Black Writers of America: A Comprehensive Anthology
Item
Title
Black Writers of America: A Comprehensive Anthology
This edition
"Black Writers of America: A Comprehensive Anthology" . Ed. Richard K. Barksdale and Keneth Kinnamon. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1972. xxiii+917 pp.
Table of contents
Part I The Eighteenth-Century Beginnings
The Major Writers
● Olaudah Equiano / from The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, or Gustavus Vassa, the African
● Phillis Wealthy / On the Death of the Rev. Mr. George Whitefield.
(1770)
● Phillis Wealthy / On Virtue
● Phillis Wealthy / To the University of Cambridge, in New England
● Phillis Wealthy / On Being Brought from Africa to America
● Phillis Wealthy / An Hymn to the Morning
● Phillis Wealthy / A Farewell to America
● Phillis Wealthy / To His Excellency General Washington
A Poet and an Intellectual
● Jupiter Hammon / An Evening Thought: Salvation by Christ with Penetential Cries
● Jupiter Hammon / An Address to Miss Phillis Wheatly, Ethiopian Poetess
● Benjamin Banneker / A Mathematical Problem in Verse
● Benjamin Banneker / Letter to Thomas Jefferson
Part II The Struggle Against Slavery and Racism: 1800-1860
The Major Writers
● Frederick Douglass / from Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave
● Frederick Douglass / Oration, Delivered in Corinthian Hall, Rochester, (July 5, 1852)
● Rev. Alexander Crummell / The Relations and Duties of Free Colored Men in America to Africa
The Struggle for Civil Rights
● Theodor S. Wright / Letter to Rev. Archibald Alexander, D.D.
● William Whipper / An Address on Non-Resistance to Offensive Aggression
● Robert Purvis / Appeal of Forty Thousand Citizens, Threatened with Disfranchisement, to the People of Pennsylvania
Black Abolitionists
● David Walker / from David Walker’s Appeal
● Nat Turner / The Confessions of Nat Turner
● Henry Highland Garnet / An Address to the Slaves of the United States of America
● William Wells Brown / from Clotel
● William Wells Brown / Visit of a Fugitive Slave to the Grave of Wilberforce
Black Nationalists
● John Browne Russwurm / The Condition and Prospects of Hayti
● Martin R. Delany / from The Condition, Elevation, and Destiny of the Colored people of the United States, Politically Considered
The Fugitive Slave Narrative
● Moses Roper / from A Narrative of the Adventures and Escape of Moses Roper, from American Slavery
Poetry
● George Moses Horton / Slavery
● George Moses Horton / The Slave’s Complaint
● George Moses Horton / On Hearing of the Intention of a Gentleman to Purchase the Poet's Freedom
● James M. Whitfield / from America
● Frances Watkins Harper / The Slave Mother
● Frances Watkins Harper / Bury Me in a Free Land
Religion
● Rev. Lemuel B. Haynes / Universal Salvation - A Very Ancient Doctrine
Folk Literature
Tales
● How Buck Won His Freedom
● Swapping Dreams
● Lias’ Revelation
● The Fox and the Goose
● Tar Baby
● Big Sixteen and the Devil
● Marster’s Body and Soul
Songs
● De Ole Nigger Driver
● Sellin’ Time
● JUba
● Mistah Rabbit
● Raise a Ruckus Tonight
● Who-zen John, Who-za
● Misee Got a Gold Chain
● Zip e Duden Duden
● Juber
● The Stroker’s Chant
● Uncle Gabriel
● Gen’el Jackson
● Mary, Don You Weep
● Gonna Shout
● When-a Mah Blood Runs Chilly and Col
● Soon One Mawnin
● Motherless Child
● Swing Low, Sweet Chariot
● Nobody Knows da Trubble Ah See
● Were You Dere
● Do, Lawd
● Dis Worl Mos Done
● Shout Along, Chillen
Part III The Black Man in the Civil War: 1861-1865
The Black Man in Battle
● William Wells Brown / from The Negro in the American Rebellion: His Heroism and His Fidelity
● George Washington Williams / from A History of the Negro Troops in the War of the Rebellion 1861-1865
Two Black Soldiers Comment
● Corporal John A. Cravat / Four Letters
● An “Old” Sergeant / Dat’s All What I Has to Say Now
A Black Orator Speaks
● Rev. Henry Highland Garnet / A Memorial Discourse Delivered in the Hall of the House of Representatives, February 12, 1865
Two Black Women Serve and Observe
● Charlotte Forten Grimké / from Journal of Charlotte Forten
● Elizabeth Keckley / from Behind the Scenes
Folk Literature of Emancipation and Freedom
● We’ll Soon Be Free
● Rock About My Saro Jane
● Don wid Driber’s Dribin’
● Many a Thousand Die
● Freedom
Part IV Reconstruction and Reaction: 1865-1915
The Major Writers
● Charles W. Chesnutt / The goophered Grapevine
● Charles W. Chesnutt / The Wife of His Youth
● Charles W. Chesnutt / The Passing of Grandison
● Paul Laurence Dunbar / We Wear the Mask
● Paul Laurence Dunbar / The Colored Soldiers
● Paul Laurence Dunbar / Ships That Pass in the Night
● Paul Laurence Dunbar / Ere Sleep Comes Down to Soothe the Weary Eyes
● Paul Laurence Dunbar / Dawn
● Paul Laurence Dunbar / The Party
● Paul Laurence Dunbar / A Negro Love Song
● Paul Laurence Dunbar / When Malindy Sings
● Paul Laurence Dunbar / Sympathy
● Paul Laurence Dunbar / Harriet Beecher Stowe
● Paul Laurence Dunbar / Soliloquy of a Turkey
● Paul Laurence Dunbar / The Poet
● Paul Laurence Dunbar / In the Morning
● Paul Laurence Dunbar / A Death Song
● Paul Laurence Dunbar / Compensation
● Paul Laurence Dunbar / Jimsella
● W. E. B. Du Bois / from The Souls of Black Folk
● W. E. B. Du Bois / Resolutions at Harpers Ferry, 1906
● W. E. B. Du Bois / A Litany of Atlanta
● W. E. B. Du Bois / The Immediate Program of the American Negro (1915)
● W. E. B. Du Bois / In Black (1920)
● W. E. B. Du Bois / from The Autobiography of W. E. B. Du Bois
History
● George Washington Williams / from History of the Negro Race in America from 1619 to 1880
Autobiography
● Booker T. Washington / from Up from Slavery
Race Politics
● Robert Brown Elliott / Speech on the Civil Rights of Bill Delivered in the United States Congress, (January 6, 187)
● Blanche K. Bruce / Address to the United States Senate in Behalf of Admitting P. B. S. Pinchback, (March 3, 1876)
● Blanche K. Bruce / Speech to the United States Senate on Mississippi Election, Delivered (March 31, 1876)
Poetry
● Albery A. Whitman / from Rape of Florida
● James Edwin Campbell / Ol’ Doc’ Hyar
● James Edwin Campbell / When Ol’ Sis’ Judy Pray
● William Stanley Braithwaite / Rhapsody
● William Stanley Braithwaite / Scintilla
● William Stanley Braithwaite / The Watchers
● William Stanley Braithwaite / Sandy Star
● Fenton Johnson / Tired
● Fenton Johnson / The Scarlet Woman
Folk Literature
Tale
● The Talkin Mule
Prison Songs
● No Mo Cane on Dis Brazis
● Go Down, Ol’ Hannah
● Po Laz’us
● Another Man Don Gon
Bad Man Songs
● Railroad Bill
● Stackerlee and de Debbil
● John Hardy
The Blues
● Shorty George
● Goin Down the Road
● Pity a Poor Boy
● Drink’s Blues
● Frankie Baker
Work Songs
● Casey Jones
● John Henry
● Dis Hammer
● Rainbow Roun Mah Shoulder
● Railroad Section Leader’s Song
● Long-Line Skinner’s Blues
Part V Renaissance and Radicalism: 1915-1945
The Major Writer
● James Weldon Johnson / from The Book of American Negro Poetry
● James Weldon Johnson / Sence You Went Away
● James Weldon Johnson / Fifty Years (1863-1913)
● James Weldon Johnson / O Black and Unkown Bards
● James Weldon Johnson / The White Witch
● James Weldon Johnson / Fragment
● James Weldon Johnson / Go Down Death - A Funeral Sermon
● Claude McKay / Spring in New Hamsphire
● Claude McKay / My Mother
● Claude McKay / Flame-Heart
● Claude McKay / The Tropics in New York
● Claude McKay / If We Must Die
● Claude McKay / The Lynching
● Claude McKay / Like a Strong Tree
● Claude McKay / Tiger
● Claude McKay / The Desolate City
● Claude McKay / America
● Claude McKay / Harlem Shadows
● Claude McKay / The Harlem Dancer
● Claude McKay / The White House
● Claude McKay / St. Isaac’s Church, Petrograd
● Claude McKay / Flower of Love
● Claude McKay / A Memory of June
● Claude McKay / Memorial
● Claude McKay / from Home to Harlem
● Jean Toomer / from Cane
● Jean Toomer / Blue Meridian
● Langston Hughes / The Negro Speaks of Rivers
● Langston Hughes / Mother to Son
● Langston Hughes / Jazzonia
● Langston Hughes / Dream Variation
● Langston Hughes / I, Too
● Langston Hughes / The Weary Blues
● Langston Hughes / Cross
● Langston Hughes / Bound No’th Blues
● Langston Hughes / Brass Spittoons
● Langston Hughes / Song for a Dark Girl
● Langston Hughes / Sylvester’s Dying Bed
● Langston Hughes / Ballad of the Landlord
● Langston Hughes / Dream Boogie
● Langston Hughes / from The Big Sea
● Langston Hughes / Dear. Dr. Butts
● Countee Cullen / Yet Do I Marvel
● Countee Cullen / A Brown Girl Dead
● Countee Cullen / Incident
● Countee Cullen / Heritage
● Countee Cullen / For John Keats, Apostle of Beauty
● Countee Cullen / For Paul Laurence Dunbar
● Countee Cullen / She of the Dancing Feet Sings
● Countee Cullen / To John Keats, Poet. At Springtime
● Countee Cullen / From the Dark Tower
● Countee Cullen / Threnody for a Brown Girl
● Countee Cullen / Variations on a Theme
● Countee Cullen / A Song of Sour Grapes
● Countee Cullen / That Bright Chimeric Beast
● Countee Cullen / Little Sonnet to Little Friends
● Countee Cullen / Therefore, Adieu
● Countee Cullen / Nothing Endures
● Countee Cullen / Black Majesty
● Countee Cullen / Magnets
● Countee Cullen / A Negro Mother’s Lullaby
● Richard Wright / The Ethics of Living Jim Crow
● Richard Wright / Big Boy Leaves Home
Oratory and Essays
● Marcus Garvey / Speech Delivered at Liberty Hall N.Y.C. During Second International Convention of Negroes, August 1921
● Marcus Garvey / Speech Delivered at Madison Square Garden, March 1924
● Alain Locke / The New Negro
● Walter White / I Investigate Lynchings
Fiction
● Rudolph Fisher / The City of Refuge
● Eric Walrond / Subjection
● Wallace Thurman / Grist in the Mill
● Zora Neale Hurston / The Gilded Six Bits
● Chester Himes / Salute to the Passing
Poetry
● Angelina Grimké / A Mona Lisa
● Angelina Grimké / Grass Fingers
● Anne Spencer / Lines to a Nasturtium
● Anne Spencer / Letter to My Sister
● Arna Bontemps / A Black Man Talks of Reaping
● Arna Bontemps / Reconnaissance
● Arna Bontemps / Nocturne at Bethesda
● Arna Bontemps / Southern Mansion
● Sterling A. Brown / Old Lem
● Sterling A. Brown / Strong Men
● Margaret Walker / For My People
Drama
● Willis Richardson / The Broken Banjo
Folk Literature
Political Songs
● Garvey
● Joe Turner
A Breakdown
● Ol’ Ant Kate, She Died So Late
The Blues
● The Blues Comes fum Texas
● St. James Infirmary Blues
● Just Blues
● Southern Blues
● Easy Rider
● Put It Right Here or Keep It Out There
Fables
● The Signifying Monkey
● Shine and the Titanic
Part VI The Present Generation: Since 1945
The Major Writers
● Melvin B. Tolson / Dark Symphony
● Melvin B. Tolson / from Harlem Gallery
● Robert Hayden / Frederick Douglass
● Robert Hayden / Runagate Runagate
● Robert Hayden / Homage to the Empress of the Blues
● Robert Hayden / A Ballad of Remembrance
● Robert Hayden / Tour 5
● Robert Hayden / Mourning Poem for the Queen of Sunday
● Robert Hayden / Middle Passage
● Ralph Ellison / Richard Wright’s Blues
● Ralph Ellison / And Hickman Arrives
● Gwendolyn Brooks / The Mother
● Gwendolyn Brooks / Of De Witt Williams on His Way to Lincoln Cemetery
● Gwendolyn Brooks / Piano After War
● Gwendolyn Brooks / Mentors
● Gwendolyn Brooks / “Do Not Be Afraid of No”
● Gwendolyn Brooks / The Children of the Poor
● Gwendolyn Brooks / We Real Cool
● Gwendolyn Brooks / The Chicago Defender Sends a Man to Little Rock
● Gwendolyn Brooks / Riders to the Blood-Red Wrath
● Gwendolyn Brooks / Way-Out Morgan
● Gwendolyn Brooks / The Wall
● Gwendolyn Brooks / Loam Norton
● James Baldwin / Everybody’s Protest Novel
● James Baldwin / Sonny’s Blues
● Imamu Amiri Baraka (LeRoi Jones) / Preface to a Twenty Volume Suicide Note
● Imamu Amiri Baraka (LeRoi Jones) / An Agony. As Now
● Imamu Amiri Baraka (LeRoi Jones) / A Poem for Black Hearts
● Imamu Amiri Baraka (LeRoi Jones) / leroy
● Imamu Amiri Baraka (LeRoi Jones) / Black People!
● Imamu Amiri Baraka (LeRoi Jones) / The Last Days of the American Empire (Including Some Instructions for Black People)
● Imamu Amiri Baraka (LeRoi Jones) / Nationalism Vs. PimpArt
Fiction
● Ann Petry / Like a Winding Sheet
● William Demby / The Table of Wishes Come True
● Paule Marshall / Barbados
● Ernest J. Gaines / The Sky Is Gray
● William Melvin Kelley / The Dentist’s Wife
Poetry
● Owen Dodson / Sorrow Is the Only Faithful One
● Owen Dodson / Yardbird’s Skull
● Dudley Randall / Booker T. and W. E. B.
● Dudley Randall / Legacy: My South
● Dudley Randall / Perspectives
● Samuel Allen / A Moment Please
● Samuel Allen / To Satch
● Samuel Allen / Nat Turner
● Margaret Danner / Far from Africa: Four Poems
● Mari E. Evans / When in Rome
● Mari E. Evans / Black Jam for Dr. Negro
● Etheridge Knight / The Idea of Ancestry
● Etheridge Knight / 2 Poems for Black Relocation Centers
● Conrad Kent Rivers / To Richard Wright
● Conrad Kent Rivers / On the Death of William Edward Burghardt Du Bois by African Moonlight and Forgotten Shores
● Don L. Lee / Assassination
● Don. L. Lee / A Poem Looking for a Reader
● Sonia Sanchez / Small Comment
● Nikki Giovanni / For Saundra
Drama
● Carlton W. Molette II and Barbara Molette / Rosalee Pritchett
Essay
● Nathan Hare / The Challenge of a Black Scholar
Racial Spokesmen
● Martin Luther King, Jr. / from Stride Toward Freedom
● Martin Luther King, Jr. / Letter from Birmingham Jail
● Martin Luther King, Jr. / I have a Dream
● Malcolm X / from The Autobiography of Malcolm X
● Eldridge Cleaver / To All Black Women, From All Black Men
Folk Literature
The Blues
● Young Boy Blues
● Fogyism
● Backdoor Blues
● Married Woman Blues
● A Big Fat Mama
● Crazy Blues
● Monte Carlo Blues
● How Long Blues
● Black Woman
● Bibliography
● Index of Authors and Titles
The Major Writers
● Olaudah Equiano / from The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, or Gustavus Vassa, the African
● Phillis Wealthy / On the Death of the Rev. Mr. George Whitefield.
(1770)
● Phillis Wealthy / On Virtue
● Phillis Wealthy / To the University of Cambridge, in New England
● Phillis Wealthy / On Being Brought from Africa to America
● Phillis Wealthy / An Hymn to the Morning
● Phillis Wealthy / A Farewell to America
● Phillis Wealthy / To His Excellency General Washington
A Poet and an Intellectual
● Jupiter Hammon / An Evening Thought: Salvation by Christ with Penetential Cries
● Jupiter Hammon / An Address to Miss Phillis Wheatly, Ethiopian Poetess
● Benjamin Banneker / A Mathematical Problem in Verse
● Benjamin Banneker / Letter to Thomas Jefferson
Part II The Struggle Against Slavery and Racism: 1800-1860
The Major Writers
● Frederick Douglass / from Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave
● Frederick Douglass / Oration, Delivered in Corinthian Hall, Rochester, (July 5, 1852)
● Rev. Alexander Crummell / The Relations and Duties of Free Colored Men in America to Africa
The Struggle for Civil Rights
● Theodor S. Wright / Letter to Rev. Archibald Alexander, D.D.
● William Whipper / An Address on Non-Resistance to Offensive Aggression
● Robert Purvis / Appeal of Forty Thousand Citizens, Threatened with Disfranchisement, to the People of Pennsylvania
Black Abolitionists
● David Walker / from David Walker’s Appeal
● Nat Turner / The Confessions of Nat Turner
● Henry Highland Garnet / An Address to the Slaves of the United States of America
● William Wells Brown / from Clotel
● William Wells Brown / Visit of a Fugitive Slave to the Grave of Wilberforce
Black Nationalists
● John Browne Russwurm / The Condition and Prospects of Hayti
● Martin R. Delany / from The Condition, Elevation, and Destiny of the Colored people of the United States, Politically Considered
The Fugitive Slave Narrative
● Moses Roper / from A Narrative of the Adventures and Escape of Moses Roper, from American Slavery
Poetry
● George Moses Horton / Slavery
● George Moses Horton / The Slave’s Complaint
● George Moses Horton / On Hearing of the Intention of a Gentleman to Purchase the Poet's Freedom
● James M. Whitfield / from America
● Frances Watkins Harper / The Slave Mother
● Frances Watkins Harper / Bury Me in a Free Land
Religion
● Rev. Lemuel B. Haynes / Universal Salvation - A Very Ancient Doctrine
Folk Literature
Tales
● How Buck Won His Freedom
● Swapping Dreams
● Lias’ Revelation
● The Fox and the Goose
● Tar Baby
● Big Sixteen and the Devil
● Marster’s Body and Soul
Songs
● De Ole Nigger Driver
● Sellin’ Time
● JUba
● Mistah Rabbit
● Raise a Ruckus Tonight
● Who-zen John, Who-za
● Misee Got a Gold Chain
● Zip e Duden Duden
● Juber
● The Stroker’s Chant
● Uncle Gabriel
● Gen’el Jackson
● Mary, Don You Weep
● Gonna Shout
● When-a Mah Blood Runs Chilly and Col
● Soon One Mawnin
● Motherless Child
● Swing Low, Sweet Chariot
● Nobody Knows da Trubble Ah See
● Were You Dere
● Do, Lawd
● Dis Worl Mos Done
● Shout Along, Chillen
Part III The Black Man in the Civil War: 1861-1865
The Black Man in Battle
● William Wells Brown / from The Negro in the American Rebellion: His Heroism and His Fidelity
● George Washington Williams / from A History of the Negro Troops in the War of the Rebellion 1861-1865
Two Black Soldiers Comment
● Corporal John A. Cravat / Four Letters
● An “Old” Sergeant / Dat’s All What I Has to Say Now
A Black Orator Speaks
● Rev. Henry Highland Garnet / A Memorial Discourse Delivered in the Hall of the House of Representatives, February 12, 1865
Two Black Women Serve and Observe
● Charlotte Forten Grimké / from Journal of Charlotte Forten
● Elizabeth Keckley / from Behind the Scenes
Folk Literature of Emancipation and Freedom
● We’ll Soon Be Free
● Rock About My Saro Jane
● Don wid Driber’s Dribin’
● Many a Thousand Die
● Freedom
Part IV Reconstruction and Reaction: 1865-1915
The Major Writers
● Charles W. Chesnutt / The goophered Grapevine
● Charles W. Chesnutt / The Wife of His Youth
● Charles W. Chesnutt / The Passing of Grandison
● Paul Laurence Dunbar / We Wear the Mask
● Paul Laurence Dunbar / The Colored Soldiers
● Paul Laurence Dunbar / Ships That Pass in the Night
● Paul Laurence Dunbar / Ere Sleep Comes Down to Soothe the Weary Eyes
● Paul Laurence Dunbar / Dawn
● Paul Laurence Dunbar / The Party
● Paul Laurence Dunbar / A Negro Love Song
● Paul Laurence Dunbar / When Malindy Sings
● Paul Laurence Dunbar / Sympathy
● Paul Laurence Dunbar / Harriet Beecher Stowe
● Paul Laurence Dunbar / Soliloquy of a Turkey
● Paul Laurence Dunbar / The Poet
● Paul Laurence Dunbar / In the Morning
● Paul Laurence Dunbar / A Death Song
● Paul Laurence Dunbar / Compensation
● Paul Laurence Dunbar / Jimsella
● W. E. B. Du Bois / from The Souls of Black Folk
● W. E. B. Du Bois / Resolutions at Harpers Ferry, 1906
● W. E. B. Du Bois / A Litany of Atlanta
● W. E. B. Du Bois / The Immediate Program of the American Negro (1915)
● W. E. B. Du Bois / In Black (1920)
● W. E. B. Du Bois / from The Autobiography of W. E. B. Du Bois
History
● George Washington Williams / from History of the Negro Race in America from 1619 to 1880
Autobiography
● Booker T. Washington / from Up from Slavery
Race Politics
● Robert Brown Elliott / Speech on the Civil Rights of Bill Delivered in the United States Congress, (January 6, 187)
● Blanche K. Bruce / Address to the United States Senate in Behalf of Admitting P. B. S. Pinchback, (March 3, 1876)
● Blanche K. Bruce / Speech to the United States Senate on Mississippi Election, Delivered (March 31, 1876)
Poetry
● Albery A. Whitman / from Rape of Florida
● James Edwin Campbell / Ol’ Doc’ Hyar
● James Edwin Campbell / When Ol’ Sis’ Judy Pray
● William Stanley Braithwaite / Rhapsody
● William Stanley Braithwaite / Scintilla
● William Stanley Braithwaite / The Watchers
● William Stanley Braithwaite / Sandy Star
● Fenton Johnson / Tired
● Fenton Johnson / The Scarlet Woman
Folk Literature
Tale
● The Talkin Mule
Prison Songs
● No Mo Cane on Dis Brazis
● Go Down, Ol’ Hannah
● Po Laz’us
● Another Man Don Gon
Bad Man Songs
● Railroad Bill
● Stackerlee and de Debbil
● John Hardy
The Blues
● Shorty George
● Goin Down the Road
● Pity a Poor Boy
● Drink’s Blues
● Frankie Baker
Work Songs
● Casey Jones
● John Henry
● Dis Hammer
● Rainbow Roun Mah Shoulder
● Railroad Section Leader’s Song
● Long-Line Skinner’s Blues
Part V Renaissance and Radicalism: 1915-1945
The Major Writer
● James Weldon Johnson / from The Book of American Negro Poetry
● James Weldon Johnson / Sence You Went Away
● James Weldon Johnson / Fifty Years (1863-1913)
● James Weldon Johnson / O Black and Unkown Bards
● James Weldon Johnson / The White Witch
● James Weldon Johnson / Fragment
● James Weldon Johnson / Go Down Death - A Funeral Sermon
● Claude McKay / Spring in New Hamsphire
● Claude McKay / My Mother
● Claude McKay / Flame-Heart
● Claude McKay / The Tropics in New York
● Claude McKay / If We Must Die
● Claude McKay / The Lynching
● Claude McKay / Like a Strong Tree
● Claude McKay / Tiger
● Claude McKay / The Desolate City
● Claude McKay / America
● Claude McKay / Harlem Shadows
● Claude McKay / The Harlem Dancer
● Claude McKay / The White House
● Claude McKay / St. Isaac’s Church, Petrograd
● Claude McKay / Flower of Love
● Claude McKay / A Memory of June
● Claude McKay / Memorial
● Claude McKay / from Home to Harlem
● Jean Toomer / from Cane
● Jean Toomer / Blue Meridian
● Langston Hughes / The Negro Speaks of Rivers
● Langston Hughes / Mother to Son
● Langston Hughes / Jazzonia
● Langston Hughes / Dream Variation
● Langston Hughes / I, Too
● Langston Hughes / The Weary Blues
● Langston Hughes / Cross
● Langston Hughes / Bound No’th Blues
● Langston Hughes / Brass Spittoons
● Langston Hughes / Song for a Dark Girl
● Langston Hughes / Sylvester’s Dying Bed
● Langston Hughes / Ballad of the Landlord
● Langston Hughes / Dream Boogie
● Langston Hughes / from The Big Sea
● Langston Hughes / Dear. Dr. Butts
● Countee Cullen / Yet Do I Marvel
● Countee Cullen / A Brown Girl Dead
● Countee Cullen / Incident
● Countee Cullen / Heritage
● Countee Cullen / For John Keats, Apostle of Beauty
● Countee Cullen / For Paul Laurence Dunbar
● Countee Cullen / She of the Dancing Feet Sings
● Countee Cullen / To John Keats, Poet. At Springtime
● Countee Cullen / From the Dark Tower
● Countee Cullen / Threnody for a Brown Girl
● Countee Cullen / Variations on a Theme
● Countee Cullen / A Song of Sour Grapes
● Countee Cullen / That Bright Chimeric Beast
● Countee Cullen / Little Sonnet to Little Friends
● Countee Cullen / Therefore, Adieu
● Countee Cullen / Nothing Endures
● Countee Cullen / Black Majesty
● Countee Cullen / Magnets
● Countee Cullen / A Negro Mother’s Lullaby
● Richard Wright / The Ethics of Living Jim Crow
● Richard Wright / Big Boy Leaves Home
Oratory and Essays
● Marcus Garvey / Speech Delivered at Liberty Hall N.Y.C. During Second International Convention of Negroes, August 1921
● Marcus Garvey / Speech Delivered at Madison Square Garden, March 1924
● Alain Locke / The New Negro
● Walter White / I Investigate Lynchings
Fiction
● Rudolph Fisher / The City of Refuge
● Eric Walrond / Subjection
● Wallace Thurman / Grist in the Mill
● Zora Neale Hurston / The Gilded Six Bits
● Chester Himes / Salute to the Passing
Poetry
● Angelina Grimké / A Mona Lisa
● Angelina Grimké / Grass Fingers
● Anne Spencer / Lines to a Nasturtium
● Anne Spencer / Letter to My Sister
● Arna Bontemps / A Black Man Talks of Reaping
● Arna Bontemps / Reconnaissance
● Arna Bontemps / Nocturne at Bethesda
● Arna Bontemps / Southern Mansion
● Sterling A. Brown / Old Lem
● Sterling A. Brown / Strong Men
● Margaret Walker / For My People
Drama
● Willis Richardson / The Broken Banjo
Folk Literature
Political Songs
● Garvey
● Joe Turner
A Breakdown
● Ol’ Ant Kate, She Died So Late
The Blues
● The Blues Comes fum Texas
● St. James Infirmary Blues
● Just Blues
● Southern Blues
● Easy Rider
● Put It Right Here or Keep It Out There
Fables
● The Signifying Monkey
● Shine and the Titanic
Part VI The Present Generation: Since 1945
The Major Writers
● Melvin B. Tolson / Dark Symphony
● Melvin B. Tolson / from Harlem Gallery
● Robert Hayden / Frederick Douglass
● Robert Hayden / Runagate Runagate
● Robert Hayden / Homage to the Empress of the Blues
● Robert Hayden / A Ballad of Remembrance
● Robert Hayden / Tour 5
● Robert Hayden / Mourning Poem for the Queen of Sunday
● Robert Hayden / Middle Passage
● Ralph Ellison / Richard Wright’s Blues
● Ralph Ellison / And Hickman Arrives
● Gwendolyn Brooks / The Mother
● Gwendolyn Brooks / Of De Witt Williams on His Way to Lincoln Cemetery
● Gwendolyn Brooks / Piano After War
● Gwendolyn Brooks / Mentors
● Gwendolyn Brooks / “Do Not Be Afraid of No”
● Gwendolyn Brooks / The Children of the Poor
● Gwendolyn Brooks / We Real Cool
● Gwendolyn Brooks / The Chicago Defender Sends a Man to Little Rock
● Gwendolyn Brooks / Riders to the Blood-Red Wrath
● Gwendolyn Brooks / Way-Out Morgan
● Gwendolyn Brooks / The Wall
● Gwendolyn Brooks / Loam Norton
● James Baldwin / Everybody’s Protest Novel
● James Baldwin / Sonny’s Blues
● Imamu Amiri Baraka (LeRoi Jones) / Preface to a Twenty Volume Suicide Note
● Imamu Amiri Baraka (LeRoi Jones) / An Agony. As Now
● Imamu Amiri Baraka (LeRoi Jones) / A Poem for Black Hearts
● Imamu Amiri Baraka (LeRoi Jones) / leroy
● Imamu Amiri Baraka (LeRoi Jones) / Black People!
● Imamu Amiri Baraka (LeRoi Jones) / The Last Days of the American Empire (Including Some Instructions for Black People)
● Imamu Amiri Baraka (LeRoi Jones) / Nationalism Vs. PimpArt
Fiction
● Ann Petry / Like a Winding Sheet
● William Demby / The Table of Wishes Come True
● Paule Marshall / Barbados
● Ernest J. Gaines / The Sky Is Gray
● William Melvin Kelley / The Dentist’s Wife
Poetry
● Owen Dodson / Sorrow Is the Only Faithful One
● Owen Dodson / Yardbird’s Skull
● Dudley Randall / Booker T. and W. E. B.
● Dudley Randall / Legacy: My South
● Dudley Randall / Perspectives
● Samuel Allen / A Moment Please
● Samuel Allen / To Satch
● Samuel Allen / Nat Turner
● Margaret Danner / Far from Africa: Four Poems
● Mari E. Evans / When in Rome
● Mari E. Evans / Black Jam for Dr. Negro
● Etheridge Knight / The Idea of Ancestry
● Etheridge Knight / 2 Poems for Black Relocation Centers
● Conrad Kent Rivers / To Richard Wright
● Conrad Kent Rivers / On the Death of William Edward Burghardt Du Bois by African Moonlight and Forgotten Shores
● Don L. Lee / Assassination
● Don. L. Lee / A Poem Looking for a Reader
● Sonia Sanchez / Small Comment
● Nikki Giovanni / For Saundra
Drama
● Carlton W. Molette II and Barbara Molette / Rosalee Pritchett
Essay
● Nathan Hare / The Challenge of a Black Scholar
Racial Spokesmen
● Martin Luther King, Jr. / from Stride Toward Freedom
● Martin Luther King, Jr. / Letter from Birmingham Jail
● Martin Luther King, Jr. / I have a Dream
● Malcolm X / from The Autobiography of Malcolm X
● Eldridge Cleaver / To All Black Women, From All Black Men
Folk Literature
The Blues
● Young Boy Blues
● Fogyism
● Backdoor Blues
● Married Woman Blues
● A Big Fat Mama
● Crazy Blues
● Monte Carlo Blues
● How Long Blues
● Black Woman
● Bibliography
● Index of Authors and Titles
Reviews and notices of anthology
• n/a
Commentary on anthology
• This anthology "sold well over 70,000 copies. Barksdale and Kinnamon take issue with the criteria of some other anthologists: 'Recognizing the limitations of a narrowly esthetic approach to a body of writing of great social import, we have provided generous selections of autobiographies, essays, speeches, letters, political pamphlets, histories, journals, and folk literature as well as poems, plays, and stories. Our criteria for inclusion were both artistic and social; inseed, facile or rigid separation of the two seems to us misguided.' The six parts . . . include eighty-five writers plus a generous sampling of folk literature at the end of each part. The introductions to the several parts are much fuller than in other anthologies, as are the headnotes to individual authors. The extensive bibliographical apparatus in the author headnotes and in the non-overlapping general bibliography of more than a thousand items has proven useful to scholars as well as students. A special feature is subclassification of five of the six parts into 'The Major Writers' and other categories. This effort at canonization recognized Equiano, Wheatley, Douglass, Crummell, Chesnutt, Dunbar, Du Bois, Johnson, McKay, Toomer, Hughes, Cullen, Wright, Tolson, Hayden, Ellison, Brooks, Baldwin, and Baraka. Each informed reader will wish to make additions and perhaps // deletions, but all would agree that Hurston should be numbered among theelect. Black Writers of America is now dated, but it has been useful to many readers during the last three decades of the century" (Kinnamon 1997: 464-65).
Cited in
• Kallenbach 1979 (gives publication information as: New York: Macmillan, 1972)
• [Kinnamon 1997: 464-65]
Item Number
A0179