You have to go all the way back to 1971 to find the publication date for "Confessions of a White Racist." And yet, it's a book that is suddenly as relevant as it was the day Larry L. King finished writing it.
King was a Texas author who died in 2012 at age 83. He was perhaps best known for his Tony Award-nominated play, "The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas," which became a smash hit on Broadway and later a Hollywood film. But that's too bad.
King was a terrific writer of narrative nonfiction, one whose skill reached a peak with "Confessions of a White Racist," which in the wake of the tragedy in Charlottesville, Va., is a work of art that all white Americans should read. The New York Times called it a "startling autobiographical work" in praising the author for examining "the complicity of every white American in the maintenance of the status quo." It was nominated for a National Book Award.
During the late 1960s, King's byline appeared often in the pages of Harper's magazine, which, under editor Willie Morris, blazed a journalistic trail. The magazine's other writers included David Halberstam and Norman Mailer.
