SOURCE: “Time, Motion, Sound and Fury in The Sea Birds Are Still Alive,” in CLA Journal, Vol. 36, No. 2, December, 1992, pp. 134-44.

In the following essay, Lyles explores the “revolutionary thrust” of the stories compiled in The Sea Birds Are Still Alive.

One of the most arresting features of the short stories in Toni Cade Bambara's The Sea Birds Are Still Alive is their revolutionary thrust. The influence of the avenging Fury, revolution, upon the minds, hearts, and actions of the characters in the stories is manifested through the depiction of the characters' sense of time and through the prominence of descriptions of sound and motion.

One characteristic of the revolutionary is that he or she experiences the future as present. The expression, “revolution in my lifetime,” which was the rallying cry of some radical black organizations of the sixties, is the embodiment of the spirit which governs many...