The Radical King

Series: The Radical King

By: Martin Luther King Jr. / Editor: Cornel West / Narrated By: LeVar Burton, Gabourey Sidibe, Cornel West, Mike Colter, Danny Glover, Wanda Sykes, Leslie Odom Jr., Michael K. Williams

Length: 11 hrs and 8 mins

More notable for Cornel West’s Commentary—soooo, I think, while this is good, I’m looking for MLK Jr’s Autobiography narrated by LeVar Burton to be better

GULP!

How can I say that this remarkable audiobook isn’t the best out there when I haven’t even tried the Burton-narration Autobiography?

Dunno, but lemme just give you my thoughts.

The MASS of narrators used seemed to have been done to show that King’s words are living and breathing, his speeches live today.

But really? I found all the narrators distracting. Extraordinary talents, each one yes. But as relaying inimitable words in King’s inimitable style? Not so much. While I’m glad women were honored in being chosen to read some of the speeches, showing how his words are lived today, what they mean to today’s Black woman, there’s nothing so disorienting as well-known words coming from where you’d least expect it.

Me? I liked LeVar Burton’s style of speech the best: Enthusiasm, with drama, with meaning, with verve.

The others? Not so much. I know! I’m proFOUNDly sorry cuz I now totally sound like a white dill hole, which I kinda sorta am (Or rather, I’m part of the Browning of America).

But here in 2021, after the racially charged murders that occurred in 2020, the violence that met largely peaceful protests, the over 74 million Americans who voted for an avowed racist? I was sooooo hoping to feeeeel King’s words, his calls for all to serve their neighbor. His decrying of racism, poverty, materialism, and military might. I wanted, after watching what happened to the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, to hear about nonviolence and have my belief in a future renewed. There has NEVER been ANYone like MLK Jr. just NEVER.

One of the speeches here is where he informs and enlightens about Gandhi, and yes I do believe Gandhi was a truly remarkable human being. But I believe, especially after being soooo struck by what I learned in Death of a King, that King was a more human one, was challenged by more self doubt, was more challenged by the people he was trying to help, felt more human emotions such as despair and depression.

So yesssss, what I did like about The Radical King was how it set out to really show King as a leader in his many forms, not the All Peaceful All the Time sanitized version society wants to paint him as, the version white America is comfortable with. Awesome!

But the “radical” part seemed to come from Cornel West rather than from King’s words. Yes, the man was stalked by the FBI, was The Most Wanted, so for the time he was indeed radical. But gosh, his words just aged sooo well over time. There seems nothing radical in appealing to impoverished whites, in enlightening them that they were as crushed by the system as Blacks. There seems nothing radical in saying war is an atrocity that America is especially good at exporting.

…hmmm…. okay… maybe that DOES sound a bit radical. And I liked it. There’s nothing that says you love your country so much as telling it that it can do better, be better. It’s like correcting a much-loved child. But I imagine it’s hard to hear…

So anyway! I was looking forward to feeling a renewed sense of purpose for Monday’s MLK Day, a renewed sense of hope. Didn’t find that cuz the multiple narrators threw me off—and Wanda Sykes reeeeally threw me off (I kept hearing in my head a hiLARious joke she told about a tiger in a casino…), so I dunno that I can recommend the Audible Freebie, The Other America, that’s part of this King Series. Get it for the words, just try not to think about a disoriented tiger in Las Vegas…

Still, this week’s Listening was all about individuals who’ve heeded the call to Serve, and there can be NO doubt that King did just that. That the audiobook ends with his last speech is HEARTbreaking; there can be no happy ending, can there?

But I s’pose that’s where the many many narrators come in? Cuz the man made a difference, changed the lives of MANY, brought dignity, brought light.

Yeh yeh yeh Radical

And yep. Here in 2021, it’s looking like Peace is going to be a radical idea.

God bless the man, and I’m hitting his Autobiography posthaste!