Synopses & Reviews
The most comprehensive guide on the market to the key authors and works of the African American literary movement.
Synopsis
The Harlem Renaissance (1918 1937) was the most influential single movement in African American literary history. Its key figures include Du Bois, Larsen, Hurston, McKay, and Hughes. This Companion presents the best of current wisdom as well as a set of new readings encouraging further exploration of this dynamic field.
Table of Contents
Chronology of major works and events; Introduction George Hutchinson; Part I. Foundations of the Harlem Renaissance: 1. The New Negro as citizen Jeffrey C. Stewart; 2. The Renaissance and the Vogue Emily Bernard; 3. International contexts of the Negro Renaissance Michael A. Chaney; Part II. Major Authors and Texts: 4. Negro drama and the Harlem Renaissance David Krasner; 5. Jean Toomer and the avant-garde Mark Whalan; 6. 'To tell the truth about us': the fictions and non-fictions of Jessie Fauset and Walter White Cheryl A. Wall; 7. African American folk roots and Harlem Renaissance poetry Mark A. Sanders; 8. Lyric stars: Countee Cullen and Langston Hughes James Smethurst; 9. 'Perhaps Buddha is a woman': women's poetry in the Harlem Renaissance Margo Natalie Crawford; 10. Transgressive sexuality and the literature of the Harlem Renaissance A. B. Christa Schwarz; 11. Sexual desire, modernity and modernism in the fiction of Nella Larsen and Rudolph Fisher Charles Scruggs; 12. Banjo meets the dark princess: Claude McKay, W. E. B. Du Bois, and the transnational novel of the Harlem Renaissance William J. Maxwell; 13. The Caribbean voices of Eric Walrond and Claude McKay Carl Pedersen; 14. George Schuyler and Wallace Thurman: two satirists of the Harlem Renaissance J. Martin Favor; 15. Zora Neale Hurston, folk performance, and the 'margarine negro' Carla Kaplan; Part III. The Post-Renaissance: 16. 'The aftermath': the reputation of the Harlem Renaissance twenty years later Lawrence Jackson; Guide to further reading.