Those of you with long memories will no doubt recall that a couple of years ago I was gifted a beautiful box set of Penguin Moderns, little books with extracts from stimulating bigger books from the Penguin Modern Classics range. It was a Mother’s Day present from the Offspring, and I *had* been gradually making my way through the set, two at a time. However, I was shocked to realise that I hadn’t actually read any for nearly a year, which is dreadful; and so recently I picked up the next two in the sequence, and a stimulating pair they turned out to be!

Penguin Modern 27 – New York City in 1979 by Kathy Acker

Reading Kathy Acker is not for the faint-hearted; and I can say that because I read a good amount of her work back in the day, including her seminal “Blood and Guts in High School”, which came out in 1984. Because of the amount of sex, drugs and violence in her books, she was touted as a female William Burroughs, though I would say that was doing two very individual authors a disservice. Structurally, the book pushed the boundaries (as it did with subject matter) and it was a fascinating read (although not for everyone). Possibly I should revisit it – I think I still have my crumbly old copy somewhere. Anyway, on to the Penguin Modern…

“NYC” is made up of texts written by Acker in 1981 but not published until much later. Illustrated with photographs by Anne Turyn, it presents vignettes of alternative night life in the city of the time; plus the story of Janey and Johnny, and their encounters with the denizens of NYC’s underground. Sex and drugs are the motivating factor – one of the pieces is titled, “Intense Sexual Desire is the Greatest Thing in the World”.

Reading Acker now took me straight back to the past; to the late 1970s when things seemed to be falling apart, punk music had altered our way of looking at things and it was becoming ok for women artists to address the subjects that were ok for men to tackle. A challenging read, yes – but intriguing and provocative and a reminder of just how Acker was pushing the boundaries back then.

Penguin Modern 28 – Africa’s Tarnished Name by Chinua Achebe

Achebe probably needs no introduction; a Nigerian novelist, poet, professor, and critic, “Things Fall Apart” is his best-know book and I really ought to read it. However, I haven’t, so starting with this little book was a great way to get an introduction to a writer new to me. “Africa’s Tarnished Name” is non-fiction, collecting together four essays originally featured in his 2011 book “The Education of a British Protected Child”; and they made stimulating, if sobering, reading. The essays are: “What is Nigeria to Me?”, “Traveling White”, “Africa is People” and the title piece; and as you can see from the number of post-its, they really made an impact.

A human is a human because of other humans.

Achebe lived through troubling times, in particular the Nigerian Civil War which caused dreadful suffering. I was fairly ignorant of much of this, although when I was quite young I remember hearing appeals for help for Biafra; in my innocence, I had no idea of the bigger picture. Achebe covers this in his first essay, and hearing of the suffering followed by the political corruption was heartbreaking. He also tackles his experiences of racism, whilst travelling through South Africa, and it’s shocking. It also made we wonder how much we’ve moved on from then…. The title essay is a powerful piece, taking on Joseph Conrad’s fetishization and distortion of the African experience, and it made me very much rethink my reaction of “Heart of Darkness”; it’s some time since I read it, but I do recall feeling quite uncomfortable about it. Achebe quotes James Baldwin at one point, words which have stayed with me:

Negroes want to be treated like men; a perfectly straightforward statement containing seven words. People who have mastered Kant, Hegel, Shakespeare, Marx, Freud and the Bible find this statement impenetrable.

I read this book while there was rioting in the USA and iconoclasm in Bristol; I can understand both, and it shocks me that we’re still in a world where racial injustice exists. Whatever happened to the idealised melting pot where we all lived in harmony together? Inspirational books like this encourage us to think about these issues, try to recognise the prejudice in ourselves and look to where we can improve. A very important Penguin Modern indeed.

*****

So two completely different Penguin Moderns by writers who couldn’t be further apart; yet both act as a bracing wake-up call to not accept the everyday, to look more closely at the world and its norms, and to consider whether it needs change. I’m so glad I jumped back on the Penguin Modern wagon, and I will try not to leave it so long until the next two!