to various family members & family friends in the deep south, never knowing his father or who he was really related to. danzy senna decides to explore her father's lineage, & hence her own, in this exploration of family, race in america, & forgiveness.

my quibbles: too short, for starters. it topped out at 200 pages, & the font was fairly large. i read the whole thing in just a couple of hours. & more of a problem: the whole thing read like it was a series of blog entries that had been strung together in something approximating chronological order. i kept waiting for a narrative to emerge, but it never really came together. i guess one could make an argument that a fractured family history full of erasures, lies, & half-truths makes for a fractured narrative conceit? sure. but i still wanted something more, more development or something. & some of the passages about her pregnancy & being a new mother felt tacked on because they were what was happening as she put the finishing touches on the book. i felt those passages would have been heavily-edited or axed had she waited a few more years to put the book together. they felt intrusive, & although one could make a very strong case that new motherhood is the perfect impetus to finally start uncovering your own family secrets...that's not really how the passages read. it was more like, "here are some family secrets. now here's a passage about my baby! i just had a baby!" too much.

this is pretty critical for a four-star review, huh? i critique because i care! this book is still well worth a read. just try to ignore the incredibly ham-fisted foreshadowing with the birth certificates.(less)

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Aug 12, 2009

Elizabeth rated it

Very compulsively readable, even if you don't know the people involved (or so I suspect). There's a detective story element to the book that is engrossing as Senna looks into her father's familial history. The way racial issues mark our culture is foregrounded here, as Senna examines growing up in a biracial family. I'm not sure, however, that she ever achieves necessary distance. She identifies as a person of color, but also identifies primarily with her white mother, and the interior confl...more

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Jul 22, 2009

Helen rated it

Senna’s narrative is very much in the vein of Walls’ The Glass Castle or Bragg’s All Over But the Shoutin. It surpasses both for its examination, not only of Senna’s parents relationship, but for its exploration of identity today, yesterday and tomorrow.

Carl Senna is a black man born in the south when Jim Crow was alive and well. Fanny Howe, on the other hand, was born of eminent Bostonians whose histories are traceable back to the Mayflower. Of her parents’ divorce Senna says “The d...more

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Mar 17, 2010

Liza rated it

Caitlin: Don't read this review!!

I've found myself in a place where I just enjoy non fiction so much and it's quite a nice place. Also, it was nice to finally finish another book. Such a slow year for me so far.

This was not the best memoir I've read, but it was good. I'd give it 3 1/2 stars if I had that option. I've had the itch to explore my family tree for quite some time, and this book encouraged that itch to get, well, itchier. My family history is probably not as c...more

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Aug 03, 2011

Traci added it

I'm not sure what I think of "Where Did You Sleep Last Night?" as a book. I'm not even sure it is a book. It's more of a loosely woven tapestry of thoughts, recollections, feelings, musings and theories. Which is fine by me because this is a truly disturbing, interesting, beautiful, ugly American family saga. The likes of which is written about more often than it is examined. Senna does a good job of showing the futility of applying sociological analysis to real-life situations. When I...more

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Jul 24, 2011

Lou rated it

A great story of discovery of the author's paternal roots with her father in tow through the poor sections of South.

It struck me very personally as I'm in a similar quandary: much is known (even cherished) about my Mother's side of the family but I know very little of my Father's family history.

As Ms. Senna digs deeper and deeper, she uncovers a startlingly different history of what her family really knows about her father, his relatives and her father's and his parent's hid...more

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Jan 17, 2011

Lucien rated it

Danzy Senna is being touted as the belles lettres of the mulatto nation. She is currently being sued for libel by her father for the lies and the defamation within this book. It is a hatchet job against a man who suffered his entire life. Her mother's background and life except for her white privelege is a mystery. She lumps all her family members into groups. It is an infantile character assassination and I do not understand its appeal at all except to people who are obsessed with the United St...more

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Jul 30, 2009

Jessica rated it

I am often a person who chooses books by their covers/titles. I am not ashamed of this as it leads me to read things that I might not otherwise read (like a memoir about a girl coming to terms with her biracial parents...which didn't sound interesting per se but had the same title as a song I once loved). Judging a book by its cover seems to be a-ok as long as it is broadening horizons instead of limiting them. With that in mind, I really wasn't sure where this book was going to take me.
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Apr 13, 2010

Gene rated it

Danzy Senna's got a WOW family history. She knows a lot about what makes her interesting, but it's the missing information that sends her down South to track her black father's heritage. On the white side of Danzy's family: money, clout, literary acumen and long-time priviledge. On the black side: apparently not a lot until Danzy digs among the "almost" family her father depended on as an abandoned child. Families so interest me and it's not often I find one that draws me in like Danzy...more

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Jun 28, 2009

Gwendalyn McHugh rated it

I think I picked up & put this book back on the shelf 3 times before I checked it out from the library - and I'm glad I finally decided to go with it. Most likely because it has a Boston connection & I loved living there.

It's a quick read (less than a day) but there's a quote somewhere about all unhappy families are unhappy in their own way (Tolstoy, maybe?) and this book gives me inside into the own dysfunction I grew up with.

I find it interesting to see how others pr...more

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Nov 10, 2009

Catherine rated it

Senna begins her memoir reflecting on her difficult childhood being raised by a single mother and her visits with her elusive, irresponsible father.

The focus and more engaging portion of Senna's story began for me when she embarks on an intriguing journey to unravel the mystery into her African-American father's heritage and discovers his extended family in the South. She also discusses her mother's Caucasian blue-blood lineage, but I found her father’s--what some might describe as ...more

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May 05, 2009

Andrea rated it

Shelves: biracial-issues

The author's parents, both writers, but her mother a white woman from Boston and her father an African American man originally from the south, married in 1968. The marriage dissolved as the author's father became abusive and alcoholic. Senna's mother's family, Boston bluebloods, have a well-publicized history, but her father's history, and the roots of his frustration, are a mystery to her until she explores them as an adult. The book is touching and well-written, but it seemed to me the auth...more

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Aug 15, 2009

Martha rated it

I'm not quite finished with this yet, but it's one of those nonfiction books you can't put down. Danzy Senna, the author of Caucasia and another novel, goes on a quest to find out more about her father's history. He practically has none--a mysterious father that no one ever met.

Her parents are a mother from a very blueblood Boston family and her father, a brilliant black man who knows almost nothing about his family or background. He has been a deeply disappointing father, alcoholic ...more

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Oct 10, 2009

Birgit rated it

I was introduced to this wellwritten memoir at the "Mixed Roots Film and Literary Festival" that takes place each year in Los Angeles; Danzy shows in her memoir that being mixed is not only ablut race; that is the obvious part of the challenges that face not only the mixed couple, but in an even higher degree affects children in the union.
Even stronger are the influences of different cultural backgrounds, such as Boston versus Jim Crow's South. With great courage Danzy opens the...more

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Apr 24, 2011

Renee rated it

This book manages to be both a wistful and bitter-toned memoir relating to the author's search for answers about her family's complicated background and racial heritage. Senna was curious about her black father's family history (her mother descended from Boston Brahmins). Senna travels South to trace her father's roots, particularly the mystery of his paternity; along the way she meets potential relatives, searches through records and photos and soaks in the atmosphere he knew as a child.
...more

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Aug 24, 2010

Louise rated it

Danzy Senna sets off on a quest in this book, to find her father's family.When her parents were married in the Sixties their integrated partnership seems likely to succeed. But in the present, her parents are divorced and her well-connected white mom is her and her sister's chief support. What is it in her father's background that would explain why a brilliant man would be so unsuited for success? What she finds is fascinating and goes a long way to illuminate her dad's insecurities.

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Jun 16, 2009

Susan rated it

Read this in one gulp this weekend after hearing DS read from it at the Mixed Roots Literary & Film Festival in LA. She was hilariously funny and the writing is SO GOOD. I love stories about secrets, uncovering hidden pasts, etc so this was right up my alley.

Interesting to read an article when I returned about her father and sister suing her for what she wrote. It doesn't change my opinion of the book but it did make me think, about the repercussions of memoir writing, etc.

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Mar 16, 2009

Meghan rated it

Recommended to Meghan by: for Elle magazine

Shelves: arc, for-review, memoir

Danzy Senna’s family tree looks like a giant oak cleaved by lightning. On her maternal side, grand, majestic branches of New England success and roots deep into the history of America. Her paternal side, merely a small limb and the hints of few branches. What makes Senna’s memoir so moving is not the failed promise of her parents’ mixed race marriage in 1968 of Boston blue blood and “a Negro of exceptional promise” but that her story is all too true of many children of mixed race. That the p...more

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May 16, 2011

Sarah rated it

Shelves: memoirs, multicultural, nonfiction

I thought this was an amazing book--the author's story is compelling, and so is the story of her parents, a mixed-race couple of literary luminaries whose reasons for coming together are ambiguous even to themselves. Senna's exploration of her own ancestry opens up a new avenue for a relationship with her troubled father, and it's poignant to follow their story as it parallels her research. The first book I'd read by this author was Caucasia, which I liked, but I was much more drawn into this on...more

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Feb 05, 2010

Nijla Mumin rated it

This memoir succeeds because of all of the rich details that Senna provides about her terse relationship with her father, and her family. She weaves these details in and out of her search of her familial history, and as a result, I was wholly involved in the narrative. I wanted to find the answers just as she did. I agree with other reviewers that there is a "detective" type element to the work. By the end, I also wanted to embark on a similar journey to uncover the unsaid and hidden ...more

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Dec 23, 2009

Anna Redsand rated it

Recommends it for: Lorraine Price, Alyzsa Van Til, Reinder Van Til

Recommended to Anna by: New York Times Notable Book

Senna examines race, racialization, miscegenation, family and national secrets through the lens of her own multi-racial background--her blueblood Bostonian mother and black father, both writers. She writes dispassionately of a subject about which she is passionate. A true mystery story.

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Sep 16, 2011

Sherry Quan rated it

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I have read Danzy Senna's novels and liked them, felt the emotion of them, but her memoir lacks just that, emotion. From the beginning we know the author wants to learn more about her father's identity to know more about the man/her father. Unfortunately, I thought the exhaustive genealogical search overpowered the author's ability to make sense of her relationship with her father (although it did have me question why I haven't yet had the necessity to dig farther into the "roots" of m...more

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Dec 10, 2009

Colin rated it

Shelves: autobiography, non-fiction, culturalstudies

3.5 stars. Senna crafts an engaging, complicated and meandering journey into her family history. There were moments that jumped out as repetative on occasion, but overall it was a good read.

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Mar 14, 2009

Elizabeth L. rated it

Senna puts together a dramatic family puzzle, with honesty and style. She's speaking at NYPL on May 27 - - Rebecca "Third Wave Feminism" Walker will be interviewing her...pls come!

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Jun 19, 2011

Dr. Marcia Chatelain rated it

Gripping and sometimes painful exploration of how to be an adult when you have a complicated childhood. Senna's honesty and clarity are enviable and inspiring.

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May 08, 2010

Linda rated it

incredible story of one woman's search for her lineage and of how race informs so much of who we are.

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May 22, 2010

Danielle rated it

Really interesting and vividly depicted book. The only thing I missed a little bit was that the author seemed to take for granted a bit that her mother's family history was public and available, and so the sections about her mother's life and her mother's family in this book sometimes left me with more questions than answers.

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About Danzy Senna

Danzy Senna is an American novelist, born and raised in Boston, Massachusetts in 1970. Her parents, Carl Senna, an Afro-Mexican poet and author, and Fanny Howe, who is Irish-American writer, were also civil rights activists.

She attended Stanford University and received an MFA from the University of California at Irvine. There, she received several creative writing awards.

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