Cover of Lions Don't Eat Us

Lions Don't Eat Us

by Constance Quarterman Bridges · 2006

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In one of Aesop's Fables, the Roman slave Androcles befriends the emperor's lion prior to his trial and thereby survives certain death in the arena. Constance Quarterman Bridges's father tells this story to his children and says, "My Babies, we're special people, lions don't eat us." In this remarkable debut collection, Bridges chronicles her ancestry―part born out of slavery, part descended from Cherokee heritage―from her great-grandparents "jumping over the broom" in Civil War Virginia to her father's journey in the Great Migration northward in 1916. The result is an unequivocally American story.

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*Lions Don't Eat Us* is the 2005 winner of the Cave Canem Poetry Prize, given to the best first collection by an African-American poet.

Themes
African AmericanAfrican AmericanMore like thisLess of thisNative AmericanNative AmericanMore like thisLess of this
Audience
adult
Length
short · 140 pages
Form
poetrypoetryMore like thisLess of this

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“If you want more of the same, start with these.”

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“If it was the poetry that hooked you, try one of these.”

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“These start from a similar idea, even if they go somewhere else with it.”

  1. We're Going on a Lion Hunt David Axtell · 1999
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