The Black American Writer I. [antikvár]

General Introduction This two-volume study of the black American writer makes no claim to be completely comprehensive, certain authors of considerable merit being omitted altogether. Its aim is rather to examine the achievement of some of the major talents to emerge from the black community, to analyse and assess the difficulties facing the black writer, and to examine the problems of criticism in a field so fraught with social, cultural and political prejudices. In recent years the white critic has found himself increasingly under attack. His motives and qualifications for the assessment of black literature have been called in question. This study consists of essays by both black and white critics and the reader will thus be in a position to judge for himself. Considerable space is devoted to this issue, and many of the general essays and interviews attempt to come to terms not merely with the achievement of the black American writer but also with the critical dilemma in an era of committed literature. The bulk of the essays in this study were specially commissioned and appear here for the first time in print. Where articles have appeared elsewhere these are works of special significance which have not previously been published in book form. Most important among these are the symposium on "The Negro in American Culture" which appears in volume I and Sartre's seminal essay on négritude. "Black Orpheus" which appears in volume II. In the former James Baldwin, Langston Hughes and Lorraine Hansberry confront Nat Hentoff and Alfred Kazin in a crucial