Today is World Book Day (WBD) which happens annually on the first Thursday of March. This year marks WBD's 25th anniversary. The theme this year is a message for all children: You are a reader!
Today, I am remembering and celebrating the books that I brought into fruition between 2005 and 2010, which were independently published collections of creative expressions by Black and mixed-race women:
*Brown Eyes, 2005
Sexual Attraction Revealed, 2008
*Hair Power Skin Revolution, 2010
*Funded by an Arts Council England Grants for the Arts Award
These anthologies included poetry and personal essays from a diverse group of Black and mixed-race women — everyday women expressing themselves in their own unique style, without the white gaze. The writers offered empowering and creative ways of understanding and relating to a range of themes including gender, 'race', ethnicity, identity, hair, colorism, culture and heritage, with strong and reflective voices, some unheard; some previously published.
Full details are listed under 'Books' on the right of this blog.
In my childhood days, my reading was somewhat limited to books that I could read in my grandparents house — the Encyclopaedia Britannica a general knowledge book, which I would tackle occasionally; a few editions of my grandmother's Readers' Digest magazines (grown up stories that I would dive in and select something appealing) plus children's' novels that I loaned from my local library, which I really enjoyed visiting on Saturday mornings. Then there were comics like Bunty a British comic for girls, which consisted of a collection of many small strips, the stories typically being three to five pages long.
Thankfully, over the last twenty seven years I have widened my reading and with modern technology, I have a vast selection of books on my Kindle. I still have a yearning to buy 'real' books and have a small collection that are of sentimental value mostly because they have been signed by the authors.
Happy World Book Day!
Comments welcome!
