---
product_id: 2264635
title: "Losing My Cool: Love, Literature, and a Black Man's Escape from the Crowd"
brand: "thomas chatterton williams"
price: "€ 38.08"
currency: EUR
in_stock: true
reviews_count: 6
url: https://www.desertcart.sk/products/2264635-losing-my-cool-love-literature-and-a-black-mans-escape
store_origin: SK
region: Slovakia
---

# Losing My Cool: Love, Literature, and a Black Man's Escape from the Crowd

**Brand:** thomas chatterton williams
**Price:** € 38.08
**Availability:** ✅ In Stock

## Quick Answers

- **What is this?** Losing My Cool: Love, Literature, and a Black Man's Escape from the Crowd by thomas chatterton williams
- **How much does it cost?** € 38.08 with free shipping
- **Is it available?** Yes, in stock and ready to ship
- **Where can I buy it?** [www.desertcart.sk](https://www.desertcart.sk/products/2264635-losing-my-cool-love-literature-and-a-black-mans-escape)

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## Description

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## Images

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## Customer Reviews

### ⭐⭐⭐⭐ 







  
  
    A little too prurient
  

*by M***S on Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on May 1, 2021*

I appreciated the author's distinction about enjoying hip-hop music ironically, rather than embracing it as a way of life. His transparency is so extreme, it is a bit discomfiting. Though upon reflection, a large part of the tell-all actually implicated his peers as much or more than him. Often as he described his adolescent exploits, the reader wonders where is parents attention was throughout. Not to mention the private (Catholic) school teachers. Perhaps the apathy is an indictment of relativism in culture at large, not just the subculture he so incisively criticizes. In summary, the author was brought up "spoiled rotten," so it is no wonder he struggled his first year in college. The book tried to place the entire blame on hip-hop culture, while mostly ignoring the particulars of his upbringing.I read this book soon after reading Coates' _We Were Eight Years in Power_ in hopes of contrasting perspectives. But the depth of analysis is not comparable.

### ⭐⭐ 







  
  
    Absolutely Not.
  

*by E***E on Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on July 14, 2010*

I read this book recently, and while I appreciate the author's ability to "evolve" from hip hop culture, I absolutely take issue with the manner he went about it. First, he uses hip hop and black culture interchangeably, which I feel is an extreme error often associated with those who are not familiar with what it actually means to be black, or who are not black themselves. I am black and around the same age as Thomas, and I have pretty much been what he "evolved" into my entire life. I have always seen the irony in hip hop and never took the lyrics to heart, and was often seen by my peers as the "uppity" girl who thought she was better than everyone because I wasn't obsessed with B.I.G. or Air Jordans. You'd think we would have a lot in common, but I totally doubt it. He makes it seem like you need to get away from your black peers in order to get away from hip hop - and he lumps the black student body at Georgetown into one category as if he is familiar with all of them, and uses an example as trivial as CHESS to address the notion that black youth is always attempting to "keep it real." Point blank, a lot of black people love chess; I enjoy it and like watching people play...but am I joining chess club? No thanks! Doesn't mean I don't think chess is "down." The stereotyping of his black peers was insulting. I went to a top ten university and while many of the black students there were similar to what he described, but there were many who(you may stereotype them at first glance) saw BET and hip hop culture for what it is.You'll notice that once he decides to stray from hip hop, he rarely has any black friends and frequently takes part in "intellectual" things to simply call himself an intellectual. He majors in Philosophy and insists on studying abroad (basically for no reason), drinking aged whiskey rather than a 40oz. Thomas, what are you trying to prove, and who are you trying to prove it to? Do you think that spending your entire week's pay on Prada shoes to look "smart" makes you evolved, or just broke?It's a nice attempt, but I truly do not think the author knows what it is to be yourself or to actually keep it real. All he does is move from one group to another (Feeling ashamed because you don't know what a baguette is? Come on...), and still seems pretty lost to me in defining himself. Sad, really.

### ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ 







  
  
    Desegregating the Life of the Mind
  

*by C***K on Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on August 18, 2016*

In this deeply personal and courageous book, Thomas Chatterton Williams seems to me to circle around one question:What is the good life, and how does one live it?Posed like that, however, the question is incomplete. It might be better posed like this:What is the good life (for a black person), and how does one live it?And, importantly, is it different than for people from different racial backgrounds?I don't think Williams offers a definitive answer to the first question—perhaps because there isn’t one.I think I’m reading him accurately if I say that—for him, as a black man—the approach to the good life is through careful examination of one’s self, one’s circumstances, and one’s attitudes towards the two.In short, through philosophy.In response to the second question, I read him as saying that philosophy can be as valuable for black people as it can be for anyone else.I am white. Philosophy as Chatterton presents it (and Socrates would have recognized it) has been a cornerstone of my life—when I’ve practiced it, I’ve done well; when I haven’t, I have not.I’m honored to share the life of the mind with someone who has worked as hard for it as Williams has, and am grateful to him for sharing the story of how he came to value it. I highly recommend it to anyone who is struggling to understand which intellectual projects are provincial and which may be universal.

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*Product available on Desertcart Slovakia*
*Store origin: SK*
*Last updated: 2026-01-24*