A Song Flung Up to Heaven

By: Maya Angelou

Narrated by: Maya Angelou

Length: 4 hrs and 41 mins

Publisher's summary

The culmination of a unique achievement in modern American literature: the six volumes of autobiography that began more than thirty years ago with the appearance of I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings.

A Song Flung Up to Heaven opens as Maya Angelou returns from Africa to the United States to work with Malcolm X. But first she has to journey to California to be reunited with her mother and brother. No sooner does she arrive there than she learns that Malcolm X has been assassinated.

Devastated, she tries to put her life back together, working on the stage in local theaters and even conducting a door-to-door survey in Watts. Then Watts explodes in violence, a riot she describes firsthand.
Subsequently, on a trip to New York, she meets Martin Luther King, Jr., who asks her to become his coordinator in the North, and she visits black churches all over America to help support King's Poor People's March.

But once again tragedy strikes. King is assassinated, and this time Angelou completely withdraws from the world, unable to deal with this horrible event. Finally, James Baldwin forces her out of isolation and insists that she accompany him to a dinner party - where the idea for writing I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings is born. In fact, A Song Flung Up to Heaven ends as Maya Angelou begins to write the first sentences of Caged Bird.

©2002 Maya Angelou (P)2002 Random House Inc., Random House Voices, an Imprint of the Random House Audio Publishing Group

Critic reviews

• Grammy Award Winner, Best Spoken Word Album, 2002

Wonderfully written.

It is so marvellous to hear Ms. Angelina tell her own story. I read her autobiography previously. I saw her receiver the Presidential medal of honor on line. I fully understand why she is poetlauriet.

How Sweet The Song

If you've ever had the opportunity to sit at the foot of one of your all times fav people and feast on their intricate, honest and fascinatingly resplendent journey...then this is it!💖💫 The bonus is her irreplaceable signature tone as the narrator.

Being there is part of the strength of this book.

This wonderful woman knew and helped and was helped by three of the now dead heroes of my youth--James Baldwin, Malcolm X, and Martin Luther King, Jr. And she was in Watts interviewing housewives for a marketing company when the citizens started burning and looting the stores. In short, she was intimately involved in many major events of our recent past; she knew both the leaders and the followers and has the skill as a writer to tell us how she and they reacted to those events. In addition, she has a great voice (she also sang professionally), which she uses to fine effect as the reader of her own book. Paraphrasing Holden Caulfield, I just wish I could call her up and ask her what's been happening lately. Buy this audio book; listen to her; you'll feel like you've been blessed for having done so.

Relatable and beautiful Maya

I loved this one more than the other autobiographies in her series. It was real and raw but relatable. I took tangible lessons from it, not in a “lofty ideals” kind of way but in a “do this and that tomorrow” kind of way. It soothed me and now I miss her more.

A favorite author

I love Maya Angelo's work. She's very down to earth and very wise. She has a poetic way with words. Beautiful book.

Fabulous!

I enjoyed this so much, I need more. I'm deciding what I will listen to next.

Sorry Angelou Lovers

Couldn't do it. Love the lady but not her narrating her own book.

Maya Parrot

I love her but every book is the same story told about her life. LIKE EVERY SINGLE BOOK.