I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings

[OffBeatBooks]

As someone who very rarely reads memoirs or non-fiction, I am interested to know how other people are finding the experience of this genre?

Personally, so far I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings has been so perceptive and beautifully written that I have become utterly engaged with it, without the detachment that I thought could come with reading non-fiction.

Please feel free to share your thoughts in the discussion, I would love to hear from you!

[OffBeatBooks]

Over halfway through now!

Since starting this book, something about it felt 'different' that I couldn't quite put my finger on. I realised that I was experiencing the story from a child's perspective - something very rare in my reading now that I am an adult. I have been captivated by young Maya's unique and intensely observant view of the world. But is this perspective truly something new and unfamiliar, or have I simply forgotten what it's like to be a child?

What are your thoughts on reading a book written from a child's perspective?

[OffBeatBooks]

I'm nearly at the end of I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings. Today someone asked me what the book is about, and I found it very difficult to put into words. I think what makes Angelou's memoir so absorbing is that it is a kaleidoscope of complex relationships, wisdom, explorations of emotive issues and powerful moments such as this one:

'she would not sit beside a draft dodger who was a Negro as well. She added that the least he could do was fight for his country the way her son was fighting on Iwo Jima. The story said that the man pulled his body away from the window to show an armless sleeve. He said quietly and with great dignity, 'Then ask your son to look around for my arm, which I left over there.'

All this means the power of Angelou's memoir defies summarisation. If you had to briefly describe I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, how would you do it?