Item Information
Title
Newspaper article reviewing Pauli Murray's visit to Durham on the anniversary of Proud Shoes publication
Creator
Hodges, Betty
Source
Durham Morning Herald
Date
November 24, 1957
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Type
Text
Text
Betty Hodges' Book Nook
Pauli Murray came back home to Durham last week, back from what she terms her “exile” in New York. Her brief three-day visit was so filled by a whirl of visits, talks and meetings that she likened it to a campaign tour. But it gave her the first “inside look” she had had at Durham in 20 years, the Durham she had described in her book. Proud Shoes.
The initial purpose of the visit was to speak at a celebration held at the Stanford L. Warren Public, Library in observation of National Book Week. It turned out, however, that her talk was only one of a number she made at schools and for civic groups before she returned to the busy law office in New York where she is a practicing attorney.
In a way, parts of what she had to say filled out the story she told in Proud Shoes, which was published by Harper and Brothers last fall. The book was, on the surface, the story of her family. It traced the origins of a heritage which carried with it a confusing mixture of pride and bitterness.
This heritage was in part a mixture of blood from Negro, Indian and white ancestors. It was also a mixture of tradition.
On the one side there was the tradition of freedom as represented by Grandfather Fitzgerald, who fought to affirm the rights of the individual in the Civil War and then spent the remainder of his productive life as an educational missionary among the freed men of the South. On the other there was the tradition of Southern aristocracy as represented by Grandmother Fitzgerald, who as the daughter of a slave girl and a blooded Southern aristocrat was brought up in her father’s household as a lady.
Telling the story of the Fitzgerald family, Miss Murray was telling the story of a people. Her own struggle, along with the struggle of her forebears, to find themselves and a way of life which they could live with honor was on a small scale the leviathan effort of her whole race.
“We needed to articulate our experiences,” she said. “Only we who had endured these, experiences could make them a part of the whole.”
As she explained how she came to write the book, Miss Murray filled in the story which she ended in the book with the ninth year of her life.
“I had many motivations, some intensely personal, some social, and they changed as I wrote.”
A freshman English essay on her Grandfather Fitzgerald was the germ of the book, she thinks, and an eight page diary entry in 1933 “on my three mothers” gave the idea further impetus.
All in all, she figured she spent nearly 25 years thinking about it and nearly another four writing it.
And, looking out on the auditorium packed with friends who had known her and her family since childhood, she said, “Proud Shoes is not my family story alone, but your story as well.”
“The book has many weaknesses, but if a Negro child can read it and hold his head higher, and if a white child can read it and have more understanding and the two can clasp hands in determination to rid the country of the sickness of racism of which segregation is only a manifestation, then it is not a failure,” she concluded.
Small in stature and in frame, Miss Murray would have seemed frail except for an appearance of inner strength which emanated from her. At the library celebration her voice was clear and distinct so that even those packed three deep at the back of the crowded auditorium could hear each word quite well, though most were unable to see her from their seats.
She wore a neat black suit on which the orchid corsage which was presented to her at the beginning of the evening seemed an unnecessary decoration. No one wondered that she held a responsible position in a New York law firm.
In connection with her talk, the library had on display an exhibit of pictures and other family treasures including the Civil War diary of her grandfather. In addition there was an exhibit of the reviews given her book, “all of which were commendatory and complimentary except one out of Jackson, Miss., written by a woman who was a native of Ohio.”
Busy woman that she is, Pauli Murray will no doubt be returning to Durham more often.
Pauli Murray came back home to Durham last week, back from what she terms her “exile” in New York. Her brief three-day visit was so filled by a whirl of visits, talks and meetings that she likened it to a campaign tour. But it gave her the first “inside look” she had had at Durham in 20 years, the Durham she had described in her book. Proud Shoes.
The initial purpose of the visit was to speak at a celebration held at the Stanford L. Warren Public, Library in observation of National Book Week. It turned out, however, that her talk was only one of a number she made at schools and for civic groups before she returned to the busy law office in New York where she is a practicing attorney.
In a way, parts of what she had to say filled out the story she told in Proud Shoes, which was published by Harper and Brothers last fall. The book was, on the surface, the story of her family. It traced the origins of a heritage which carried with it a confusing mixture of pride and bitterness.
This heritage was in part a mixture of blood from Negro, Indian and white ancestors. It was also a mixture of tradition.
On the one side there was the tradition of freedom as represented by Grandfather Fitzgerald, who fought to affirm the rights of the individual in the Civil War and then spent the remainder of his productive life as an educational missionary among the freed men of the South. On the other there was the tradition of Southern aristocracy as represented by Grandmother Fitzgerald, who as the daughter of a slave girl and a blooded Southern aristocrat was brought up in her father’s household as a lady.
Telling the story of the Fitzgerald family, Miss Murray was telling the story of a people. Her own struggle, along with the struggle of her forebears, to find themselves and a way of life which they could live with honor was on a small scale the leviathan effort of her whole race.
“We needed to articulate our experiences,” she said. “Only we who had endured these, experiences could make them a part of the whole.”
As she explained how she came to write the book, Miss Murray filled in the story which she ended in the book with the ninth year of her life.
“I had many motivations, some intensely personal, some social, and they changed as I wrote.”
A freshman English essay on her Grandfather Fitzgerald was the germ of the book, she thinks, and an eight page diary entry in 1933 “on my three mothers” gave the idea further impetus.
All in all, she figured she spent nearly 25 years thinking about it and nearly another four writing it.
And, looking out on the auditorium packed with friends who had known her and her family since childhood, she said, “Proud Shoes is not my family story alone, but your story as well.”
“The book has many weaknesses, but if a Negro child can read it and hold his head higher, and if a white child can read it and have more understanding and the two can clasp hands in determination to rid the country of the sickness of racism of which segregation is only a manifestation, then it is not a failure,” she concluded.
Small in stature and in frame, Miss Murray would have seemed frail except for an appearance of inner strength which emanated from her. At the library celebration her voice was clear and distinct so that even those packed three deep at the back of the crowded auditorium could hear each word quite well, though most were unable to see her from their seats.
She wore a neat black suit on which the orchid corsage which was presented to her at the beginning of the evening seemed an unnecessary decoration. No one wondered that she held a responsible position in a New York law firm.
In connection with her talk, the library had on display an exhibit of pictures and other family treasures including the Civil War diary of her grandfather. In addition there was an exhibit of the reviews given her book, “all of which were commendatory and complimentary except one out of Jackson, Miss., written by a woman who was a native of Ohio.”
Busy woman that she is, Pauli Murray will no doubt be returning to Durham more often.