Bøger af James Weldon Johnson

Fifty Years and Other Poems (1917) is a collection of poems by James Weldon Johnson. Although less popular than his book God¿s Trombones: Seven Negro Sermons in Verse (1927), Johnson¿s second poetry collection showcases his talents as a rising star of African American literature. Including some poems that would be featured in The Book of American Negro Poetry (1922), an influential anthology compiled and edited by the poet himself, Fifty Years and Other Poems remains essential to Johnson¿s legacy as a leading figure of the Harlem Renaissance. ¿Fifty Years¿ opens the collection with an ode to emancipation, a starting point from which millions of men, women, and children were given the opportunity, however fragile it was, to pursue better lives. Rather than give thanks for freedom granted, however, Johnson implores his fellow Black Americans to remain proud, assured that liberty is their hard-earned right: ¿This land is ours by right of birth, / This land is ours by right of toil; / We helped to turn its virgin earth, / Our sweat is in its fruitful soil.¿ Hopeful and resilient, Johnson reflects on his own place in this history of struggle, paying particular heed to his status as a poet, his ability to sing despite centuries of violent oppression. In his poem ¿O Black and Unknown Bards,¿ he asks ¿O black and unknown bards of long ago, / How came your lips to touch the sacred fire?¿ Recognizing the need for a reconciliation between the long tradition of black culture and the overwhelming erasure of his own contemporary artists, Johnson highlights the efforts of those poets such as himself, who ¿Within [their] dark-kept soul[s], burst into song.¿ >With a beautifully designed cover and professionally typeset manuscript, this edition of James Weldon Johnson¿s Fifty Years and Other Poems is a classic of African American literature reimagined for modern readers.

"The groundbreaking classic novel of the Black experience in America, with an introduction by Henry Louis Gates, Jr. First published anonymously in 1912, this novel gave many white readers their first glimpse of the double standard--and double consciousness--that ruled the lives of Black people in America. Republished in 1927, at the height of the Harlem Renaissance, with an introduction by Carl Van Vechten, The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man emerged as a groundbreaking document of African-American culture and an eloquent model for later novelists ranging from Zora Neale Hurston to Richard Wright and Ralph Ellison. Narrated by a man whose light skin enables him to pass for white, the novel describes a journey through the strata of Black society at the turn of the century--from a cigar factory in Jacksonville to an elite gambling club in New York, from genteel aristocrats to the musicians who hammered out the rhythms of ragtime. The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man is a complex and moving examination of the question of race and an unsparing look at what it meant to forge an identity as a man in a culture that recognized nothing but color"--

James Weldon Johnson's career was one of extraordinary range, spanning the worlds of diplomacy (as U.S. consul in Venezuela and Nicaragua), politics (as Secretary of the NAACP), journalism (as founder of one newspaper and longtime editor of another), musical theater (as lyricist for the Broadway songwriting team of Cole and Johnson Brothers), and literature (as novelist, poet, and anthologist). At the dawning of what would become the modern civil rights movement, he forged a record of accomplishment that defied the odds. The Library of America now presents a collection of his writings that displays the many facets of a complex and impassioned writer.The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man (1912), Johnson's first book, is a novel that on its original anonymous publication was taken by many for an actual memoir. A groundbreaking work of modern fiction, it powerfully describes the inner development of a gifted, socially alienated man as he tries to come to terms with the constraints of racism.Along This Way (1933) is Johnson's genial and enthralling account of his fantastically busy life, with a cast of characters including W.E.B. Du Bois, Paul Robeson, Clarence Darrow, Booker T. Washington, Theodore Roosevelt, Carl Van Vechten, and many others.A selection of shorter prose-editorials from The New York Age, political essays, literary prefaces, an excerpt from the historical study Black Manhattan-confirms the variety of Johnson's interests, as he comments on figures and topics including Jack Johnson, Marcus Garvey, Woodrow Wilson, lynching, anti-Japanese discrimination in California, American involvement in Haiti, changing trends in theater and poetry, and the significance of spirituals.Johnson's poetry is represented by the full text of God's Trombones (1927), his stirring homage to African-American preaching, and shorter works including "O Black and Unknown Bards," lyrics from Johnson's Broadway songwriting days, and "Lift Every Voice and Sing," the hymn often referred to as the "Negro National Anthem."LIBRARY OF AMERICA is an independent nonprofit cultural organization founded in 1979 to preserve our nation's literary heritage by publishing, and keeping permanently in print, America's best and most significant writing. The Library of America series includes more than 300 volumes to date, authoritative editions that average 1,000 pages in length, feature cloth covers, sewn bindings, and ribbon markers, and are printed on premium acid-free paper that will last for centuries.

James Weldon Johnson's emotionally gripping novel is a landmark in black literary history and, more than eighty years after its original anonymous publication, a classic of American fiction. The first fictional memoir ever written by a black, The Autobiography of an Ex-Coloured Man influenced a generation of writers during the Harlem Renaissance and served as eloquent inspiration for Zora Neale Hurston, Ralph Ellison, and Richard Wright. In the 1920s and since, it has also given white readers a startling new perspective on their own culture, revealing to many the double standard of racial identity imposed on black Americans. Narrated by a mulatto man whose light skin allows him to "pass" for white, the novel describes a pilgrimage through America's color lines at the turn of the century--from a black college in Jacksonville to an elite New York nightclub, from the rural South to the white suburbs of the Northeast. This is a powerful, unsentimental examination of race in America, a hymn to the anguish of forging an identity in a nation obsessed with color. And, as Arna Bontemps pointed out decades ago, "the problems of the artist [as presented here] seem as contemporary as if the book had been written this year."

UP FROM SLAVERYThe autobiography of Booker T Washington is a startling portrait ofone of the great Americans of the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. The illegitimate son of 'a white man and a Negro slave, Washington, a man who struggled for his education, would go on to struggle for the dignity of all his people in a hostile and alien society.THE SOULS OF BLACK FOLKW.E.B. DuBois's classic is a major sociological document and one of the momentous books in the mosaic of American literature. No other work has had greater influence on black thinking, and nowhere is the African-American's unique heritage and his kinship with all men so passionately described.THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF AN EX-COLORED MANOriginally published anonymously, James Weldon Johnson's penetrating work is a remarkable human account of the life of black Americans in the early twentieth century and a profound interpretation of his feelings towards the white man and towards members of his own race. No other book touches with such understanding and objectivity on the phenomenon once called "passing" in a white society.These three narratives, gathered together in Three Negro Classics chronicle the remarkable evolution of African-American consciousness on both a personal and social level. Profound, intelligent, and insightful, they are as relevant today as they have ever been.The Autobiography of Booker T. Washington is a startling portrait of one of the great Americans of the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. The illegitimate son of a white man and a Negro slave, Washington, a man who struggled for his education, would go on to struggle for the dignity of all his people in a hostile and alien society.W.E.B. DuBois's classic is a major sociological document and one of the momentous books in the mosaic of American literature. No other work has had greater influence on black thinking, and nowhere is the African-American's unique heritage and his kinship with all men so passionately described.Originally published anonymously, James Weldon Johnson's penetrating work is a remarkable human accout of the life of black Americans in the early twentieth century and a profound interpretation of his feelings towards the w3hite man and towards members of his own race. No other book touches with such understanding and objectivity on the phenomenon once called "passing" in a white society.These three narratives, gathered together in Three Negro Classics, chronicle the remarkable evolution of African-American consciousness on both a personal and social level. Profound, intelligent, and insightful, they are as relevant today as they have ever been.

A landmark anthology of forty poets that brought serious attention to writers such as Countee Cullen and Langston Hughes. The poetry, the prefaces, and Johnson's critical notes have made this book a classic. Indices.

First published anonymously in 1912, this resolutely unsentimental novel gave many white readers their first glimpse of the double standards - and double consciousness - experienced by Black people in modern America. Republished in 1927, at the height of the Harlem Renaissance, with an introduction by Carl Van Vechten, The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man became a pioneering document of African-American culture and an eloquent model for later novelists ranging from Zora Neale Hurston to Richard Wright and Ralph Ellison.Narrated by a man whose light skin enables him to 'pass' for white, the novel describes a journey through the strata of Black society at the turn of the century - from a cigar factory in Jacksonville to an elite gambling club in New York, from genteel aristocrats to the musicians who hammered out the rhythms of Ragtime. The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man is a complex and moving examination of the question of race and an unsparing look at what it meant to forge an identity as a man in a culture that recognized nothing but colour.

First published anonymously in 1912, this resolutely unsentimental novel gave many white readers their first glimpse of the double standard -- and double consciousness -- that ruled the lives of black people in modern America. Republished in 1927, at the height of the Harlem Renaissance, with an introduction by Carl Van Vechten, The Autobiography of an Ex-Coloured Man became a groundbreaking document of Afro-American culture; the first first-person novel ever written by a black, it became an eloquent model for later novelists ranging from Zora Neale Hurston to Richard Wright and Ralph Ellison.Narrated by a man whose light skin enables him to "pass" for white, the novel describes a journey through the strata of black society at the turn of the century -- from a cigar factory in Jacksonville to an elite gambling club in New York, from genteel aristocrats to the musicians who hammered out the rhythms of ragtime. The Autobiography of an Ex-Coloured Man is a complex and moving examination of the question of race and an unsparing look at what it meant to forge an identity as a man in a culture that recognized nothing but color.

A compellingly powerful novel about racial relations that is as relevant now as it was one hundred years ago.

Johnson, the first black executive of the NAACP and an active civil-rights campaigner, provides an autobiographical account of living as a white man, although by heritage and experience he is an African American. He is also the author of "God's Trombones" and "Along This Way".

Recalling the great confessional narratives from St. Augustine to Jean Jacques Rousseau, from Benjamin Franklin and Frederick Douglass to Henry Adams, James Weldon Johnson relates the emotionally gripping tale of a mixed-race piano prodigy who can pass for white in turn-of-the-century America. Forced into impossible choices created by an unjust society, the narrator describes his experiences as he travels from Jacksonville to New York City, the rural South to Paris, London, and beyond. The earliest first-person novel published by an African American author, Johnson''s powerfully unsentimental story examines the significance of chance and choice, the particularly American investment in self-invention, and the role of identity in shaping our lives. Its influence extends to Richard Wright, Ralph Waldo Ellison''s Invisible Man and even Barack Obama''s Dreams from my Father. Includes several of Johnson''s influential and still timely New York Age editorials and a detailed biographical timeline.

A powerful look at race and race relations in America, Autobiography of an Ex-Coloured Man is a vital text that is just as relevant today as it was when it was published.