Soul on Ice (Paperback)

by Eldridge Cleaver (Author) "Nineteen fifty-four, when I was eighteen years old, is held to be a crucial turning point in the history of the Afro-American- for the U.S.A..." (more)
Key Phrases: Omnipotent Administrator, Supermasculine Menial, Elijah Muhammad (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Review
"A collection of essays straight out of Dante's Inferno.  The hell is there, and its name is America...as with Malcolm X, Cleaver's book is a spiritual autobiography.  An odyssey of a soul in search of itself, groping toward a personal humanism which will give meaning to life...the book is important...the book is extraordinary."
--Shane Stevens, The Progressive

"A remarkable book...beautifully written...Eldridge Cleaver makes you twist and flinch...he throws light on the dark areas that we wish he would leave alone."
--The Nation

"Brilliant and revealing."
--The New York Times Book Review

"All the essays [in Soul on Ice] deal with racial hurt, racial struggle, and racial pride...Eldridge Cleaver is a promising and powerful writer, an intelligent and turbulent and passionate and eloquent man."  
--Robert Coles, The Atlantic Monthly -- Review

Review
"A collection of essays straight out of Dante's Inferno. The hell is there, and its name is America...as with Malcolm X, Cleaver's book is a spiritual autobiography. An odyssey of a soul in search of itself, groping toward a personal humanism which will give meaning to life...the book is important...the book is extraordinary."—Shane Stevens, The Progressive

"A remarkable book...beautifully written...Eldridge Cleaver makes you twist and flinch...he throws light on the dark areas that we wish he would leave alone."—The Nation

"Brilliant and revealing."—New York Times Book Review

"All the essays [in Soul on Ice] deal with racial hurt, racial struggle, and racial pride...Eldridge Cleaver is a promising and powerful writer, an intelligent and turbulent and passionate and eloquent man."—Robert Coles, Atlantic Monthly

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 256 pages
• Publisher: Delta (January 12, 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 038533379X
• ISBN-13: 978-0385333795
• Product Dimensions: 7.9 x 5.3 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars See all reviews (43 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #45,038 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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  #68 in	Books > Nonfiction > Current Events > Civil Rights & Liberties
  #82 in	Books > History > United States > African Americans

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars There are insights in here somewhere. . ., November 9, 2000

By	"trevisol" (Deerfield Beach, Florida United States) - See all my reviews

Eldridge Cleaver writes his memoirs here, and much of the book seeks to justify his actions and sentiments. It is as if he knows that his actions have been looked down upon by America and he needs to tell us where he is coming from. I found it shocking, not only that he should admit to raping women, both white and black, but more so that he makes excuses for why he HAD to rape them. He also explains his veiws on the inferiority complex that has plagued the African American since slavery, and his motivation for violent response. These views, though, are exceedingly hard to sift out of the pontificatory run-on sentance that permeates this book. He will launch into the feelings of a black woman in this society, and while his point may be valid, his statement consists of two pages of metaphorical secondary clauses. But, for all of his circumlocution, Cleaver's points provide great insight not only into a black revolutionary, but a convict, a Muslim after the style of Malcom X, and the african american experience in general. In all, his thoughts are hauntingly true.

23 of 29 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Stands the test of time, January 23, 2000

By A Customer

I've spent the last thirty-two years being reminded of the brutal honesty and truth of much of this classical work on race, sex, and poverty by Eldridge Cleaver. I was honestly shocked by some of the sexual/racial ideas it contains the first time I read it in 1968, and decided to try it again to see if my present understanding of and assumptions about America now render this work moot- or affirm it.

Not surprisingly, as much as I'd like to confirm or refute this work, the jury still won't come in and remains out. You should read this book if you've thought deeply about the "why" of our race problem in America, our prison problem in America, or the psychology of gender. You really owe this one to your real-world educational and intellectual development, whether you agree with it, or like it, or not. It will challenge, frustrate, and in the end, inspire you to look deeper. Great achievement; makes you wonder what extraordinary things never surfaced from inside this man's mind.

A must-read from the 20th century.

9 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars SOUL ON ICE, October 21, 2004

By	Anj "Anj" - See all my reviews

Soul on Ice, written by Eldrige Cleaver is a collection of essays (written during his 9 years in Folsom State Prison during the 1960's) in which Cleaver discovers his racial identity. "I knew I was black, but never really stopped to take stock of what i was involved in. I met life as an individual and took my chances." Cleaver was sentenced 9 years for raping a white woman. Cleaver felt his crime was a way to "spit" on the white man's values and women. He lived his life only to benefit himself. After meeting with his attorney, he realizes the value of listening and absorbing what another human being has to say. "The price of hating other human beings is loving one's self less." Cleaver, educating himself in prison, also writes "In prison those things held and denied from the prisoner become precisely what he wants most of all."
Cleaver becomes especially interested in the writings of Thomas Merton, particularly his excerpt on the "New York Black Ghetto: Harlem." After many religious endeavors, Cleaver found himself most intrigued by the teachings of Elijah Muhammad and Malcolm X. Malcolm X appealed to the black convicts caught in the vicious prison paroll cycle, like himself. One aspect in which Cleaver felt most attracted to in Malcolm was that the society owed a debt to prisoners and not vice versa. Malcolm X did not "compromise truth to have favor with the white power structure." The American tactic was to emmasculate the black leadership and to manipulate them. The unique black leader who would defy white power would ultimately end up dead, in prison, or forced out of the country. Classic illustrations of this policy are the careers of Marcus Garvey, W. E. B. Dubois, and Paul Robeson. White America crushes the black leaders while inflating the images of Uncle Tom's (black on the surface, white on the inside)and celebrities. Power is taken out of political and economic context and plainly debased to the level of good sportsmanship. James Baldwin was an author who wrote "Native Son" and "White Negro." Cleaver, inspired by Baldwin, felt that police brutatily was not caused by the hatred for the black man, but for social, economical, and political reasons. Blacks, having their freedom for approximately 100 years as a result of the Emancipation Proclamation, were still treated as "part of someone's invetory of assests."
After the most violent negro uprisings, the Burning of Watts, the white power structure pacifies the black community by appointing John Roseboro, an African American baseball player for the dodgers, to consultant for community relations. Cleaver also writes about the Vietnam War. Black soldiers are called upon to sacrafice their lives for freedom in Vietnam. In Watts they are killed because of their desire for freedom. Cleaver felt the black man should stay and die here for a better life.
Cleaver's first imprisonment in 1954, for a drug charge, set the tone for his next 9 year term. Cleaver hung a poster of a white woman in his cell like the other prisoners. One of the guards came by and tore the poster down. The guard would only allow Cleaver to hang a picture of a black woman. Cleaver realizes that his attraction to the white women is not because of beauty or sexual appeal but because of their status and symbol. The white woman displays a symbol of freedom while the black woman is a symbol of slavery. "I will not be free until the day i can have a white woman in my bed and a white man minds his own business."
Although Cleaver's actions were not always moral nor did he go about things in a peaceful way, his fight was to allow the black race to revive their eradicated identity. From the moment the blacks were brought to this country from Africa, the white man imposed their culture and heritage upon them. Cleaver's quote, dealing with the white woman in bed, hits the nail on the head. He does not care for trivial freedoms and rights such as drinking from the same water fountain or riding at the front of the bus, he cares for the freedom where he can do what he wants, when he wants, without the white man looking over his shoulder. "One task that we have in the black community is a coupe de'etat against our present leadership, to strip them from that machinery that controls the community. So that new ideas and new people can percualate up, then we can have a new agenda."

I thorougly enjoyed this book because Cleaver moves from hate and violence towards an understanding of himself and humanity. I recommend this book to anyone who is willing to gain a better understanding of the black struggle in the 1960's.