Paul Laurence Dunbar

[By Kenton Rambsy]

Paul Laurence Dunbar is primarily known as a poet; however, his body of writing is extremely diverse. For instance, over his lifetime Dunbar wrote a dozen books of poetry, four books of short stories, five novels, and a play. Two of his novels, The Fanatics (1901) and The Sport of the Gods (1902) are included in the “100 Novels Collection.”

Dunbar is remembered most for his use of Negro Dialect or African American Vernacular English in his writing.  Geneva Smitherman defines AAVE or Black Dialect as “an Africanized form of English reflecting Black America’s linguistic-cultural African heritage and the conditions of servitude, oppression, and life in America. Black Language is Euro-American speech with Afro-American meaning, nuance, tone, and gestures…It has allowed blacks to create a culture of survival in an alien land, and as a by-product has served to enrich the language of all Americans.”

Langston Hughes

[By Kenton Rambsy]

Quite often, Langston Hughes is thought of primarily as a poet. Popular historical appraisals of Hughes tend to focus more on his poetry and do not place as much emphasis on his work as a playwright, novelist, and even newspaper columnist. Huhges's novel Not Without Laughter is apart of the "100 Novels Collection" and mirrors the thematic representations found in his poetry and other works. 

One common theme in his writing, though, is the struggles of working class people. Hughes probes the lives of working class people in his writing to offer glimpses of certain economic, political, and social barriers that confront America’s proletariat. His fascination with leftist political ideologies creeps into his work and exposes his disapproving attitude of the racially charged capitalist culture and his yearning for America to be more encompassing of minorities, especially black people. 

Frederick Douglass

[By Kenton Rambsy]

When the name “Frederick Douglass” is uttered, often times, people think of the famous ex- social reformer, orator, writer and statesman. Rarely, though, do people think of Douglass as a fiction writer.

Frederick Douglass serves as an important figure in African American and American history. His contributions to American Literature have provided future generations of scholars an opportunity to study his philosophies about race, equality, and politics in America during the nineteenth century. Although Douglass is one of our most famous ex-slaves primarily because of his autobiography, few people or at least not enough of us recognize the significance of his fictional work The Heroic Slave.

5 notable NYC Female Characters

[By Kenton Rambsy]

Yesterday, I focused on five notable characters that resided in NYC at some point throughout the action of the novel. Today, I have decided to focus on black women characters in five novels from the “100 Novels Collection.” Similar to the male characters, these female characters all face different challenges, but NYC seems to be a recurring setting for the action in the lives of these diverse sets of black men.