Tag Archives: Langston Hughes

The Cosmopolitan Vernacular

February 6, 2014 Not an oxymoron, but a genetic condition, as Sheldon Pollock argues, a local tongue globalized in its emergence and globalized again in its circulation. Is that why so many African-American authors began with dialect poetry? Not only … Continue reading

Posted in African-American literature, Creole, Dialect, Indian Ocean, Vernacular | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Passing On: Amiri Baraka, Suzan-Lori Parks, Claudia Rankine

January 22, 2014 James Baldwin probably felt a tinge of jealousy at the sight of Amiri Baraka, Maya Angelou, and Toni Morrison at his funeral. Thousands of people there, and those three in particular, so eloquent in their tribute, but … Continue reading

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New James Baldwin letters

January 1, 2014 The 100 letters recently acquired by the Beinecke Library are not to famous people, just Baldwin’s friends.  The letters to Painter began in 1954, when his play “The Amen Corner” opened at Howard, and came up to 1964, … Continue reading

Posted in African-American literature, Europe, Friendship, Libraries, Turkey, Twentieth century literature | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Faulkner’s Harlem Renaissance

November 20, 2013 This past week I was teaching Nella Larsen’s Quicksand and Passing.  I’d never assigned them before,  but they couldn’t have been better — for my “Hemingway, Fitzgerald, Faulkner” class. How else to contextualize Light in August?  Not … Continue reading

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Ralph Ellison, Gordon Parks: Photographers

Sept 18, 2014 The photos, under the title “A Man Becomes Invisible,” were in Life Magazine, 25 August 1952, close on the heels of novel’s publication earlier that year, on April 14. It was a coup.  Parks had been a … Continue reading

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March on Washington: unsung

August 28, 2013 No, not literally unsung.   In fact, the most memorable moments at the microphone, other than Martin Luther King’s “I had a Dream” speech,  featured singers: Mahalia Jackson; Marian Anderson; Peter, Paul and Mary; Joan Baez and … Continue reading

Posted in African-American literature, African-American music, Journalism, Media, Music, Twentieth century literature | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

Children’s literature as World Literature

July 10, 2013 Is there a special connection between children’s literature and world literature?  I’ve always wondered about this. Langston Hughes, Gertrude Stein, and Toni Morrison are just individual examples, and maybe they’re all flukes.   Still, there they are: … Continue reading

Posted in African-American literature, ancient Greece, Children's literature, Educational institutions, world literature | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Langston Hughes’s Children Literature

May 31, 2013 My class, “Regional, National, Global,” has no special focus on children’s literature, but it does seem to come up a lot. I think it’s because of Langston Hughes — the uncertain borders of his poetry, holding a … Continue reading

Posted in Africa, African-American literature, African-American music, Children's literature, Cities, collaboration, Educational institutions, Ethnicity, Experimental poetry, jazz, Modernist poetry, Music, print medium, Twentieth century literature, World history | Tagged , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Pynchon on the Simpsons, Hughes on the Bootsie cartoons

August 29, 2012 I’m not absolutely sure it is his voice, but most people seem to think it is: “Diatribe of a Mad Housewife,” Season 15 of The Simpsons, aired on Jan 25, 2004. Marge is mad enough to write a … Continue reading

Posted in African-American literature, collaboration, Contemporary Art, Ethnicity, Graphic Novels, Interdisciplinarity, Media, Modern art, Modernist poetry, print medium, Race, Remediation, Television, twentieth century art, Twentieth century literature, Visual arts, YouTube videos | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

Street Scene: Langston Hughes, Kurt Weill, Elmer Rice

July 11, 2012 It started out as a play by Elmer Rice: a Broadway run of 601 shows, the Pulitzer Prize in 1929, the  movie in 1931. Kurt Weill saw it in Berlin, both the play and the film, and … Continue reading

Posted in adaptation, African-American literature, Arts communities, Broadway plays, Cities, collaboration, Dance, Ethnicity, film medium, Interdisciplinarity, jazz, lyric, Media, Modernist poetry, Music, Remediation, Theater, Twentieth century literature, world literature, YouTube videos | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 9 Comments