Ta-Nehisi Coates and the World as It Is

The author's new book is an Orientalist comedy

Lyle Ashton Harris | National Portrait Gallery

In his new book The Message, Ta-Nehisi Coates explores how storytelling can distort our understanding of the world. Ironically, he initially intended to write a book about writing itself, in the style of George Orwell’s “Politics and the English Language.” I say ironically because the golden rule of writing is “show, don’t tell” and although he tells us throughout the book that our stories distort reality, the text becomes an accidental comedy when he repeatedly shows us what he means by doing it himself.

The story Coates most loves to tell, of course, is that systemic racism and white supremacy are not just historical artifacts but ongoing forces that continue to shape American society. In Between the World and Me, Coates argued that racism is embedded in the very fabric of American life and as foundational to our democracy as the Constitution.

The book ends up being one long question—what’s between the world and me?—and the answer ends up being in the only place he never looks. Namely, his own ego.

Still, plenty of ink has already been spilled on the matter, and I’m not here to rehash the merits of the Everything Is Racism argument, but to discuss Coates’ new book, which is a collection of four intertwined essays. Although three of the essays seem to exist mainly so that the fourth one on Israel, which is fully half the text, can be a book.