This semester my students are writing about the Sixties. We are exchanging ideas about Protest and Change. We are searching the campus databases for information about Civil Rights, the Women's Movement, Gay Liberation, the Sexual Revolution. We are learning to search the campus databases for the most interesting information to incorporate into our research papers.  It's too bad we didn't meet in the classroom, so I could read them excerpts from the biography What Happened, Miss Simone?  It would save us a lot of work time and shorten our works cited lists. 

Born in the South during the Jim Crow era, Nina Simone lived a segregated life. She never met a white person until she began taking music lessons. At very early age, Nina was identified a child genius at the piano, and she had dreams of becoming the world’s first black classical pianist. But, when that didn’t happen, she found her true calling. She became a strong voice for Civil Rights. She once said, “I’ll tell you what freedom is to me: no fear” (Light). For fifty years, Nina spoke her mind on the stage and off it. In the sixties she was at the forefront of the Civil Rights Movement. She was close to both Martin Luther King and Malcolm X. Her racial experiences shaped her life. And even though the whole world loved Nina Simone, she would never rest until she saw social justice in this country.

Nina's start at activism came at a very early age. This may be my favorite part of the book. As Nina – her birth name was Eunice – quickly displayed the skills of a child prodigy, her music teacher, a white lady, invited the town to attend ten-year-old Eunice's debut piano recital at the community library.  Of course, someone thought to reserve two seats for the proud parents in the front row, but when the library began filling up to hear Eunice play, the parents were asked to move to the back of the room so white people could get a closer look at the mastery of Eunice's fingers float across the piano keys. But this is what happened:  When 10-year-old Eunice took center stage at the piano and didn't see her parents where she expected to see them, she said, "I will not be playing.  My mother is a black woman.  And if she can't sit where she can watch my hands, I won't be playing."  

That's hard to comprehend.  Up until this point in her life, this little girl had experienced little overt racism.  Everyone she knew was black. Her parents had never taken the time to tell her anything may have been different down the road. You would think she would be nervous enough to play her first concert in front of a white audience, but that didn't stop her from taking a stand.  I suppose moment shaped the rest of her life.  This is when Eunice became Nina. 

Currently, my students are writing sixties research papers about important historical figures of the decade. I ask them to break the most interesting personality traits of their chosen subjects.  What made Cesar Chavez dedicate his life to the poor?  What did Gloria Steinem experience at the time that inspired her to stand up for women's rights.  What made Marilyn Monroe stand out from all the other beautiful women that followed their dreams to Hollywood? I encourage my students to write a much bigger story than they are used to. We will look at our subjects inside and out. 

Students:  If you are reading this post I invite you to turn to Netflix to view the documentary "What Happened, Miss Simone?"  If you ask me later, I will say Nina suffered from mental health issues for nearly her entire life.  Many of the chapters in my book are filled with her constant episodes of anger, paranoia, sadness, violence.   Until the day she died, she marveled her fans with her music and she alienated everyone with else with her erratic behavior.   I hope you enjoy writing about your subjects as much as I just did for Nina. No one, then or now, could be any more different from me than Nina Simone, but reading about her filled my senses. This book guided me through some complicated and uncomfortable moments in her life, but I'm left feeling more inspired and compassionate.