About the Book
Finalist, Pauli Murray Book Prize in Black Intellectual History, African American Intellectual History Society
Shortlisted, 2023 Historical Nonfiction Legacy Award, Hurston / Wright Foundation
One of the foremost Black writers and intellectuals of his era, Claude McKay (1889-1948) was a central figure in Caribbean literature, the Harlem Renaissance, and the Black radical tradition. McKay's life and writing were defined by his class consciousness and anticolonialism, shaped by his experiences growing up in colonial Jamaica as well as his early career as a writer in Harlem and then London. Dedicated to confronting both racism and capitalist exploitation, he was a critical observer of the Black condition throughout the African diaspora and became a committed Bolshevik.
Winston James offers a revelatory account of McKay's political and intellectual trajectory from his upbringing in Jamaica through the early years of his literary career and radical activism. In 1912, McKay left Jamaica to study in the United States, never to return. James follows McKay's time at the Tuskegee Institute and Kansas State University, as he discovered the harshness of American racism, and his move to Harlem, where he encountered the ferment of Black cultural and political movements and figures such as Hubert Harrison and Marcus Garvey. McKay left New York for London, where his commitment to revolutionary socialism deepened, culminating in his transformation from Fabian socialist to Bolshevik.
Drawing on a wide variety of sources, James offers a rich and detailed chronicle of McKay's life, political evolution, and the historical, political, and intellectual contexts that shaped him.
About the Author :
Winston James is the author of A Fierce Hatred of Injustice: Claude McKay's Jamaica and His Poetry of Rebellion (2000); The Struggles of John Brown Russwurm: The Life and Writings of a Pan-Africanist Pioneer, 1799-1851 (2010); and Holding Aloft the Banner of Ethiopia: Caribbean Radicalism in Early Twentieth-Century America (second edition, 2020), winner of the Gordon K. Lewis Memorial Award for Caribbean Scholarship of the Caribbean Studies Association. He is also coeditor of and contributor to Inside Babylon: The Caribbean Diaspora in Britain (1993). James has held teaching positions in the United Kingdom and the United States, most recently as professor of history at the University of California, Irvine.
Review :
A major, unignorable advance.-- "American Literary History"
[I applaud] the nuance, rigor, and commitment that James brings to this fine study of McKay's early years.-- "Journal of African American History"
A trenchant and astonishing work. James' care with details, research, and analysis--along with a pleasurable style of writing--make for a captivating biography of the first part of McKay's radical life.--Joel Wendland-Liu "People's World"
James is the ideal person to author such a work . . . [This] biography makes important interventions.--Owen Walsh "Radical Americas"
Writing with precision and flair and drawing on his own impeccable research, James limns McKay's political life and legacy of influence in American letters . . . Highly recommended.--L. L. Johnson "Choice Reviews"
The revolutionary Jamaican poet Claude McKay deserves a good Marxist biographer and has found one. Winston James's new book on McKay illuminates the mind and art of one of the most important writers of the early twentieth century as it responded to the seismic contest between capitalism, colonialism, and Socialism in the age of the Russian Revolution.--Bill Mullen "Tempest Magazine"
A powerfully relevant study about an iconoclastic Black thinker and poet who was dedicated to economic reform as well as the eradication of racism.--Thomas Filbin "The Arts Fuse"
Elegantly written and carefully reasoned, this is a fascinating look at the political evolution of a key literary figure.-- "Publishers Weekly"
James provides a deep understanding of McKay's early political formation and radicalization and how these origins structured McKay's thinking and art. He ably historicizes McKay while retaining a keen sensitivity to McKay's literary contributions.--Michelle Ann Stephens, Rutgers University-New Brunswick
The wandering poet and revolutionary socialist Claude McKay was one of the twentieth century's most captivating writers, noted for his intellectual intensity and emotional depth. Combining unparalleled erudition, literary sensitivity, and political nous, Winston James's book provides a compelling and authoritative account of the life that McKay made and the circumstances within which he made it.--Peter Hulme, professor emeritus, University of Essex
Claude McKay goes beyond biography. Although an excellent biography of a pivotal period in McKay's early political education, the book is also an important contribution to scholarship in several other fields . . . Few scholars have been so detailed and sympathetic in their treatment of McKay's early experiences. James has succeeded in effectively demonstrating how McKay's ideology was marked by both continuity and change and has given serious weight to the idea that McKay and his black contemporaries were ahead of their time ideologically.--Jasmine Calver "H-Socialisms"
[In] The Making of a Black Bolshevik, McKay properly joins the greats of black America, now accorded his due respect in this scrupulous and thoughtful study. It is a wonderful book, which draws the reader into McKay's tempestuous world. At every point James's interpretation is coolly judicious, bringing a lifetime's thought to fruition.-- "History Workshop's Radical Reads of 2022"
James is a perceptive literary critic, and his close readings are some of the most electrifying parts of The Making of a Black Bolshevik.--Jennifer Wilson "Dissent Magazine"
A compelling and provocative rendering of the complex transnational racial geographies that shaped the remarkable Claude McKay. Winston James illuminates underexplored features of post-emancipation history and, through exhaustive research, dramatizes the deep entanglements between place and psyche, poetry and politics, violence and hope.
--Honor Ford-Smith, York University
Meticulously researched and superbly written, this is the premier work on Claude McKay's astonishing artistic range and diverse passions. It is also an incisive examination of the wider Jamaican and Caribbean colonial context, and a major contribution to the history of the Atlantic world, the Harlem Renaissance, and the overlooked connection with the founders of Négritude.
--Franklin W. Knight, Leonard and Helen R. Stulman Professor Emeritus of History, Johns Hopkins University
Winston James's resurrection of the many lives of Claude McKay is a revelation. Page after page, his McKay becomes an increasingly startling figure, never conforming to prevailing expectations. As the narrative gathers pace, McKay shimmers, the life outgrowing the circumstances of his history. The unfolding story presents us with a portrait that is simultaneously compelling and troubling. McKay will never be the same.
--Bill Schwarz, Queen Mary University of London
