Anna Deavere Smith's Art

Lost With Translation: Anna Deavere Smith’s Art
Having been aware of police brutality growing up, many of us saw what was occurring on television. We also heard politically charged music that opened our minds and ears. I remember when I was a teen listening to Rage Against The Machine. This type of music gave me a voice. At the time when the Rodney King beating occurred, the city of Los Angeles became a literal war zone. We were introduced to Twilight: Los Angeles, 1992 by Anna Deavere Smith. When I first looked at the structure Smith used in her book, I was skeptical. I had never read books with this style. The style is very unique and this book is a mixture of poetry and autobiographical accounts of L.A. Riots. Even though I agreed with a
For example the interview with district attorney Gil Garcetti titled “Magic”, this is a reference the godlike authority police and their departments display (Smith 76). In my opinion, this is true in many cases across the country, but there’s a huge disconnect between the community. We get a glimpse of it, with the interview titled “The Beverly Hills Hotel”, Elaine Young describes herself as three weeks separated and her date cancels on her and she didn’t want to be along fast-forward to the weekend where she found another date. He then
Maybe it was done on purpose to understand the book; it is what came from the Los Angeles riots, utter disorder. In all honesty, it is hard to say that I did not like what smith was trying to do. Artistically her theater performances made much more sense than the book, it shows us the emotion and the rage of the community and why they were so upset, and through reading the book it is unyielding to comprehend. The main drawback of the book was the confusion, making the significance fall between the cracks of Smith’s purpose. The city of Los Angeles is so vast that bridging the racial differences is very difficult still this day. Since, throughout the book there was no real focus. It just addresses the issue and leaves you on a cliffhanger. Ultimately Smith’s desire to succeed fall short, but she does raise an interesting idea, Smith states, “If more of us could actually speak from another [person's] point of view, like speaking another language, we could accelerate the flow of ideas” (Smith xxv). What Smith is trying to say is, when people unite from different backgrounds, exchanging ideas and speak up for their colleagues it could have helped, bring justice to the injustice acts that came from the LA riots and reform LAPD. I strongly believe that she made a point, in an effort to unite the citizens of Los