You Don't Know Us Negroes and Other Essays

August 1, 2021

Edited by Henry Louis Gates Jr., You Don't Know Us Negroes and Other Essays is the first comprehensive collection of essays, criticism, and articles by Harlem Renaissance great Hurston, coming at a time when she is in the news again with books like the New York Times best-selling Barracoon (100,000-copy first printing). From Nayeri, an arts and culture writer for the New York Times, Takedown argues that while censorship once happened top-down (think kings and popes), it is now sometimes done bottom-up by activists challenging artists, critics, and museums. Author of the two-volume biography of Alexander Calder, critic Perl argues in Authority and Freedom that art's value lies in its independence from any ideology; "art's relevance has everything to do with what many regard as its irrelevance." Pulitzer Prize-winning musician Reich (love Drumming and Double Sextet!) holds Conversations about his life and music. Focusing on linen, cotton, silk, synthetics, and wool, Pratt Institute professor Thanhauser's Worn tells us everything we would want to know about clothes, what they are made of, and how they have shaped--and been shaped by--human history.

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Starred review from November 22, 2021
More than three decades of work by novelist Hurston (1891–1960) come together in this showstopping collection. In “Spirituals and Neo-Spirituals,” she spotlights the power of spiritual songs, and notes that “in the mouth of the Negro, the English language loses its stiffness... ‘the rim bones of nothing’ is just as truthful as ‘limitless space.’ ” Her pride in the richness of Black American life is evident throughout, especially in “Race Cannot Become Great Until It Recognizes Its Talent” and the title essay, in which she reminds readers that “Two hundred and forty-six years of outward submission during slavery... intensified our inner life instead of destroying it.” In “Court Order Can’t Make Races Mix” and “Which Way the NAACP?” she reveals her misgivings regarding the Brown v Board of Education decision and its implication that all-Black schools are inferior. Whether reporting on the injustices of the criminal justice system, poking holes in the pomposity of Marcus Garvey, or drawing a character sketch of a Black Florida cattle rancher, Hurston’s work stands out for its wit and range. This will delight her fans, and should garner her some new ones. Agent: Joy Harris, The Joy Harris Literary Agency.

December 1, 2021
A collection of Hurston's trenchant, acerbic commentaries on Black life. Edited, introduced, and extensively annotated by scholars Gates and West, 50 essays written over nearly four decades showcase the uncompromising views of novelist, anthropologist, folklorist, and critic Zora Neale Hurston (1891-1960). Organized thematically into sections focusing on "the Folk," race, gender, art, politics, and the scandalous trial of a Black woman accused of killing her White lover, the essays cohere to present Hurston's "lifelong attempt to reclaim traditional Black folk culture from racist and classist degradations, to share with her readers the 'race pride' she felt, to build the race from within." In the title essay, among the handful previously unpublished, Hurston excoriates Whites for assuming that they understand anything about Black experience. "Most white people have seen our shows but not our lives," she wrote in 1958. "If they have not seen a Negro show they have seen a minstrel or at least a black-face comedian and that is considered enough." She hurled criticism at some Blacks, as well: After Harlem Renaissance leader Alain Locke panned her novel Their Eyes Were Watching God, she damned him as a fraud. In "Which Way the NAACP?" written in 1957, Hurston questioned "the interpretation of 'advancement' " by the organization that pressed for school integration. "One has to be persuaded that a Negro suffers enormously by being deprived of physical contact with the Whites and be willing to pay a terrible price to gain it," she wrote. Co-founded by W.E.B. Du Bois, the NAACP, she predicted, "will remain a self-constituted dictatorship so long as it does not ask and receive a mandate from the entire Negro population of the United States." Writing during the Harlem Renaissance, Jim Crow, and civil rights unrest, Hurston argued for recognizing "the full richness of the African American experience" through its unique contributions to art, music, and language. Vigorous writings from a controversial and important cultural critic.

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December 1, 2021
In this newly compiled essay collection covering 35 years of life and writing, Hurston's eye turns to language, race, gender, art, and much more. Editors Gates and West have created a volume that enables readers both steeped in and new to Hurston to discover her acerbic wit, her crisp prose, and the breadth of her artistic ability and interests. From trial coverage to folktales, explorations of spirituals and debacles at Howard University, Hurston's inquiries provide an opportunity to experience the evolution of her work in context with her better-known writings. "Characteristics of Negro Expression" is a particularly fascinating look at Black life and language and highlight's Hurston's skill with the pen as well as her attention to detail and her deft ability to share her insights with those who might not otherwise notice significant nuances. Her anthropological background is on full display as she confronts Jim Crow, white supremacy, civil rights actions, and Black creativity. This is an invaluable nonfiction companion to the collection of Hurston's short stories, Hitting a Straight Lick with a Crooked Stick (2020).HIGH-DEMAND BACKSTORY: Media coverage will catalyze requests for this landmark gathering of an essential American writer's incisive social, cultural, and artistic critiques.

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