Safiya Sinclair was born to parents who followed the Rastafari religion. She was the oldest of four, three of whom were girls. Her father was the king of his own household, and while he was loving when Safiya was young, he became obsessed with his girls' purity and physically abusive towards his family. Safiya and her siblings are encouraged to excel in school, and she finds an outlet in poetry - reading and relating to it, and then writing it.

I love a good memoir, and this one is so well done. Sinclair recounts her childhood experiences with clarity and really makes you feel for her and her siblings - and even her parents - as she processes what happened. As you'd expect from a poet, her writing is lovely and she reflects on her life, on her father and mother, in a way that makes the reader her confidant. There are definitely moments of intensity, abuse on the page, and things that are hard to read, but there's a lot of hope too. Great for fans of Educated and other memoirs about overcoming childhood adversity and abuse. ( )

In preparation for the Bob Marley move One Love I read How to Say Babylon: A Memoir by Safiya Sinclair about a woman who was raised in the Rastafarian religion. The religion worked for Marley and helped him write some powerful, hopeful songs beloved world-wide. Of course it also lead to his death since he refused to have his cancerous toe amputated. It seems to have done nothing good for Sinclair. The way she describes the religion, every man is the king of his castle and all the other people in it - wife, children - are his serfs. He can make whatever law he wants to govern his home. Some men make liberal laws, some men devise laws so restrictive that women have to confine themselves to a room away from the family for the duration of their menstruation. Sinclair's father was a singer 10 years after Marley's death. He wanted fame and respect but got disrespected by his band, his employers, and the white government. She does a good job of showing why her father was abusive but also shows just how abusive he was to his family, or rather to the females in his family. Like Tara Westover, Sinclair is saved by education, but she's had to fight for her freedom. ( )

Fascinating account of a young woman whose father became a Rastafarian in Jamaica. Safiya Sinclair is the oldest of 4 siblings born to her mother. (Her father has other children) She relates the account of their life in Jamaica, where she is forced to adopt the Rasta ways. Wearing dreadlocks was a primary way of identifying followers. Safiya's mother taught the children and they were extremely bright. Safiya attends school and is moved forward a few grades due to her intelligence. Her dreadlocks cause her to be bullied, and also to miss out on opportunities. Her father's discipline was harsh, he beat her mother, herself, and her siblings. Safiya needs to come to terms with her home life and her father's ideals. Safiya is depressed, but is able to find herself through poetry. Poetry opens new avenues for her and allows her to leave Jamaica, get an education, and win multiple awards. She decides to write her family story for those that came before, and those that will follow her.
An emotional story, beautifully written, with great insights on how to survive a difficult family experience and to come out whole.
Fantastic. ( )

15. How to Say Babylon: A Memoir by Safiya Sinclair
reader: the author
OPD: 2023
format: 16:46 audible audiobook (352 pages in hardcover)
acquired: February 26 listened: Feb 26 – Mar 21
rating: 4½
genre/style: memoir theme: random audio
locations: Jamaica 1960’s to 2010’s
about the author: A Jamaican poet and memoirist and associate professor of creative writing at Arizona State University, born 1984 in Montego Bay, Jamaica.

I have to thank the Women's Nonfiction longlist for taking me here. I loved listening to this. It was gorgeous, and Sinclair is a remarkably good reader. She reads slow, with poetic cadence, bringing out the poetry within her own writing. Audio adds a lot to this.

This is a memoir of growing up Rastafarian in Jamaica, but with a bitter pill. Sinclair's father is a reggae singer, who makes his living playing at tourist hotels. But when she was young he had opportunities to make serious record deals. He ran his family Rastafarian, a religion without any set rules, inspired by Marcus Garvey, Bob Marley, and, oddly, Ethiopian dictator Haile Selassie. It's strongly anti-western, anti-British in once-British-controlled Jamaica. In practice, it tends to be male dominated, with women left subservient, and with hints of unsettled Islamic extremism. For Safiya as a child, this meant no meat, dreadlocks, and lots of inspirational anti-western rants by a motivated inspired dad. But as his career opportunities disappeared, he became angry and abusive, and mom largely acquiesced.

However, this is also a good study of her mom, who led four children to be well educated, managed all her husband's issues with minimal resources. Safiya Sinclair graduated high school at 15, it was six years(!) before her mother found the money to send her to college (in the US).

Overall I adored the early parts and the later parts of this book. (She has really a powerful small part on learning to be black in America.) It struggles a bit to carry through the author's six years between school, where she began to become a poet. The tone she creates in this book is inflexible, and that's the section where it strains the book a bit, becoming dangerously close to melodramatic. My other somewhat critical observation is that it doesn't read as easily as she, the author, makes it sound. It scanned through a paper copy and it reads slow, her rhythm hard to find. But it's there. So, take time to find it. But these are light criticisms of a very intense author with a beautiful written and spoken voice.

I recommend this to anyone interested, especially audio aficionados.

2024
https://www.librarything.com/topic/358760#8481979 ( )

This is a memoir of Safiya Sinclair's first 30+ years of life. Born into a Rastafarian home, this story is really about abuse by a father whose emotions range from loving to uncontrollable rage rooted in his personal failures that he takes out on the weakest (his children and their mother). As time goes on and his despair mounts, there is less and less loving and more and more rage. It's hard to fathom that I could find a book on abuse to be so good and so looking forward to finding time to read more, but it is that good. Safiya's poetry skills are obvious in her writing skills. Yes a very hard subject to read but such a good book. ( )