King: A Life

This was outstanding, and it's clear to me why it has been so acclaimed. The details and story telling make it a page-turner, and I learned a great deal more about King because of the depth and breadth of this biography. As a writer and historian myself, I'm so impressed with Eig's ability to recreate day by day minutia, as well as dialog, to create a rich and full picture of King's life as well as his family members' and friends' too.
This was an excellent listen, by the way. The narrator has King's cadence down.
Finally, in the final section of Q & A, Eig talks about the way that we have “hollowed” King and how we must see him as a real man. I have long felt this also, and this book helps us see King's complexity, his rage, and his sadness toward the end of his life. I have told my students that we have sort of made King into a “teddy bear” of sorts, and the reality of his depression, his sense that he might be killed, and his frustration with the movement actually make his greatness greater. There is also comfort here in our own often-depressing and scary time.

A great and important book. I loved the closing statements of the epilogue, which expresses better than I could why it is so worth reading:

“...in almost every school in America, King's life and lessons are often smoothed and polished beyond recognition.

...

Our simplified celebration of King comes at a cost. It saps the strength of his philosophical and intellectual contributions. It undercuts his power to inspire change... the nation remains racked with racism, ethno-nationalism, cultural division, residential and educational segregation, economic inequality, violence, and a fading sense of hope that government, or anyone, will ever fix those problems.

...

Today, his words might help us make our way through these troubled times, but only if we actually read them; only if we embrace the complicated King, the flawed King, the human King, the radical King; only if we see and hear him clearly again, as America saw and heard him once before.”

Listen to the audiobook narration by Dion Graham: it elevates what is possibly one of the most engaging stories in American history, into something even better. When it comes to the speeches, the narrator NAILS the inflection and tone of MLK. Especially the “I Have a Dream Speech” where I found myself nearly in tears in hearing how it was described and how it impacted every single person in the audience. The book is not afraid of dramatizing events, but does it tastefully using primary sources and quotes that makes it as authentic as it is emotional. It reads like a novel. The narrator makes it even better.

King is an easy figure to deify; his place in history is shrouded in tragedy and reverence. He boasts the claim of being the only civilian to have a federal holiday named after him and for being the reason several civil rights legislation were able to be accomplished. But it is wrong to say that this man was perfect. Even as a man of God who was thrust into the nation's spotlight that demanded a spotless record to represent the Civil Rights Movement - he was a serial adulterer, often egotistical, and made mistakes that history has washed away in favor of not tarnishing his legacy. This book uses new evidence and interviews to show the side of King that is not shown to the public. While he is far from a bad man, he does succumb to temptation and the pressures that are oft born in the crucible of unexpected fame. Sometimes, someone has to make decisions that are bound to upset people who do not deserve to be wronged for the greater good.