From Library Journal
Particularly in light of the recent deaths of June Jordan and Gwendolyn Brooks, readers might well look to Giovanni as spokeswoman for the black experience. And, at times, she captures it, effectively representing "all the women who said Baby, Baby, Baby I know you didn't mean to lose your job...I know you didn't mean to gamble the rentmoney I know you didn't mean to hit me." A recent poem, "Have Dinner with Me," written after the World Trade Center collapsed, is a modern masterpiece. Unfortunately, too many of these poems, though themselves strong, seem intent on rehashing the 1950s political climate. And the "Not Quite Poems" predominate. These proselike pieces include childhood memoirs that draw the reader clearly into her experiences, and there is a delightful spoof on what the movie of Harry Potter should have been, but elegiac tributes and political diatribes fare less well. "I keep trying to learn something new so I can share what I am learning," she writes in a letter-poem to a convict on death row. While the effort is to be praised, she too often comes up with insights readers have absorbed a long time ago. For larger collections.Rochelle Ratner, formerly with "Soho Weekly News," New York Copyright 2002 Reed Business Information, Inc.


From Booklist
For 30 years Giovanni has channeled her experiences and responses to American life into bluesy poetry that entwines the political and the personal and celebrates womanhood and black society and culture. Hers is an embracing, uplifting, and sustaining voice, one given to both anger and humor. In her latest collection of 50 new poems and "not quite poems," Giovanni pays sweet tribute to her grandmother and remembers Gwendolyn Brooks: "Not only one of the premier poets of America but a woman for all seasons." She also shares family stories, ponders a scary bout with cancer, offers an unusual view of Harry Potter, and scathingly castigates Bush and Gore. In the title poem, she's at her swinging best, funny and wise as she riffs on the line "we're going to Mars," writing in one striking stanza, "because whatever is wrong with us will not / get right with us so we journey forth / carrying the same baggage," and yet, Giovanni hopes, we may be lightening that burden bit by bit. Donna Seaman
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved


Book Description
When Nikki Giovanni's poems first emerged during the Civil Rights and Black Arts Movements of the 1960s, she immediately took a place among the most celebrated and influential poets of the era. Now, Giovanni continues to stand as one of the most commanding, luminous voices to grace America's political and poetic landscape. In a career spanning over thirty years, Giovanni has created a body of work that's become vital and essential to our American consciousness. This collection of new poems is a masterpiece that explores the ecstatic union between self and community. Quilting the Black-Eyed Pea is an extraordinarily intimate collection. Each poem bears our revered cultural icon's trademark of the unfalteringly political and the intensely personal: The elegant "What We Miss" exalts the might and grace of women, while "Swinging on a Rainbow" rejoices about the spaces in which we read; Giovanni commemorates Africa and her family legacy in the majestic "Symphony of the Sphinx" and contemplates our America in the heartbreaking "Desperate Acts" and "9:11:01 He Blew It." And in the dreamy "Making James Baldwin" and dazzling "Quilting the Black-Eyed Pea," Giovanni gives us reason to comfort, to share, to love, to change and to be human. Quilting the Black-Eyed Pea is Nikki Giovanni's meditation on humanity and soul. It's her revelatory gaze at the world in which we live -- and her confession on the world she dreams we will one day call home. Nikki Giovanni is a national treasure as she once again confirms her place as one of America's most powerful truth tellers and beloved daughters.


About the Author
When Nikki Giovanni's poems first emerged during the Civil Rights, Black Power and Black Arts Movements in the 1960s, she immediately took a place among the most celebrated and influential poets of the era. Now, more than 30 years later, Nikki Giovanni still stands as one of the most commanding, luminous voices to grace America's political and poetic landscape.Poet, activist, mother and professor Nikki Giovanni was born June 7, 1943, in Knoxville, Tennessee.While a student at Fisk University, she re-established the campus's Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) Chapter in 1965. In New York, 1968, after studying at University of Pennsylvania's School of Social Work and Columbia University's School of Fine Arts and, she self-published her first volume of poetry Black Feeling, Black Talk. Over the span of 30 years as a poet, Ms. Giovanni has received nineteen honorary degrees from colleges and universities including, Fisk University, Smith College, Indiana University, Delaware State University, and University of Maryland. Her numerous awards include Woman of the Year for Ebony, Mademoiselle, Essence, and Ladies Home Journal magazines; YWCA Woman of the Year, Cincinnati Chapter; Outstanding Woman of Tennessee Award; Ohio Women's Hall of Fame induction; Distinguished Recognition Award, Detroit City Council; McDonald's Literary Achievement Award for Poetry presented in the name of Nikki Giovanni in perpetuity; Outstanding Humanitarian Award, The House of Representatives of the Commonwealth of Kentucky; two Tennessee Governor's Award in the Arts and in the Humanities; the Virginia Governor's Award; and two NAACP Image Awards for Love Poems and Blues: For All the Changes. Ms. Giovanni has been given the keys to more than a dozen cities, including New York City, Los Angeles, Dallas, Miami, New Orleans, and Baltimore. Most recently, she was named the first recipient of the Rosa Parks Woman of Courage Award.Nikki Giovanni is the author of 16 books of poetry for adults and children including the seminal Black Feeling, Black Talk/Black Judgement, Re: Creation, My House, The Women and the Men, Those Who Ride the Night Winds, The Selected Poems of Nikki Giovanni, Love Poems and her most recent Blues: For All the Changes. Nikki is University Distinguished Professor/English at Virginia Tech. She continues to read her work all over the country.

FROM THE PUBLISHER

When Nikki Giovanni's poems first emerged during the Civil Rights and Black Arts Movements of the 1960s, she immediately took a place among the most celebrated and influential poets of the era. Now, Giovanni continues to stand as one of the most commanding, luminous voices to grace America's political and poetic landscape.

In a career spanning over thirty years, Giovanni has created a body of work that's become vital and essential to our American consciousness. This collection of new poems is a masterpiece that explores the ecstatic union between self and community. Quilting the Black-Eyed Pea is an extraordinarily intimate collection. Each poem bears our revered cultural icon's trademark of the unfalteringly political and the intensely personal: The elegant "What We Miss" exalts the might and grace of women, while "Swinging on a Rainbow" rejoices about the spaces in which we read; Giovanni commemorates Africa and her family legacy in the majestic "Symphony of the Sphinx" and contemplates our America in the heartbreaking "Desperate Acts" and "9:11:01 He Blew It." And in the dreamy "Making James Baldwin" and dazzling "Quilting the Black-Eyed Pea," Giovanni gives us reason to comfort, to share, to love, to change and to be human.

Quilting the Black-Eyed Pea is Nikki Giovanni's meditation on humanity and soul. It's her revelatory gaze at the world in which we live -- and her confession on the world she dreams we will one day call home. Nikki Giovanni is a national treasure as she once again confirms her place as one of America's most powerful truth tellers and beloved daughters.

FROM THE CRITICS

VOYA

Giovanni's latest poetry book must have been written for just for this reviewer. Its subject matter, its regional views, and its political agenda are aimed in this direction. Arranged in six untitled sections whose themes are not self-evident, the poems take an artifact from life and examine its cultural impact. For example, Giovanni captures her grandmother's wisdom through the image of a colander full of blackberries. Likewise, she laments the tragedy of September 11 through the loss felt by unattended pets of the victims. Whether the poem is about things, such as a park in Knoxville, a robin's nest in snow, the latest Harry Potter movie, or people, such as Gwendolyn Brooks, Richard Williams (father of Serena and Venus), and Aretha Franklin, the poet examines the culture surrounding them. Her poems are eulogies and proclamations. For example, in "In the Spirit of Martin," she writes, "How much pressure / does the Earth exert on carbon / to make a diamond / This is a sacred poem / open your arms / turn your palms up / feel the Spirit of Greatness / and be redeemed." It will be easy for any reader to find himself or herself in Giovanni's work. As she says in her poem to Emerson Edward Rudd, "Thank you for finding yourself in my poetry." VOYA Codes: 4Q 4P S A/YA (Better than most, marred only by occasional lapses; Broad general YA appeal; Senior High, defined as grades 10 to 12; Adult and Young Adult). 2002, HarperCollins, 110p, Reddy-Damon

Library Journal