One Drop

June 18, 2007
For Broyard, who was “raised as white in Connecticut,” the discovery that her father, the writer and critic Anatole Broyard, “wasn’t exactly white” raised the question of “how black I was”—a question that set her in search of the history of “the most well-known defector from the black race in the latter half of the twentieth century.” In the first section, Broyard weaves her privileged childhood together with later travels to New Orleans (her father’s birthplace) and Los Angeles (where there is a determinedly white set of Broyards as well as a determinedly black set). Part two extends from the first Broyard, a Frenchman arriving in mid-18th century Louisiana territory, to six-year-old Anatole’s 1927 arrival in Brooklyn. The last section is devoted to Anatole’s life. Broyard’s “identity quest” takes her on an odyssey through social, military, legal, Louisiana and general American history, as well as U.S. race relations and her family DNA, introducing innumerable relatives, classmates, friends and employers, and making for a rather overstuffed account. Fortunately, she’s got an ear for dialogue, an eye for place and a storyteller’s pacing. But the most compelling element is her ambivalent tenor: “Was my father’s choice rooted in self-preservation or in self-hatred?... Was he a hero or a cad?” Part eulogy, part apologia, the answer is indirect: “But he was my dad and we loved each other.”

October 1, 2007
Broyard first learned that her father, noted "New York Times"literary critic Anatole Broyard, was black a few weeks before his death. This book outlines her exploration of her father's past, which delves into Creole history, slavery in the United States, and Anatole's quiet "passing" in an era where "one drop" of black blood could determine almost everything. Broyard remains a mystery to his daughter as well as the reader, even after his story is fleshed out. While the mid-20th century wasn't welcoming for a black man of his obvious intellect, style, and creativity, even in later years Broyard limited contact with his still living family and denied contact to his two children. His daughter asks all the questions a reader would ask: Why did he deny his children an extended family? Why was this an "open secret" among friends and coworkers but a complete secret to others? Who was Anatole Broyard? Why does the definition of race still hold such power? While the author is never able to adequately answer these questions, she presents a fascinating narrative. Recommended for public and academic libraries.Jan Brue Enright, Augustana Coll. Lib., Sioux Falls, SD

Copyright 2007 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

Starred review from August 1, 2007
How easy it is to keep secrets, even within a close-knit family. Bliss Broyard was 24 when she learned that her father, Anatole, for many years the daily book reviewer for the New York Times, had concealed his black heritage. With a mother of Norwegian and French descent (who carried her own burdens), Bliss and her brother never looked anything but white, yet as soon as Bliss was told about her fatherslineage, all sorts of family traits suddenly made a new kind of sense. Still, the disclosure left Broyard reeling, uncertain of her identity or place in the world. At the same time, herjazz-loving, lady-killer father was dying. Determined to learn as much as possible about her heritage, Broyard embarked on an intrepidgenealogical quest that yielded not only new relatives but also galvanizing insights into Creole culture, African American history, and the cold truth about passing. Broyards vivid, compassionate portrait of her complex father raises the question, What is the deep-down cost of living a lie? And her remarkably perceptive and well-wrought saga of blood ties denied and nurturedcelebrates the grand diversity and true interconnectivity of the entire human family.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2007, American Library Association.)