The Heart of a Woman (from Ex Libris)

7/7-7/10/05—The Heart of a Woman by Maya Angelou
Angelou’s autobiographical novel was a bit disconcerting to me. As a read, I rather enjoyed it (even though I was made to feel throughout like “my kind” was the ultimate enemy). The disconcerting part was in that it was a blow to my image of Angelou. I’ve always thought of her as this elegant lady full of wisdom whose voice could read anything and make it sound lovely. I never thought of where the wisdom must have come from. I didn’t expect to read that she’d been a bed-hopping social climber who put as much or more in stock of her own agenda as that of her teenaged son.