Clever look at White supremacism and its affects on Blacks in terms of families destroyed by the separation of relatives during the transatlantic slave trade and the difficulty of establishing a positive sense of self when one is told, for example, that Black women can never be beautiful simply because they are black.
That there are no White supremacists who are blind from birth is carefully-evoked by a blind White girl who can see the beauty of the Invisible Princess.
An easy read for children, given the extensive use of analogy and metaphor in this allegory of the relations between the so-called races. The mythological approach enables the narrative to focus on archetypes; thereby avoiding any crude stereotyping of either racists or their victims. Black family life is shown as respectful of the elderly, of tradition, of the difference between who you are and how you are seen (the Invisible Princess & the Village of Visible) and of nature itself.
Naively, this book presents a reformed slave-owner yet, the fact that the central character is Black, makes this is a useful primer in the development of a Black racial identity in a White supremacist culture. This is especially true because it presents positive Black role models - as do Mary Hoffman's Grace books.
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