The Sweeter the Juice: A Family Memoir in Black and White [Paperback]

Shirlee Taylor Haizlip (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 27, 1995

The Sweeter the Juice is a provocative memoir that goes to the heart of our American identity. Shirlee Taylor Haizlip, in an effort to reconcile the dissonance between her black persona and her undeniably multiracial heritage, started on a journey of discovery that took her over thousands of miles and hundreds of years. While searching for her mother's family, Haizlip confronted the deeply intertwined but often suppressed tensions between race and skin color.

We are drawn in by the story of an African-American family. Some members chose to "cross over" and "pass" for white while others enjoyed a successful black life. Their stories weave a tale of tangled ancestry, mixed blood, and identity issues from the 17th century to the present. The Sweeter the Juice is a memoir, a social history, a biography, and an autobiography. Haizlip gives to us the quintessential American story, unveiling truths about race, about our society, and about the ways in which we all perceive and judge one another.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

"All America is in me," writes the author, whose heritage combines black, white and Indian forebears. Her effort to untangle her family history makes for an absorbing, if sometimes convoluted, American saga. Although Haizlip, who was born in 1937, grew up comfortably in Connecticut as the daughter of a Baptist minister, her mother's rejection by her own white father left an enduring wound on both mother and daughter. The author uses a rich mixture of records, interviews and memory to trace her family tree and along the way offers vignettes that illustrate America's historic racial divide: one white-looking relative became the first Washington, D.C., black police officer, albeit unbeknownst to the police department; an aunt living as a black denied her blood tie to her white-skinned niece to spare the young woman difficulties. Haizlip's own story includes satisfying, if isolated, years studying at Wellesley, her marriage to Harvard graduate student Harold Haizlip and subsequent integration into New York City life, and her search for her estranged maternal relatives. At the end, Haizlip, now living in Los Angeles, finds and attains an awkward reunion with her mother's "white" sister, who "had no colored memories at all." This memoir will confront readers with resonant questions about identity. Photos not seen by PW . Doubleday Book Club and Literary Guild alternates.
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Library Journal

In Haizlip's dramatic account of her search for her mother's multiracial family, race is less a matter of genetic endowment than of social and psychological perceptions. Her mother and her mother's siblings could all pass for white; Haizlip recounts their differing choices with considerable narrative force. The life-long consequences of these decisions, combined with vivid details of her family's success in claiming position and power in a race-conscious society, and above all, the emotional pain caused by the conflicting perceptions of race, give this account an almost novelistic quality. We learn of Haizlip's numerous prominent positions in public service and the media. In the final analysis, Haizlip raises the issue of identity itself--who is black and who is white? How do we know, and what does it mean? Highly recommended for all Americans desiring to come to terms with who we are.
- Marie L. Lally, Alabama Sch . of Mathematics & Science, Mobile
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 271 pages
• Publisher: Free Press (January 27, 1995)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0671899333
• ISBN-13: 978-0671899332
• Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 5.4 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 11.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (18 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #758,737 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #85 in Books > Education & Reference > Genealogy > United States

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

12 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Very enjoyable, while still intense book...., December 12, 2003

By 

GroovyGirl177 (USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Sweeter the Juice: A Family Memoir in Black and White (Paperback)

I enjoyed this book from cover to cover. Sure, some of it was confusing, like some said, but what part of genealogy isn't confusing? My own genealogy confuses ME! :o) This book was wonderful! I think the author did a wonderful job in addressing this little spoken of topic. I was recommended this book after I found out that my family had African American roots, & so this book hit home with me. It aided me through an emotional journey...answering many of the questions such as: "Why so many secrets?" It also helped me to understand that some of my family members will never in their lifetimes will willing to openly talk about this subject, but the book confirmed my feelings that it's their loss. Thanks & kudos to the author!!!

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Lost Family, March 23, 2003

By A Customer

This review is from: The Sweeter the Juice: A Family Memoir in Black and White (Paperback)

I just read this book. It was very moving and insightful. It was so sad that Margaret Taylor, Shirlee's mother, was abandoned by her father,sister and brothers, and endured such a difficult childhood. It took over 70 years for Margaret to find her sister!

I think that Grace Cramer's life was more tragic, perhaps, because she blocked out so many memories and isolated herself. I would think she could have at least written her sister, once in 70 years! even if she was nervous about revealing her heritage to other people. It was wonderful to hear that Grace's grandchildren had a happy meeting with Shirlee.
The photos are great and the stories about the Taylors, Morrisses etc. are inspiring. It was fascinating to read about African American life in New England and the South. I look forward to reading the book about the Haizlip marriage.

11 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A first rate piece of writing, October 12, 2002

By 

Chris (Washington state, USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Sweeter the Juice: A Family Memoir in Black and White (Paperback)

The author, Shirlee Taylor Haizlip, is of mixed race parentage, her father more dark skinned black than her mother. Her mother, the youngest of her family, was abandoned by her brothers and sisters and her father, a mulatto, her mulato mother having died. Most of her surving relatives (those of Mrs. Haizlip's mother) moved away to other places and passed for white. The last child of the family, she was a painful reminder to them of the black experience they inherited. This abandonment happened around 1916. She passed into several gaurdianships and then ended up in the home of a light skinned couple, a dentist and lady who was slowly loosing her sanity. Her female gaurdian spent most of her time covering her furniture with white sheets,pulling down the blinds of the house and running around in rags. Her mother eventually met Julian, a part white and part Indian, a divorcee son of a prominent black minister. They married and Julian Jr. settled in as a pastor to the small black community in the working class town of Ansonia Connecticut.

In the pictures provided in the book, Margaret and her mother look rather Mediteranian. Margaret and Julian their three children, plus some foster children, lived an exceedingly happy middle class lifelife. There were summer homes to vacation, pleasant trips to Baptist national conventions, regular shopping trips, a vibrant social life, guests at home from NAACP leaders to Jackie Robinson. Racial problems were a little part of their life in this community. The children, except for the only sun Julian Jr. nicknamed "Brother," one of the few problems in their lives, were very successful in school,full of extra-curricular activities, camping, clubs, and so on.

Not exactly the life of the average black family in the 1940's. The author would marry a gentleman named Harold Haizlipp, attend Ivy league schools. They were amongst the elite of New York, sitting on a bunch of trustee boards, knowing all the famous intellectuals, and it was in such genteel circles that she and her husband conducted activism against racism. One interesting incident was a party thrown by the Haizlips in apparently the late 60's in New York. Attendees included Betty Shabaz, widow of Malcom X and a daughter of Nelson Rockefeller. A white woman, apparently some sort of civil rights worker, was brought along with one of Shirlee's friends. She apparently was so overcome by the interracial socilization going on, in addition to the nature of the party which called for guests to wear costumes revealing as much skin as possible (inspired by the play "Hairspray). The woman gripped around Harold's Cousin tightly and started screaming that the black males there wished to rape her before she was subdued and taken to a mental hospital.

Harold was commissioner of education in the Virgin Islands from 1971 to 1980. Shirlee had to fret about things like worrying about wearing the same dress as Queen Elizabeth when she met the latter. She became manager of the local CBS affiliate on the island and tried to make its programing reflect the interests of the natives. When she returned to the U.S., she became a director until 1986 at New York Public Television station WNET and had a few unpleasant racial situations there. She moved on to be the director of the National Center for Film and Video preservation at the American film institute and she found quickly found herself out of place in this organization which declared "Birth of a Nation" to be one of America's greatest film treasures. She didn't last long there. She expresses a great deal of disillusionment with race relations in this country.

The author towards the end of the book (set in the early 90's) helps her mother seek out her "white" relatives and there is mostly happy reunions. The interaction with Shirlee's Aunt Grace is particularly interesting. That lady was apparently quite sincere when she said she had no memory of her early life of things that related to the "black" part of her life. She had blocked it all out. Grace also is quoted bring up the issue more than once of her Spanish translator grandaughter going out with Hispanic men. She says "what's wrong with a good white man" and that her grandaughter's boyfriend is "dark--like a black man."

This book, except for the first part which is somewhat stiffly writen-- where the author laboriously describes, her ancestors, their physical features, their houses, personalities and so on--is a first rate piece of writing. The author has lived an exceedingly romantic life, one with lots of family love, friends and activity. ...