Nothing. Okay that’s not true, I read Salt by Selina Thompson, which is wonderful, but I don’t feel compelled to write about it. Or at least, I don’t feel this is the proper forum for me to write about it. A work like this deserves a delicate brush, it’s unsuited to a relatively informal blog.
Sometimes a work is best to speak for itself, especially one as politically loaded and personal as this. Writing about a deeply personal work is a strange thing isn’t it. Someone puts something out there that is a piece of them, they offer us a deep introspection or a recounting of life history, what is one supposed to say to that.
There have been films I have watched (and I am hesitant to name them due to the fact that this publication might reach the people involved, not likely but you never know) that I have been disappointed with, and at least one film that on a bad day I outright hate, but I’m glad they exist because they are clearly therapeutic pieces for the people involved. Who am I to say a personal work is worthless.
This is not to say a deeply personal work cannot be offensive, or badly thought-out or just not very well made. It’s only to say that a personal work needs a careful approach. And I am a very clumsy man.
Gail Low
“A work like this deserves a delicate brush” (nicely put!)