Awards

• Commended for Kirkus Prize (Nonfiction) 2020
• Short-listed for Dayton Literary Peace Prize 2022
• Short-listed for Kirkus Prize 2022
• Short-listed for National Book Awards (Nonfiction) 2020
• Short-listed for National Book Critics Circle Awards 2022

Overview

#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • NEW YORK TIMES READERS PICK: 100 BEST BOOKS OF THE 21st CENTURY • OPRAH’S BOOK CLUB PICK • “An instant American classic and almost certainly the keynote nonfiction book of the American century thus far.”—Dwight Garner, The New York Times The Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Warmth of Other Suns examines the unspoken caste system that has shaped America and shows how our lives today are still defined by a hierarchy of human divisions. #1 NONFICTION BOOK OF THE YEAR: Time ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR: The Washington Post, The New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Boston Globe, O: The Oprah Magazine, NPR, Bloomberg, The Christian Science Monitor, New York Post, The New York Public Library, Fortune, Smithsonian Magazine, Marie Claire, Slate, Library Journal, Kirkus Reviews Winner of the Los Angeles Times Book Prize • National Book Critics Circle Award Finalist • Winner of the Carl Sandburg Literary Award • Dayton Literary Prize Finalist • PEN/John Kenneth Galbraith Award for Nonfiction Finalist • PEN/Jean Stein Book Award Finalist • Kirkus Prize Finalist “As we go about our daily lives, caste is the wordless usher in a darkened theater, flashlight cast down in the aisles, guiding us to our assigned seats for a performance. The hierarchy of caste is not about feelings or morality. It is about power—which groups have it and which do not.” Beyond race, class, or other factors, there is a powerful caste system that influences people’s lives and behavior and the nation’s fate. Linking the caste systems of America, India, and Nazi Germany, Isabel Wilkerson explores eight pillars that underlie caste systems across civilizations, including divine will, bloodlines, stigma, and more. Using riveting stories about people—including Martin Luther King, Jr., baseball’s Satchel Paige, a single father and his toddler son, Wilkerson herself, and many others—she shows the ways that the insidious undertow of caste is experienced every day. Finally, she points forward to ways America can move beyond the artificial and destructive separations of human divisions, toward hope in our common humanity.

Full Product Details

9780593230251

Table of Contents

Reviews

It should be at the top of every American's reading list. --Chicago Tribune This enthralling expose deserves a wide and impassioned readership. -- Publishers Weekly (starred review) Similar to her previous book, the latest by Wilkerson is destined to become a classic, and is urgent, essential reading for all. --Library Journal (starred review) Praise for Isabel Wilkerson Wilkerson's work is the missing puzzle piece of our country's history. --The American Prospect [Wilkerson's] closeness with, and profound affection for, her subjects reflect her deep immersion in their stories and allow the reader to share that connection. --Janet Maslin, The New York Times Wilkerson combines impressive research . . . with great narrative and literary power. . . . She humanizes history, giving it emotional and psychological depth. --John Stauffer, The Wall Street Journal What she's done. . . is stow memory in amber. --Lynell George, Los Angeles Times What Wilkerson urges . . . isn't argument at all; it's compassion. Hush, and listen. --Jill Lepore, The New Yorker

Author Information

Isabel Wilkerson, winner of the Pulitzer Prize and the National Humanities Medal, is the author of the critically acclaimed New York Times bestseller The Warmth of Other Suns, which won the National Book Critics Circle Award for Nonfiction and was named to Time’s 10 Best Nonfiction Books of the 2010s and The New York Times Magazine’s list of the best nonfiction books of all time. She has taught at Princeton, Emory, and Boston Universities and has lectured at more than two hundred other colleges and universities across the United States and in Europe and Asia.

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