Coming Up Down Home by Cecil Brown
"Coming Up Down Home" by Cecil Brown is a memoir that explores the complexities of growing up in the South during a time marked by racial tension and the clash between rural and urban lifestyles. The story is narrated by Morris, a young boy raised by his aunt and uncle, who instill in him the importance of education and perseverance amidst the challenges posed by his family's dynamics. Morris's relationship with his father, Culphert (Cuffy) Brown, is central to the narrative; Cuffy is depicted as a violent figure who undermines education yet provides unexpected support, such as gifting Morris a saxophone to encourage his musical aspirations.
Throughout the memoir, Morris grapples with his identity as the son of a sharecropper and seeks to transcend the limitations of his upbringing. His journey takes him to New York, where he encounters a different, yet familiar, form of racism, leading him to recognize the significance of his Southern roots while also yearning to escape them. The narrative is rich with elements of African American culture, including sermons, folk traditions, and oral storytelling, presenting these experiences as integral to Morris's identity and growth. Ultimately, the memoir culminates in Morris's departure from his troubled home life, symbolizing his path toward a future as a writer, further highlighted by a poignant gift from his father.
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Coming Up Down Home by Cecil Brown
First published: 1993
The Work
InComing Up Down Home: A Memoir of a Southern Childhood, Cecil Brown presents a child shaped by the clash between agricultural and urban living and by the omnipresent tension of racism in the South. Morris, the first-person narrator of Coming Up Down Home, is reared primarily by his aunt and uncle, who teach him the value of education and hard work. As teenagers, Morris and his brother are returned to their father, who has been released from prison. Culphert (Cuffy) Brown is a violent man who rejects the importance of education and culture but who supports Morris in surprising ways, such as buying him a new, top-of-the-line saxophone when Morris has the opportunity to join the high school band. Morris has the skills of a farmer but combines them with knowledge gleaned from school in order to move beyond his father’s limitations. Morris notes that “I found the hard life of being a farmer’s son alleviated by the ability to attach words and values to previously mundane surroundings. It opened up a whole new world for me.”
Morris consistently attempts to escape his agricultural roots and his violent home life. At sixteen, he spends a summer in New York, where he discovers that the same racism he took for granted as a child in the South is present in New York, but in subtler forms. Upon his return to Bolton, Morris realizes that he can no longer live the life of a sharecropper’s son. He discovers the strength to defy his often-abusive father, ultimately winning a college scholarship without Cuffy’s knowledge. The main body of the memoir ends with Morris’ departure, when Cuffy presents him with a typewriter, foreshadowing Brown’s successful career as an author.
Coming Up Down Home, like many of Brown’s works, makes frequent use of African American folk traditions. The reader experiences a sermon in a black church, numerous toasts, gospel songs, and other elements of the African American oral tradition. Morris includes these in his narrative without comment, implying that such forms are integral to growing up African American.
Bibliography
Brown, Cecil. Afterword to Target Zero: A Life in Writing, by Eldridge Cleaver. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2006. Brown’s commentary on the importance of Cleaver’s life and writing showcases the writer’s political and literary investments in general and provides a valuable lens for assessing his own work.
Carroll, Rebecca. Swing Low: Black Men Writing. New York: Carol Southern Books, 1995. Includes a chapter on Brown’s life and work, reading him at the intersection of race and gender to evaluate his contributions to the ongoing representation of each in African American literature.
Kirkus Reviews. Review of Coming Up Down Home, by Cecil Brown. 61 (May 15, 1993). In a simple style reflecting “the child’s naïve perspective,” Brown has told a story that is often touching. Although he focuses on aspects of both South and North that approach the stereotypical, Brown’s memoir is “particularized and engaging in the telling.”
Publishers Weekly. Review of Coming Up Down Home, by Cecil Brown. 240 (May 10, 1993): 60. A favorable review noting that, although Brown has skillfully particularized his story, the childhood he recalls has universal dimensions. This story of a boy who grew up “poor but loved” is “totally engrossing.”