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Harlem Stomp! A Cultural History of the Harlem RenaissanceThe African American Century By Laban Carrick Hill Imagine an America without African American music. Without hip hop. Without even Justin Timberlake since not only Timberlake’s influences are deeply rooted in black culture, but also his record producers and songwriters are African American. An America without blacks is a place without Rock and Roll. Without Jazz. Without essentially any truly American music. Now, imagine a sports world without African Americans. Without Michael Jordan. Without Barry Bonds. Without Michael Vick. Without Jesse Owens. Without Jackie Robinson. Without Mohamed Ali. Without “Float like a butterfly and sting like a bee.” How about movies without Spike Lee, Denzel Washington, Chris Rock, and Sidney Poitier. Theater without August Wilson. And Politics without Martin Luther King, Jr., Jesse Jackson, Thurgood Marshall, Malcolm X…even Al Sharpton. The writer Ralph Ellison wrote in his essay “What America Would be Like Without Blacks” that “…whatever else the true American is, he is also somehow black.” Try to imagine the 20th Century without African Americans. Scholars Henry Louis Gates, Jr., and Cornell West have gone so far as to call the 20th Century the African American Century. American life is inconceivable without its black presence. And if Gates and West are right and the 20th Century IS the Black Century, then the 1920s is the coming age for African Americans in that century. In the 1920s Harlem was hoppin’ and stompin’. The poet Arna Bontemps described the feeling, “In Harlem, it was like a foretaste of paradise. A blue haze descended at night and with it strings of fairy lights on the broad avenues.” The poet Countee Cullen characterized the spirit of the era in his poem “Harlem Wine.” Harlem Wine This is not water running here, These thick rebellious streams That hurtle flesh and bone past fear Down alleyways of dreams. This is a wine that must flow on Not caring how or where, So it has ways to flow upon Where song is in the air. So it can woo an artful flute With loose, elastic lips, Its measurements of joy compute With blithe, ecstatic hips. The energy, writing, music and dance of the Harlem Renaissance are like no other period in American history. It celebrates not only a race, but all of America. |
Selected Works1. Nonfiction
America Dreaming
How Youth Changed America
"Phenomenal."–Howard Zinn "Excellent."–New York Times Book Review Harlem Stomp! A Cultural History of the Harlem Renaissance
“Harlem Stomp! is a wonderous new book: it celebrates a time, a place, an energy, and a people who refused to be held back and so they created a culture the entire world is still reeling from.” --George C. Wolfe, writer, director, and producer of the Public Theater, NYC 2. Fiction
A Brush with Napoleon
A seventeen-year-old is plucked out of the Grande Armee to sit in place of Napoleon for a portrait of the Emperor by the artist David. Casa Azul
"I felt like a kid reading every word on the page! I liked the strains of "magic realism" coming through in Frida's house! Children will relate to this very much! The story is charming and reads like a thriller." –Margarita Aguilar, Assisant Curator, El Museo del Barrio 3. Poetry
Dave the Potter
A picturebook poem describing the life of the slave potter Dave. Contemporary Poetry of New England
“Contemporary Poetry of New England offers a vivid portrait of a region, its colors and smells, its physical and emotional textures, and the people…. It presents a range of poets, few of whom would call themselves a “region poet,” although each has taken to heart in a private way Frost’s haunting dictum: ‘Locality gives art.’” --from the Introduction 4. Middle Grade Series
Xtreme Mysteries
These kids love extreme sports--snowboarding, skateboarding, rock climbing, wake boarding--and are ready to fight when the right to do their sport is threatened. |
