În recenzia uneia dintre cele mai importante cărţi de nonficţiune lansate recent, The Warmth of Other Suns de Isabell Wilkerson — o istorie a Marii Migraţii a negrilor din Sudul Americii după primul război mondial — se vorbeşte mult şi despre munca reporterului şi scriitorului de jurnalism narativ: “[It’s] about the individual, [the belief that] if you could just find the right person to talk to, and it had to be an ordinary person, you could write the story of everyone.”

The people on Ida Mae’s street, Wilkerson tells us, echoing Wright, “are the lost grandchildren of the Migration.” This is narrative nonfiction, lyrical and tragic and fatalist. The story exposes; the story moves; the story ends. What Wilkerson urges, finally, isn’t argument at all; it’s compassion. Hush, and listen.