Trillin’s reporting in several of his essays offers insight into the mix of fear, entitlement, anxiety and sense of superiority felt by many white Americans. 'No sophisticated study of public opinion is needed to establish the fact that in the United States, North or South, a white life is considered to be of more value than a Negro life,' he wrote in 1964. This book provides historical context to the issues of race, racism, voter suppression and income inequality underpinning the current presidential election. Trillin’s elegant storytelling and keen observations sometimes churned my wrath about the glacial pace of progress.
The title essay takes what must have been, at the time, the most probing, wide-ranging view yet of the epochal 'Freedom Summer' of 1964 when young activists from all over the country converged upon Mississippi to register black votes. With the diligent clarity, humane wit, polished prose and attention to pertinent detail that exemplify Trillin’s journalism at its best, the piece captures both the potential and the perils of that movement ... Jackson, 1964 drives home a sobering realization: Even with signs of progress, racism in America is news that stays news.
Not everything in it is top shelf. Some of the early articles are tentative and straightforwardly reportorial; Mr. Trillin was still finding his voice. But everything in Jackson, 1964 resonates. The book builds, and the payoffs in some of its later pieces (the most recent is from 2008) are generous. The volume is more than a history lesson. The issues it considers — police shootings, voter suppression tactics, race-based acts of terrorism — seem taken from today’s headlines. We’ve come so far, yet we haven’t come very far at all ... Jackson, 1964 is a memorial of sorts. It contains the names of many forgotten figures in the civil rights struggle. The biggest honor Mr. Trillin paid these men and women was to write about them so honestly and so well. These pieces have literary as well as historical merit, and they will continue to be read for the pleasure they deliver as well as for the pain they describe.
These unsettling tales, elegantly written and wonderfully reported, are like black-and-white snapshots from the national photo album. They depict a society in flux but also stubbornly unmoved through the decades when it comes to many aspects of race relations ... Jackson, 1964 records an important, albeit shameful, chapter of American history. The grace Trillin brings to his job makes his stories all the more poignant.
One of the weaknesses of collections of reportage that span decades is that they can be heavy on facts and light on analysis. But an advantage is that they give a snapshot of an era. And that’s what Jackson, 1964 gives us: a chilling portrait of the discrimination, student protests and police shootings that have characterized African-American life ... Essay after essay reminds us that the history of this struggle consists of events that easily could happen today ... One of Trillin’s greatest gifts is his reporter’s eye for the telling detail. That skill is very much in evidence here ... The writing is sometimes too detached for the racial injustices described, but these essays still feature shocking passages.
The subjects in the collection from the longtime New Yorker contributor — tensions between black co-eds and white college administrators, halfhearted attempts at school desegregation, police brutality and questions of racial identity — are as relevant today as they ever were ... While some writers grab readers by the nape, Trillin's hand is at the small of the reader's back. Reading Trillin's take on an all-black Mardi Gras crew prompts the same anxiety you might feel while watching a novice totter across a high wire ... In any compilation of pieces reported over so many years, some will stand up better than others...Reading Trillin's take on an all-black Mardi Gras crew prompts the same anxiety you might feel while watching a novice totter across a high wire.
