A review by reasie
A People's History of the United States: Highlights from the 20th Century by Howard Zinn

3.0

It wasn't quite what I was expecting. The narrative relies on first-hand accounts, which is nice, and poetry, which was unexpected, and runs through general topics such as the anti-war movement, the civil rights movement, the prisoner's rights movement.

Felt jarring to me that my audiobook was narrated by Matt Damon. Like... "Hi, I'm Matt Damon, I am a young black woman..."

In hindsight that was right on the cover, but I'm used to my audiobooks being narrated by the author or someone I've never heard of, whose voice I can associate fully with the text. I couldn't associate his voice fully with the text. :P

I also hadn't realized this was put out in 2003, rather close to the end of the 20th Century and I felt myself feeling the disconnect between that time and today. Things look a little different from today's perspective.

I'm hoping to read the parent volume eventually, this came up on the library app first. I wish I hadn't already been familiar with most of the poems in this volume.
I felt the women's movement was given short shrift. I dunno... that bit just felt real short, and the most out-of-date. Might be my bias.

Lots of reasons to get angry in a slender volume.