The World Will Follow Joy by Alice Walker Book Review — Hilary Ogohi
The award-wining American novelist, poet, and activist; Alice Walker, in this collection reveals so much about her perception of the world: friendships, governments/political affairs, her patriotism to her fellow activists, and of course generosity to nature and its creatures. Walker is a true-to-heart activist who knows so well the power of poetry as a weapon for the fight for justice, and she makes effective use of this weapon.
Throughout this collection are universal themes which makes it enjoyable and relatable to readers irrespective of diverse geographical or cultural backgrounds, so long as you are of this “world”. There is a strong feel of intimacy in a good number of poems in this collection also; mostly from her experience as an individual, as an activist, as a lover, as a friend, as a patriot, as a lover of nature, which to me, is one of the features that makes her poems unique and authentic.
I find the title — The World Will Follow Joy: Turning Madness Into Flowers — very catchy too. it raises one’s curiosity as to how the world will follow joy and how we who live in it will be turning madness into flowers. Reading through the poems gives you satisfactory answers to questions that may run through your mind at the sight of the title. (Most of these poems were written between October 2009 — August 2011).
Walker is not one that separates her works from her personal life. You meet her, all she is and all she stands for, through her works! Her strong acknowledgement to friends and patriots in the form of dedicated poems, shows her level of loyalty.
It is basically impossible to have “favorites” from this collection. In Democratic Motherism (a sequel, or better version of another of the poems; Democratic Womanism), Walker’s activist’s tone is at a high pitch. In this longer narrative, she explains what the world’s democracy should be or look like. ‘The earth needs mothering more than anything,’ she says. There is a deeper level of the understanding of the act of mothering; it not is not gender restricted. Taking care of the earth, nurturing it as a child, to cleanse it from its filth (all anti-democratic practices).
And Do You See What They Have Bought With It is a pointed finger to those who loot public funds to lavish on yet more useless things, and worse; ones bought from abroad with other people’s sweat and hard labor. And the things they buy; made from poor animals’ skins and parts (Walker is a lover of animals). She laments as these people appear on TV with their “innocent” faces yet dressed in all the useless, expensive wears they buy with what might as well be termed as blood money.
Her perception on the thirst for fame, power, money, discovering yourself, and the nothingness in all of these can be sensed in poems like The Foolishness of Captivity: in her words, “an open poem for who the shoe fits”. The Answer is: Live Happily simply confirms the nothingness to riches and poverty; when poor, it is shaming, and your “blackness” is unwelcomed”. When rich, you own too much of everything, and “blackness” still creeps in. The answer to it all is to live happily. This Human Journey addresses discovering oneself wherever you are. Instead of trying to be someone different or some other place; finding yourself in Brussels- rather than — in Broccoli, find what is good about wherever you are.
Among the poems dedicated to her girls are; Don’t be like those who ask for everything (for Miriam Makeba) a fellow patriot who stood on her swollen feet and sang her people to freedom. Knowing You Might Someday Come is one of her most intimate poems to a loved deceased friend — Kaleo. A sad and yet hopeful poem about list of things she will do with her friend if she might someday come. She is to Gloria Steinem: a friend, a sister, and a teacher, for her 75th birthday. There is a feel of warmness to these poems as they are all very personally detailed to each of her girls. She recognizes the casualties: those who, in her words, have sacrificed their lives to bring to life something unknown.
May It Be Said of Me reveals her devoutness to the fight for justice and freedom. She vows to sing the only song she is meant to truly sing: the song of solidarity “I am me — and you — we are”.
Her passionate love for children is felt in This is the story of how love works, another long narrative about her encounter with M. B and how she got involved in building and taking care of an orphanage. In Two boys on a pink tricycle she expresses her admiration for kids in the simple things they do like riding a bike.
In Going Out to the Garden among other poems, she shows love to animals like geckos, and by doing so, forgetting the troubles of this world ‘at least for moment short’, and enjoying the joy, happiness and peace at the present.
Throughout the poems is Walker’s wavy tone of justice, love, happiness, hope, calls to solidarity, loyalty, friendship, bold challenges (to those concerned), and tips on how to live a happy life, all put together as The World Will Follow Joy. It feels like a life manual — you will always want to refer to it as many times as possible.
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