A Choice of Weapons

Front Cover
Minnesota Historical Society, 2010 - Art - 274 pages
Gordon Parks (1912-2006)--the groundbreaking photographer, writer, composer, activist, and filmmaker--
was only sixteen in 1928 when he moved from Kansas to St. Paul, Minnesota, after his mother's death. There, homeless and hungry, he began his fight to survive, to educate himself, and to fulfill his potential dream. This compelling autobiography, first published in 1966, now back in print by popular demand and with a new foreword by Wing Young Huie, tells how Parks managed to escape the poverty and bigotry around him and to launch his distinguished career by choosing the weapons given him by "a mother who placed love, dignity, and hard work over hatred." Parks, the first African American to work at Life magazine and the first to write, direct, and score a Hollywood film, told an interviewer in 1999, "I saw that the camera could be a weapon against poverty, against racism, against all sorts of social wrongs. I knew at that point I had to have a camera."

"A perceptive narrative of one man's struggle to realize the values (defined as democratic and
especially American) he has been taught to respect." --New York Times Book Review

"A lean, well-written memoir." --Time

Gordon Parks (1912-2006) was a groundbreaking photographer, writer, composer, activist, and film director. He may be best known for his photo essays for Life magazine and as the director of the 1971 film Shaft. Wing Young Huie is an acclaimed photographer and the author of several books including Frogtown and Looking for Asian America.

 

Selected pages

Contents

Section 1
1
Section 2
17
Section 3
29
Section 4
36
Section 5
39
Section 6
47
Section 7
56
Section 8
67
Section 13
138
Section 14
162
Section 15
169
Section 16
177
Section 17
185
Section 18
194
Section 19
201
Section 20
220

Section 9
85
Section 10
97
Section 11
103
Section 12
129
Section 21
252
Section 22
261
Copyright

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About the author (2010)

Gordon Parks (1912-2006) was a groundbreaking photographer, writer, composer, activist, and film director. He may be best known for his photo essays for Life magazine and as the director of the 1971 film Shaft. Wing Young Huie is an acclaimed photographer and the author of several books including Frogtown and Looking for Asian America.