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Hat Full of Sky

@hatfullofsky.bsky.social
636 followers 696 following 3.5K posts

Profile pic by Lynda Barry. Nonsense by me.

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Hat Full of Sky @hatfullofsky.bsky.social · 26/09/2026
🛶 James: The End?, Or, The Fire Next Time 🧵 After spending so long with James and his speech, his philosophical discussions, and the theoretical underpinnings of his survival, we come to this: violence, murder, & a breeding camp in flames. If Huck Finn's concluding chapters made Jim the object of
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Hat Full of Sky @hatfullofsky.bsky.social · 25/09/2026
🛶 James readers, we’re coming to the close of this novel. The heartbreak and violence don’t stop; heads up for scenes of rape and murder.
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Hat Full of Sky @hatfullofsky.bsky.social · 25/09/2026
🛶
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Hat Full of Sky @hatfullofsky.bsky.social · 25/09/2026
🛶 James, 9/25; part 3, chs. 1, 2, 3, 4: the boy who faked his own death meets the man who faked his own life; soldiers in blue; identity crisis; father-son time, noodling-style.
en.wikipedia.org
Noodling - Wikipedia
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Hat Full of Sky @hatfullofsky.bsky.social · 25/09/2026
🛶 A thought about Brock: his labor makes the engine go. He may be lying about Corey, but maybe not about how he speaks or thinks of himself. Internalized oppression does its work. Seven short bells (followed by a long ring) seems to be code for an emergency aboard ship, but Brock doesn’t
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Hat Full of Sky @hatfullofsky.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
🛶 James, 9/24: Pt. 2, chs. 7, 8, 9: Sidewheel tragedy; finest worksong; an impossible choice. TIL about the Sultana, America’s worst maritime disaster, and the dangers of boilers.
en.wikipedia.org
Sultana (steamboat) - Wikipedia
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Hat Full of Sky @hatfullofsky.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
🛶 Been thinking about why I feel so strongly about reading Huck Finn and James together, a 🧵. When I first read James, I was stunned by the audacity of Everett’s ambition. Reimagining such a Great American Novel takes confidence, and Everett did it so well! I thought, and still think, that this
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Hat Full of Sky @hatfullofsky.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
🛶 Documenting the atrocities. "The image was shocking. Newspapers, abolitionist groups, and antislavery advocates used it to show the northern public exactly what slavery looked like when you stripped away all the euphemisms. It became a kind of visual testimony—undeniable and unforgettable."
jimcrowmuseum.ferris.edu
The Story of Whipped Peter
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Hat Full of Sky @hatfullofsky.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
🛶 James, 9/23, Part 2, chs. 4, 5, 6: Freedom, never used, for sale.
nationalhumanitiescenter.org
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Hat Full of Sky @hatfullofsky.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
🛶 Some rough waters ahead. Violence, assault, and sadness. We’re adults here, but mind your hearts in the chapters to come.
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Hat Full of Sky @hatfullofsky.bsky.social · 22/09/2026
🛶 Of interest--a new site. John Locke (philosopher/investor) is in there.
britishslavetraders.org
The Register of British Slave-Traders
The Register of British Slave-traders compiles and presents information on all known slave-traders in Britain who invested in the trafficking of captive Africans from 1563 to 1807.
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Hat Full of Sky @hatfullofsky.bsky.social · 22/09/2026
🛶 James, 9/22: Thinking of James, and the difficulties of his plan.
aaihs.org
Slavery, Family Separation, and the Ransom Case of John Weems - AAIHS
During the nineteenth century, several state laws prohibited, or restricted the ability of African Americans to testify against white people. As historian Elizabeth Stordeur Pryor has demonstrated in ...
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Hat Full of Sky @hatfullofsky.bsky.social · 22/09/2026
🛶 James, 9/22: On passing
npr.org
'A Chosen Exile': Black People Passing In White America
From the time of slavery, some light-skinned African-Americans escaped racism by passing as white. The new book, A Chosen Exile: A History of Racial Passing in American Life, explores what they lost.
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Hat Full of Sky @hatfullofsky.bsky.social · 22/09/2026
🛶 James, 9/22. Part 2, chs. 1, 2, 3. Emmett’s notebook: WTH, 19th c ice cream parlors played minstrel tunes so we still have this?
npr.org
Recall That Ice Cream Truck Song? We Have Unpleasant News For You
This is the story of why our beloved ice cream truck plays blackface minstrel music that sends kids dashing into homes in a Pavlovian frenzy searching for money to buy a Popsicle.
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Hat Full of Sky @hatfullofsky.bsky.social · 20/09/2026
🛶 The first 3.5 minutes are relevant to James’s experience with the minstrel troupe. How are you doing with this novel as we come to the end of the first section?
youtube.com
The Jim Crow Museum
YouTube video by Jim Crow Museum
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Hat Full of Sky @hatfullofsky.bsky.social · 18/09/2026
🛶
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Hat Full of Sky @hatfullofsky.bsky.social · 18/09/2026
Awww. Has a sweet @duchessgoldblatt.bsky.social vibe to it!
talknicer.online
Fighting hate speech with nice speech
Poke me for a weirdly specific compliment and help fund the fight against online hate.
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Hat Full of Sky @hatfullofsky.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
🛶James, 9/17: chs. 27, 28, 29: James the tenor; minstrelsy; black-white-black-passing.
nmaahc.si.edu
Blackface: The Birth of An American Stereotype
Learn the history behind common African American stereotypes. #ANationsStory
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Hat Full of Sky @hatfullofsky.bsky.social · 16/09/2026
🛶 Daniel Decatur Emmett, we meet again.
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Hat Full of Sky @hatfullofsky.bsky.social · 16/09/2026
🛶 James, 9/15, chs. 21, 22, 23: a moment of freedom; wanted man; back when; the return of the king and the duke; bullying by name, cruelty by violence; river hunting. Leaving this here for no reason, or maybe because, as Faulkner said, "The past is never dead. It's not even past.”
globalhealth.harvard.edu
Racial bias in medicine - Harvard Global Health Institute
By Kate Raphael The response to drug epidemics cuts along lines of race and class. In my recent piece with Toni Monkovic in the New York Times’ Upshot Dr. M. Norman Oliver,...
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Hat Full of Sky @hatfullofsky.bsky.social · 15/09/2026
🛶 James, remaining schedule: 9/14 19, 20 (15) 9/15 21, 22, 23 (16) 9/16 24, 25, 26 (16) 9/17 27, 28, 29 (14) 9/18 30, 31, 32 (16) 9/19 Break 9/20 Break 9/21 Break 9/22 Part 2: 1,2,3 (18) 9/23 4, 5, 6 (20) 9/24 7, 8 ,9 (21) 9/25 Part 3: 1, 2, 3, 4 (20) 9/26 5, 6, 7, 8 (16)
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Hat Full of Sky @hatfullofsky.bsky.social · 14/09/2026
🛶James, 9/14, chs. 19, 20: a teary tale to con the con men; revival; render unto Caesar; Southern culture on the skids. My favorite Southern Shakespeare:
youtube.com
Southern Shakespeare “Friends, Romans, Countrymen” from JULIUS CAESAR
YouTube video by The Cultured Bumpkin
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Hat Full of Sky @hatfullofsky.bsky.social · 13/09/2026
🛶 James readers, may I present the divine and stunning Ms. Bettye LaVette. ”Strange Fruit,” 1939. For the soundtrack, @hleisthen.bsky.social
youtube.com
Bettye LaVette - Strange Fruit (Audio)
YouTube video by BettyeLaVetteVEVO
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Hat Full of Sky @hatfullofsky.bsky.social · 11/09/2026
A tough read from 25 years ago. With compassion for all of the suffering that grew out of that day.
metafilter.com
Plane crashes in to the word trade center.
Plane crashes in to the word trade center. Apologies for not linking to anything besides the main CNN page but there are no full stories on this yet. The plane crashed into the building about six...
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Hat Full of Sky @hatfullofsky.bsky.social · 11/09/2026
🛶 James, 9/11, chs. 17, 18: feud; reunited; “How do a slave sound?”; tale of trauma; Faber and Locke; and a less welcome duo. Take the weekend off, get caught up, and feel free to keep posting. Anybody want to take a whack at Locke’s appearance? Trauma post-violence? Code-switching/slipping?
bklynlibrary.org
The Eberhard Faber Pencil Company | Brooklyn Public Library
The Eberhard Faber Pencil Company traces back to 18th century Bavaria, where carpenter Casper (Kasper) Faber began crafting and selling lead pencils in the small town of Stein. Casper’s son Anton Wilh...
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Hat Full of Sky @hatfullofsky.bsky.social · 10/09/2026
🛶 James, 9/10, chs. 15,16: a favor; logic hunger; the pencil and its consequences (heads up: historically accurate punishment scene); RUN.
connecticuthistory.org
Venture Smith, from Slavery to Freedom - Connecticut History | a CTHumanities Project
Smith’s account sheds light on the experience of enslaved and free blacks in 18th-century Connecticut.
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Hat Full of Sky @hatfullofsky.bsky.social · 10/09/2026
🛶 James, 9/9, chs. 13 and 14: Huck's uncle; losing Huck; meeting new folks; James needs a pencil.
30daysofkentuckyarchaeology.wordpress.com
When is a pencil a really special find?
Pencils are not especially common artifacts to find in archaeological contexts, compared to say, things like window glass or nails, but they are also not rare.  The wood often preserves well, as do…
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Hat Full of Sky @hatfullofsky.bsky.social · 08/09/2026
🛶 James, 9/8: Chs. 11, 12. If wishes worked; fiction, take me away; naming the self; good has nothing to do with the law; the voice of the river. What is James reading? "In the country of Westphalia, in the castle of the most noble Baron of Thunder-ten-tronch, lived a youth whom Nature...
en.wikipedia.org
Candide - Wikipedia
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Hat Full of Sky @hatfullofsky.bsky.social · 08/09/2026
🛶 Re-upping this soundtrack thread as there's music ahead. If you have suggestions, please add them, and tag our mix-maker-in-chief, @hleisthen.bsky.social.
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The Museum of English Rural Life (MERL) @themerl.bsky.social · 07/09/2026
just take a look at this pig ok
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Hat Full of Sky @hatfullofsky.bsky.social · 05/09/2026
…and that’s how Lev Zubov got his pet thylacines.
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Hat Full of Sky @hatfullofsky.bsky.social · 05/09/2026
Speaking of learning and literacy… This is joyful problem solving! (Do read the Reddit post.)
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Hat Full of Sky @hatfullofsky.bsky.social · 05/09/2026
🛶 Language and life lessons from James.
youtube.com
Nonso Anozie reads from ‘James’ | The Booker Prize
YouTube video by The Booker Prizes
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Hat Full of Sky @hatfullofsky.bsky.social · 05/09/2026
🛶 James, 9/4: Chs. 8, 9. Family secrets and dangerous waters. Jim isn't the only one pretending not to be himself, as he sends Huck on a covert mission to find out how Jim's family is getting along without him. (Now with 100% less boy-in-a-dress humor, and a lot more tactical planning from Jim.)
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Hat Full of Sky @hatfullofsky.bsky.social · 04/09/2026
🛶 “But my interest is in how these marks that I am scratching on this page can mean anything at all. If they can have meaning, then life can have meaning, then I can have meaning.” Writing as integrity and freedom, a 🧵. @hleisthen.bsky.social
youtube.com
Hamilton – “Wrote My Way Out” (Nas, Dave East, Lin-Manuel Miranda & Aloe Blacc) [Official Video]
YouTube video by Hamilton
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Hat Full of Sky @hatfullofsky.bsky.social · 03/09/2026
🛶
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Matt Muir @mattmuir.bsky.social · 01/09/2026
We have whittled down all the nominations to our shortlist for the 2026 Tiny Awards! 11 of the most beautiful, interesting, heartfelt, weird, silly websites from the past year, for you to explore and enjoy and vote on - pick your favourite, vote for the winner, TELL THE WORLD! tinyawards.net/vote/
An image of the Tiny Awards logo with the word 'VOTE' underneath it
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Hat Full of Sky @hatfullofsky.bsky.social · 03/09/2026
Psst, if you don't already know about this excellent podcast, treat yourself to amazing stories of endurance, adaptability, and hope: What to Carry, What to Burn.
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Hat Full of Sky @hatfullofsky.bsky.social · 03/09/2026
🛶 James, chs. 6, 7: A visit with Voltaire; the power of the pen.
artchive.com
Slave Market with the Disappearing Bust of Voltaire (1940) by Salvador Dali – Artchive
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Anna Vangala Jones @anniejowrites.bsky.social · 02/09/2026
writing tip: when in doubt, read
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Hat Full of Sky @hatfullofsky.bsky.social · 02/09/2026
🛶 9/2, James, chs. 3, 4, 5: the return of the hairball and the hobnail print; island escape; language slip; nature, snakes, dead man floating. How are you doing with being in Jim’s head instead of Huck’s?
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Hat Full of Sky @hatfullofsky.bsky.social · 02/09/2026
🛶 James’s language lesson: The more things change…
pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
“The Talk” and Parenting While Black in America: Centering Race, Resistance, and Refuge
“The Talk” refers to a specific type of racial socialization message that many Black parents have with their children about how to safely conduct themselves when interacting with police officers and o...
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Hat Full of Sky @hatfullofsky.bsky.social · 31/08/2026
🛶Having read Huck Finn, you won't be surprised that this novel contains racist violence, and we're approaching a scene of racial terror lynching in these first chapters of James. Further reading, from a place of memory and healing.
legacysites.eji.org
The National Memorial for Peace and Justice
A memorial dedicated to the victims of of racial terror lynchings.
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Hat Full of Sky @hatfullofsky.bsky.social · 30/08/2026
🛶 I forgot to include The Notebook of Daniel Decatur Emmett in the first day’s reading of James. It’s just a few pages—song lyrics — but deserves supplemental reading. A 🧵: Emmett was “an American composer, entertainer, and founder of the first troupe of the blackface minstrel tradition…
en.wikipedia.org
Dan Emmett - Wikipedia
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Hat Full of Sky @hatfullofsky.bsky.social · 29/08/2026
TIL
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Hat Full of Sky @hatfullofsky.bsky.social · 29/08/2026
🛶 Free at last, free at last…. What did you get out of this readalong? Has your opinion of the book changed? Does it still have a place in public education? Is it a book for young adults, adults, or both? What does this story ask of its readers? Closing thoughts?
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Hat Full of Sky @hatfullofsky.bsky.social · 28/08/2026
🛶 8/27 Ch. 31-35 (36) 8/29 Ch. 36-The Last (49) “Readers who object to the treatment of Jim at the Phelps plantation are being radicalized to resist what the white South did to its formerly enslaved population after the failure of Reconstruction…”
twain.lib.virginia.edu
Illustrating the Evasion
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Hat Full of Sky @hatfullofsky.bsky.social · 26/08/2026
🛶 Revised schedule for James, 9/1-9/27 Short book, busy month--as suggested, I've spread out the reading, and added breaks for holidays/life/etc. Pages are for the print edition (Doubleday, 2024). Hope this will work for everybody! Looking forward to hearing what you think of this book!
Date, Chapters, # Pages

9/1 Part 1: 1, 2 (20)
9/2 3, 4, 5 (19)
9/3 6, 7 (8)
9/4 8,9 (15)
9/5 Break
9/6 Break
9/7 Break
9/8 11, 12 (9)
9/9 13, 14 (9)
9/10 15, 16 (8)
9/11 17, 18 (12)
9/12 Break
9/13 Break
9/14 19, 20 (15)
9/15 21, 22, 23 (16)
9/16 24, 25, 26 (16)
9/17 27, 28, 29 (14)
9/18 30, 31, 32 (16)
9/19 Break
9/20 Break
9/21 Break
9/22 Part 2: 1,2,3 (18)
9/23 4, 5, 6 (20)
9/24 7, 8 ,9 (21)
9/25 Part 3: 1, 2, 3, 4 (20)
9/26 5, 6, 7, 8 (16)
9/27 9, 10, 11, 12 (17)
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Hat Full of Sky @hatfullofsky.bsky.social · 26/08/2026
🛶 Coming down to the end. 8/25 Ch. 26-30 (38) 8/27 Ch. 31-35 (36) 8/29 Ch. 36-The Last (49) Scams and (the limits of) balancing the scales against the "aristocracy"; family matters; a falling out among thieves.
lareviewofbooks.org
For the Love of Glamour: American Aristocracy from Twain to Trump | Los Angeles Review of Books
Are people—and the United States—doomed to be the subalterns of the aristocrats?
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Hat Full of Sky @hatfullofsky.bsky.social · 26/08/2026
🛶 A big thank you to @hleisthen.bsky.social for heroic rescue of the feed! We’re back up! Appreciate the assist!
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