Dewey Edition20
Reviews"Some of the best stories that have appeared in this country in years." - Herschel Brickell, North American Review "Powerful, polemical pieces." - David Herbert Donald, The New York Times
Table Of Content1 Cora Unashamed 2 Slave on the Block 3 Home 4 Passing 5 A Good Job Gone 6 Rejuvenation Through Joy 7 The Blues I'm Playing 8 Red-Headed Baby 9 Poor Little Black Fellow 10 Little Dog 11 Berry 12 Mother and Child 13 One Christmas Eve 14 Father and Son
SynopsisA collection of vibrant and incisive short stories depicting the sometimes humorous, but more often tragic interactions between Black people and white people in America in the 1920s and '30s. One of the most important writers to emerge from the Harlem Renaissance, Langston Hughes may be best known as a poet, but these stories showcase his talent as a lively storyteller. His work blends elements of blues and jazz, speech and song, into a triumphant and wholly original idiom. Stories included in this collection: "Cora Unashamed" "Slave on the Block" "Home" "Passing" "A Good Job Gone" "Rejuvenation Through Joy" "The Blues I'm Playing" "Red-Headed Baby" "Poor Little Black Fellow" "Little Dog" "Berry" "Mother and Child" "One Christmas Eve" "Father and Son", Perhaps more than any other writer, Langston Hughes made the white America of the 1920s and '30s aware of the black culture thriving in its midst. Like his most famous poems, Hughes's stories are messages from that other America, sharply etched vignettes of its daily life, cruelly accurate portrayals of black people colliding -- sometimes humorously, more often tragically -- with whites. Here is the ailing black musician who comes home from Europe to die in his small town -- only to die more quickly and brutally than he had imagined. Here are the wealthy bohemians who collect Negroes like so many objets d'art ... the moonlighting student who becomes the reluctant confidante of a boozy white Don Juan ... the elegant charlatan who peddles "real, primitive jazz out of Africa" as a nostrum to the spiritually starved elite. Filled with mordant wit and human detail, The Ways of White Folks is unmistakably the work of a great poet who was also a shrewd and compelling storyteller. Book jacket.