The New Negro: An Interpretation - Paperback

by Alain Locke (Editor)

Edited by the first African American Rhodes Scholar, this landmark anthology of fiction, poetry, essays, drama, music, and illustration is widely regarded as the key text of the Harlem Renaissance. Exploring social, political, and artistic change, the works include Locke's titular tract, as well as contributions by Langston Hughes, Zora Neale Hurston, Claude McKay, Jean Toomer, James Weldon Johnson, and other luminaries.

Back Jacket

This landmark anthology of fiction, poetry, essays, drama, and illustration is widely regarded as the key text of the Harlem Renaissance, collecting the works of creative leaders into one of the most powerful and thought-provoking books of this historic movement. Among its many social and political observations, The New Negro champions self-expression through art and culture, as well as the demand for civil rights, as drivers of changing African American identity in the 1920s.

Edited by the "dean" of the Harlem Renaissance and the first African American Rhodes Scholar, Alain Locke, the book begins with his titular essay, "The New Negro." Contributors include Langston Hughes, Zora Neale Hurston, Claude McKay, Jean Toomer, James Weldon Johnson, W. E. B. Du Bois, and many other luminaries.

Author Biography

Alain Leroy Locke (1885-1954) was an American writer, philosopher, educator, and patron of the arts. Distinguished as the first African American Rhodes Scholar in 1907, Locke was the philosophical architect -- the acknowledged "Dean" -- of the Harlem Renaissance.