Black American Literature

The Russian Revolution in October 1917 was an even of International import which had wide ranging repercussions in the world of lette Black American fiction, already in ferment and heading toward the energetic era off the Harlem Renaissance, also showed signs of another form of radicalism which was more in keeping with the spirit of Marxism. The Marxist ideology held special appeal for the black intellectuals. In this book the author analyzes the works of a few major black American novelists, who during their lives were involved with Marxism inn one way of the other. This study includes a detailed analysis of fourteen novels and a collection off novellas written by six authors: namely Claude Mckay, Langston Hughes, Richard Wright, Chester Himes, Ralph Ellision, and John Oliver Killens. The main object of this book is to identify the values held by the various protagonists with a view to finding out whether the Marxist leaning of their creators have left any impact on them.
After a close analysis of the novels the author writes that these novelists projected the black social reality as they saw it. Marxism only gave them a particular stand point from where they observed their racial status in a white capitalist society. While aiming at a realistic depiction off their characters these writers have portrayed their characters revealing all their joys and sorrows. In doing so they unfold a whole range off the latter’s dreams and desires, hopes and aspirations which when cumulatively perceived seem to fall in a pattern, forming mosaic as it were, which needs a definition. Usha Shourie defines this pattern in terms of the values held by the protagonists which according to her, are the values of an average middle-class American which are, more or less, in keeping with the American Dream. Here, she has successfully brought out the polarity between the authors’ ideology and the values held by their protagonists. This book is divided into eight chapte The first chapter presents a brief literary historical background against which the black novel moves from mild protest to radicalism, as well as a survey of the critical works on these authors, a brief history of the American Communist Party, and its role among the American blacks, the relevant theoretical precepts of Marxist ideology and literary aesthetics, as well as a definition of the third, fourth, fifth, sixth, and seventh chapters are devoted to the works of the individual autho The eighth chapter is a summing up off the argument and the conclusion. While by and large this book is a thematic study, the author reinforces her argument by analyzing literary symbols, imagery, and metaphors used in these novels.