Something to Read: ‘Caste’

“Caste” is the second book written by “The Warmth of Other Suns” author Isabel Wilkerson.

Isabel Wilkerson’s award-winning first book, “The Warmth of Other Suns,” has long been on my “to be read” list. But I’ll be honest: I was intimidated by its heft. Coming in at 622 pages of very small print, it presented quite an undertaking. And then, this summer, Wilkerson released “Caste.” At just about 200 fewer pages, “Caste” felt more manageable, and at the insistence of my sister-in-law I decided to give it a read. 

This book illuminates America’s foundation, showing us how we got where we are by presenting the groundwork that was laid and maintained for centuries: 

Caste is insidious and therefore powerful because it is not hatred, it is not necessarily personal. It is the worn grooves of comforting routines and unthinking expectations, patterns of a social order that have been in place for so long that it looks like the natural order of things.

Americans have a culture of collective amnesia. I hear racist acts attributed to “bad apples”; I hear people laying the manifestations of hatred we see around us at the feet of the 45th president and the political landscape he created (or that created him). This book reminds us that the instinct to hold others down is a part of the fabric of who we are. 

This is one of the best books I have ever read. I guess it’s time I pick up “The Warmth of Other Suns.” 

You can find copies of “Caste” at the library and wherever books are sold.