Eden110 reviewed The Message by Ta-Nehisi Coates
Must Read
5 stars
A very thought provoking narrative that will stay with me for a good while.
256 pages
English language
Published 2024 by Random House Publishing Group.
The Message
5 stars
(22 reviews)
Ta-Nehisi Coates originally set off to write a book about writing, in the tradition of Orwell’s classic Politics and the English Language, but found himself grappling with deeper questions about how our stories—our reporting and imaginative narratives and mythmaking—expose and distort our realities.
The first of the book’s three intertwining essays is set in Dakar, Senegal. Despite being raised as a strict Afrocentrist, Coates had never set foot on the African continent until now. He roams the “steampunk” city of “old traditions and new machinery,” but everywhere he goes he feels as if he’s in two places at once: a modern city in Senegal and a mythic kingdom in his mind. Finally he travels to the slave castles off the coast and has his own reckoning with the legacy of the Afrocentric dream.
He takes readers along with him to Columbia, South Carolina, where he meets an educator whose job …
Ta-Nehisi Coates originally set off to write a book about writing, in the tradition of Orwell’s classic Politics and the English Language, but found himself grappling with deeper questions about how our stories—our reporting and imaginative narratives and mythmaking—expose and distort our realities.
The first of the book’s three intertwining essays is set in Dakar, Senegal. Despite being raised as a strict Afrocentrist, Coates had never set foot on the African continent until now. He roams the “steampunk” city of “old traditions and new machinery,” but everywhere he goes he feels as if he’s in two places at once: a modern city in Senegal and a mythic kingdom in his mind. Finally he travels to the slave castles off the coast and has his own reckoning with the legacy of the Afrocentric dream.
He takes readers along with him to Columbia, South Carolina, where he meets an educator whose job is threatened for teaching one of Coates’s own books. There he discovers a community of mostly white supporters who were transformed by the “racial reckoning” of 2020. But he also explores the backlash to this reckoning and the deeper myths of the community—a capital of the confederacy with statues of segregationists looming over its public squares.
And in Palestine, Coates discovers the devastating gap between the narratives we’ve accepted and the clashing reality of life on the ground. He meets with activists and dissidents, Israelis and Palestinians—the old, who remember their dispossessions on two continents, and the young, who have only known struggle and disillusionment. He travels into Jerusalem, the heart of Zionist mythology, and to the occupied territories, where he sees the reality the myth is meant to hide. It is this hidden story that draws him in and profoundly changes him—and makes the war that would soon come all the more devastating.
Written at a dramatic moment in American and global life, this work from one of the country’s most important writers is about the urgent need to untangle ourselves from the destructive nationalist myths that shape our world—and our own souls—and embrace the liberating power of even the most difficult truths.
benwerd reviewed The Message by Ta-Nehisi Coates
Vital
5 stars
A powerful set of first person essays on injustice that serve to emphasize the parallels - and hard links of funding and culture - between systemic racism in America and in Israel. Its point is not to provide a comprehensive overview of the problem, but to shine a light through a particular lens into it. The result is compelling and tragic. A portrait of occupation and oppression which is easier to overlook than face.
Aaron reviewed The Message by Ta-Nehisi Coates
The Message
5 stars
Coates's chapter on his journey to Palestine is the longest chapter in this book and has gotten the most public attention upon the book's release. But there's a lot more than "just" that to sink your teeth into in this compact but thoughtful work. Coates begins with a moving, autobiographical account of his discovering the joy of reading. One chapter covers his trip to Dakar, and another covers a journey to South Carolina to meet dedicated teachers fighting against his own books being banned in public schools there. In that chapter, I was particularly struck by his account of his own evolution as a writer, realizing that he could not simply stand on the sidelines as others were risking their positions in the community to defend his writing. This introspection continues into the Palestine chapter, and I was struck by his general tone of "I really thought X, but now …
Coates's chapter on his journey to Palestine is the longest chapter in this book and has gotten the most public attention upon the book's release. But there's a lot more than "just" that to sink your teeth into in this compact but thoughtful work. Coates begins with a moving, autobiographical account of his discovering the joy of reading. One chapter covers his trip to Dakar, and another covers a journey to South Carolina to meet dedicated teachers fighting against his own books being banned in public schools there. In that chapter, I was particularly struck by his account of his own evolution as a writer, realizing that he could not simply stand on the sidelines as others were risking their positions in the community to defend his writing. This introspection continues into the Palestine chapter, and I was struck by his general tone of "I really thought X, but now I understand Y," which gives the book a level of self-reflection perhaps not always shared by Coates's loudest critics. Coates ties the end of the book back to the beginning's love of language and story by considering what role an outsider, like him, has in telling the story of other people. We are fortunate, in 2025, to have a thinker and writer of Coates's skill among us, and as the South Carolina chapter makes clear, preserving artists of this skill is going to take all of us working in their defense.
Eric reviewed The Message by Ta-Nehisi Coates
Message
4 stars
First time reading Coates--eager to read more. Last 1/3 or 1/2 of the book about his visit to Palestine. Admirable reflection on his evolving views from writing The Case for Reparations to now.
Emily Johnson reviewed The Message by Ta-Nehisi Coates
Everyone should read this
5 stars
Required reading and so much better caliber of writing, social political comprehension of apartheid, and primary and secondary historical resources and research than many reviewers have let on
Steel Rabbit reviewed The Message by Ta-Nehisi Coates
An Enthralling Read
4 stars
An earnest examination of Coates’ self, history, and previous writing, all while traveling through Senegal, North Carolina, and Palestine. Moving and thought-provoking to be sure.
Marc A. Godin reviewed The Message by Ta-Nehisi Coates
The Message
5 stars
A profound and meaningful book about the responsibilities we take on when we become writers. Coates describes his travels to through the perspective of why he is a writer, the spirits he's carried with him, the reach his words have had, and the times he failed to meet his own high standards while at the same time highlighting injustices and reminding us how to fight against them. Deeply personal and deeply readable.
pdotb@wyrms.de reviewed The Message by Ta-Nehisi Coates
Good, but somehow not what I expected
4 stars
I came here off the back of that CBS interview, but was surprised to see how the book went. It's really three quite separate essays, held together by a common theme of the stories we tell ourselves, and how important writing and story telling are. The third essay has obviously attracted the most attention and, while it's definitely thought-provoking, I think it really suffers from being too short -- perhaps it should have been a book on its own? One of the principal points of the essay is that we really need more Palestinian voices in the media. The stories we're told matter as they construct our reality.
Jim Brown reviewed The Message by Ta-Nehisi Coates
Tempting to think that a book might break through
The tide has certainly shifted in the U.S. when it comes to the conversation around Palestine, and this book is more evidence of this. It is tempting to think that because Coates is the author, this book will somehow break through or crack open the rhetorical situation and allow things to be said that have, to date, been deemed unsayable. But I think that's a dream. Unfortunately, the shift in public conversation has tended to coincide with a ratcheting up of the killing of civilians. Those who think that rhetoric and discourse are an alternative to violence will have to contend with that fact.
"An inhuman system demands inhumans, and so it produces them in stories, editorials, newscasts, movies, and television. Editors and writers like to think that they are not part of such systems, that they are independent, objective, and arrive at their conclusions solely by dint of their …
The tide has certainly shifted in the U.S. when it comes to the conversation around Palestine, and this book is more evidence of this. It is tempting to think that because Coates is the author, this book will somehow break through or crack open the rhetorical situation and allow things to be said that have, to date, been deemed unsayable. But I think that's a dream. Unfortunately, the shift in public conversation has tended to coincide with a ratcheting up of the killing of civilians. Those who think that rhetoric and discourse are an alternative to violence will have to contend with that fact.
"An inhuman system demands inhumans, and so it produces them in stories, editorials, newscasts, movies, and television. Editors and writers like to think that they are not part of such systems, that they are independent, objective, and arrive at their conclusions solely by dint of their reporting and research. But the Palestine I saw bore so little likeness to the stories I read and so much resemblance to the systems I've known that I am left believing that, at least here, this objectivity is self delusion."
