A Jean Toomer Reader: Selected Unpublished Writings

Jean Toomer achieved instant recognition as a critic and thinker in 1923 with the publication of his novel Cane, a harsh, eloquent vision of black American hardship and suffering. But because of his reclusive, introspective nature, Toomer's fame waned in later years, and today his other contributions to American thought and literature are all but forgotten. Now, this collection of unpublished writings restores a crucial dimension to our understanding of this important African American author. Thematically arranging letters, sketches, poems, autobiography, short stories, a play, and a children's story, Frederik Rusch offers insight into Toomer's mind and spirituality, his feelings on racial identity in America, and his attitudes toward and ideas about Cane. Rusch highlights Toomer's reflections on America, its people, landscape, and politics, reveals his significance for the problems and issues of today, and helps us understand Toomer not only as writer, but also as social critic, prophet, mystic, and idealist. Exploring Toomer's attempts to find self-realization and transcend social and cultural definitions of race, this book offers a unique view of the United States through the life of one of its most significant and fascinating intellectuals.

Table of Contents:
I. Cane 1: Pre-Cane Letter to Waldo Frank, John McClure, Frank, The Liberator, Lola Ridge, Sherwood Anderson 2: Cane Letter to Gorham Munson, Kenneth Macgowan, Frank 3: Post-Cane Letter to Frank, Horace Liveright II. The Mystical Experience The Experience III. The Negro, the Blue Man, and the New Race Introduction: Prejudice; Germ Carriers; The Fable of a Creature 2: The Negro Negro Psychology in The Emperor Jones Letter to Sherwood Anderson The Negro Emergent 3: The Blue Man Letter to Horace Liveright, Waldo Frank Not Typically American Fighting the Vice 4: The New Race A New Race in America Letter to James Weldon Johnson The Americans Oppose the Force, Not the Man Mankind Means Brotherhood IV. Caught in the Machine To Dyke Selling F. Scott Fitzgerald: A Comment on the Vegetable by Drackman The Scottsboro Boys American Letter To Sleep Love on a Train Man's Home Companion Lump The Spoken Word Winter Road George Washington Atomic Energy V. A Children's Story Monrovia VI. The Land 1 Introduction: Highways Should Be Rightways It Used to Be Why These? The Extremes Are Great 2: The Northeast New York The Brilliant Brotherhood: New York City during the Mystical Experience of 1926 Doylestown The Presence of a Field 3: The South Night 4: Chicago 5: New Mexico To the Land of the People Rainbow The Dust of Abiquiu Taos Night New Mexico after India Part of the Universe Santa Fe Sequence 6: California Caromb America's Proposed Riveria: A Chicagoan's Impressions of Los Angeles VII. Epilogue Music A Double Portrait To Georgia O'Keeffe and Alfred Stieglitz Tired, I have come to the door Bibliography

Review :
"A useful addition to African-American literary scholarship....Properly emphasizes what Toomer critics have identified as the major themes of his life and work."--Choice "A valuable addition to the body of Toomer's work."--Georgia Historical Quarterly "Toomer was one of the most talented authors of the Harlem Renaissance, and he made valuable contributions to modernist literature, unfortunately forgotten, that this volume helps make clear."--Mary Ann Wimsatt, University of South Carolina "Continuing a decade's work on Jean Toomer's literary development, Frederick L. Rusch's exemplary edition of the unpublished works invites us to follow the work of a writer whose project was no less than defining the subjective creation of a multi-cultural American."--John M. Reilly, State University of New York at Albany "Valuable supplementary material from one of the most important African-American writers of all time. This will help to re-establish his worth and make him more widely known and appreciated."--Dennis Brutus, University of Colorado "A valuable addition to the primary source materials on Toomer."--Joseph McLaren, Hofstra University "A useful addition to African-American literary scholarship....Properly emphasizes what Toomer critics have identified as the major themes of his life and work."--Choice "A valuable addition to the body of Toomer's work."--Georgia Historical Quarterly "Toomer was one of the most talented authors of the Harlem Renaissance, and he made valuable contributions to modernist literature, unfortunately forgotten, that this volume helps make clear."--Mary Ann Wimsatt, University of South Carolina "Continuing a decade's work on Jean Toomer's literary development, Frederick L. Rusch's exemplary edition of the unpublished works invites us to follow the work of a writer whose project was no less than defining the subjective creation of a multi-cultural American."--John M. Reilly, State University of New York at Albany "Valuable supplementary material from one of the most important African-American writers of all time. This will help to re-establish his worth and make him more widely known and appreciated."--Dennis Brutus, University of Colorado "A valuable addition to the primary source materials on Toomer."--Joseph McLaren, Hofstra University