reputation, even if he had not written his poems. One of the best
technically is "Jimsella," from the "Folks from Dixie" volume. This
story exhibits the pathos of the life of unskilled Negroes in the North,
and the leading of a little child. In the sureness with which it moves
to its conclusion it is a beautiful work of art. "A Family Feud" shows
the influence of an old servant in a wealthy Kentucky family. In similar
vein is "Aunt Tempe's Triumph." "The Walls of Jericho" is an exposure of
the methods of a sensational preacher. Generally these stories attempt
no keen satire, but only a faithful portrayal of conditions as they are,
or, in most cases, as they were in ante-bellum days. Dunbar's novels are
generally weaker than his short stories, though "The Sport of the Gods,"
because of its study of a definite phase of life, rises above the
others. Nor are his occasional articles especially strong. He was
eminently a lyric poet. By his graceful and beautiful verse it is that
he has won a distinct place in the history of American literature.
By his genius Paul Laurence Dunbar attracted the attention of the great,
the wise, and the good. His bookcase contained many autograph copies of
the works of distinguished contemporaries. The similarity of his
position in American literature to that of Burns in English has
frequently been pointed out. In our own time he most readily invites
comparison with James Whitcomb Riley. The writings of both men are
distinguished by infinite tenderness and pathos. But above all worldly
fame, above even the expression of a struggling people's heart, was the
poet's own striving for the unattainable. There was something heroic
about him withal, something that links him with Keats, or, in this
latter day, with Rupert Brooke and Alan Seeger. He yearned for love, and
the world rushed on; then he smiled at death and was universally loved.
IV
CHARLES W. CHESNUTT
Charles Waddell Chesnutt, the best known novelist and short story writer
of the race, was born in Cleveland, Ohio, June 20, 1858. At the age of
sixteen he began to teach in the public schools of North Carolina, from
which state his parents had gone to Cleveland; and at the age of
twenty-three he became principal of the State Normal School at
Fayetteville. In 1883 he left the South, engaging for a short while in
newspaper work in New York City, but going soon to Cleveland, where he
worked as a stenographer. He was admitted to the bar in 1887.
While in North Carolina Mr. Chesnutt studied to good purpose the
dialect, manners, and superstitions of the Negro people of the state. In
1887 he began in the _Atlantic Monthly_ the series of stories which was
afterwards brought together in the volume entitled, "The Conjure
Woman." This book was published by the Houghton Mifflin Co., the firm
which published also Mr. Chesnutt's other collection of stories and the
first two of his three novels. "The Wife of his Youth, and Other Stories
of the Color-Line" appeared in 1899. In the same year appeared a compact
biography of Frederick Douglass, a contribution to the Beacon
Biographies of Eminent Americans. Three novels have since appeared, as
follows: "The House Behind the Cedars" (1900); "The Marrow of Tradition"
(1901); and "The Colonel's Dream" (1905).
Mr. Chesnutt's short stories are not all of the same degree of
excellence, but the best ones show that he is fully master of the short
story as a literary form. One of the best technically is "The Bouquet."
This is a story of the devotion of a little Negro girl to her white
teacher, and shows clearly how the force of Southern prejudice might
forbid the expression of simple love not only in a representative home,
but even when the object of the devotion is borne to the cemetery. "The
Sheriff's Children" is a tragic tale of the relations of a white father
with his illegitimate colored son. Most famous of all these stories,
however, is "The Wife of his Youth," a simple work of art of great
intensity. It is a tale of a very fair colored man who, just before the
Civil War, by the aid of his Negro wife, makes his way from slavery in
Missouri to freedom in a Northern city, Groveland [Cleveland?]. After
the years have brought to him business success and culture, and he has
become the acknowledged leader of his social circle and the prospective
husband of a very attractive young widow, his wife suddenly appears on
the scene. The story ends with Mr. Ryder's acknowledging before a
company of guests the wife of his youth. Such stories as these, each
setting forth a certain problem and working it out to its logical
conclusion, reflect great credit upon the literary skill of the writer.
[Illustration: CHARLES W. CHESNUTT]
Of the novels, "The House Behind the Cedars" is commonly given first
place. In the story of the heroine, Rena Walden, are treated some of the
most subtle and searching questions raised by the color-line. Rena is
sought in love by three men, George Tryon, a white man, whose love fails
when put to the test; Jeff Wain, a coarse and brutal mulatto, and Frank
Fowler, a devoted young Negro, who makes every sacrifice demanded by
love. The novel, especially in its last pages, moves with an intensity
that is an unmistakable sign of power. It is Mr. Chesnutt's most
sustained treatment of the subject for which he has become best known,
that is, the delicate and tragic situation of those who live on the
border-line of the races; and it is the best work of fiction yet written
by a member of the race in America. In "The Marrow of Tradition" the
main theme is the relations of two women, one white and one colored,
whose father, the same white man, had in time been married to the mother
of each. The novel touches upon almost every phase of the Negro Problem.
It is a powerful plea, but perhaps too much a novel of purpose to
satisfy the highest standards of art. The Wellington of the story is
very evidently Wilmington, N. C., and the book was written immediately
after the race troubles in that city in 1898. "The Colonel's Dream" is a
sad story of the failure of high ideals. Colonel Henry French is a man
who, born in the South, achieves success in New York and returns to his
old home for a little vacation, only to find himself face to face with
all the problems that one meets in a backward Southern town. "He dreamed
of a regenerated South, filled with thriving industries, and thronged
with a prosperous and happy people, where every man, having enough for
his needs, was willing that every other man should have the same; where
law and order should prevail unquestioned, and where every man could
enter, through the golden door of hope, the field of opportunity, where
lay the prizes of life, which all might have an equal chance to win or
lose." Becoming interested in the injustice visited upon the Negroes in
the courts, and in the employment of white children in the cotton-mills,
Colonel French encounters opposition to his benevolent plans, opposition
which finally sends him back to New York defeated. Mr. Chesnutt writes
in simple, clear English, and his methods might well be studied by
younger writers who desire to treat, in the guise of fiction, the many
searching questions that one meets to-day in the life of the South.
V
W. E. BURGHARDT DUBOIS
William Edward Burghardt Dubois was born February 23, 1868, at Great
Barrington, Mass. He received the degree of Bachelor of Arts at Fisk
University in 1888, the same degree at Harvard in 1890, that of Master
of Arts at Harvard in 1891, and, after a season of study at the
University of Berlin, received also the degree of Doctor of Philosophy
at Harvard in 1895, his thesis being his exhaustive study, "Suppression
of the Slave-Trade." Dr. DuBois taught for a brief period at Wilberforce
University, and was also for a time an assistant and fellow in Sociology
at the University of Pennsylvania, producing in 1899 his study, "The
Philadelphia Negro." In 1896 he accepted the professorship of History
and Economics at Atlanta University, the position which he left in 1910
to become Director of Publicity and Research for the National
Association for the Advancement of Colored People. In connection with
this work he has edited the _Crisis_ since the beginning of that
publication. He has made various investigations, frequently for the
national government, and has contributed many sociological studies to
leading magazines. He has been the moving spirit of the Atlanta
Conference, and by the Studies of Negro Problems, which he has edited at
Atlanta University, he has become recognized as one of the great
sociologists of the day, and as the man who more than anyone else has
given scientific accuracy to studies relating to the Negro.
[Illustration: W. E. BURGHARDT DU BOIS]
Aside from his more technical studies (these including the masterly
little book, "The Negro," in Holt's Home University Library Series), Dr.
DuBois has written three books which call for consideration in a review
of Negro literature. Of these one is a biography, one a novel, and the
other a collection of essays. In 1909 was published "John Brown," a
contribution to the series of American Crisis Biographies. The subject
was one well adapted to treatment at the hands of Dr. DuBois, and in the
last chapter, "The Legacy of John Brown," he has shown that his hero
has a message for twentieth century America, this: "The cost of liberty
is less than the price of repression." "The Quest of the Silver Fleece,"
the novel, appeared in 1911. This story has three main themes: the
economic position of the Negro agricultural laborer, the subsidizing of
a certain kind of Negro schools, and Negro life and society in the city
of Washington. The book employs a big theme in its portrayal of the
power of King Cotton in both high and lowly life in the Southland; but
its tone is frequently one of satire, and on the whole the work will not
add much to the already established reputation of the author. The third
book really appeared before either of the two works just mentioned, and
embodies the best work of the author in his most highly idealistic
period. In 1903 fourteen essays, most of which had already appeared in
such magazines as the _Atlantic_ and the _World's Work_, were brought
together in a volume entitled, "The Souls of Black Folk." The remarkable
style of this book has made it the most important work in classic
English yet written by a Negro. It is marked by all the arts of
rhetoric, especially by liquid and alliterative effects, strong
antithesis, frequent allusion, and poetic suggestiveness. The color-line
is "The Veil," the familiar melodies, the "Sorrow Songs." The qualities
that have just been remarked will be observed in the following
paragraphs:
I have seen a land right merry with the sun, where children
sing, and rolling hills lie like passioned women wanton with
harvest. And there in the King's Highway sat and sits a figure
veiled and bowed, by which the traveler's footsteps hasten as
they go. On the tainted air broods fear. Three centuries'
thought has been the raising and unveiling of that bowed human
heart, and now behold a century new for the duty and the deed.
The problem of the Twentieth Century is the problem of the
color-line.
* * * * *
My journey was done, and behind me lay hill and dale, and Life
and Death. How shall man measure Progress there where the
dark-faced Josie lies? How many heartfuls of sorrow shall
balance a bushel of wheat? How hard a thing is life to the
lowly, and yet how human and real! And all this life and love
and strife and failure--is it the twilight of nightfall or the
flush of some faint-dawning day?
Thus sadly musing, I rode to Nashville in the Jim Crow car.
* * * * *
I sit with Shakespeare and he winces not. Across the color-line
I move arm in arm with Balzac and Dumas, where smiling men and
welcoming women glide in gilded halls. From out the caves of
evening that swing between the strong-limbed earth and the
tracery of the stars, I summon Aristotle and Aurelius and what
soul I will, and they all come graciously with no scorn nor
condescension. So, wed with Truth, I dwell above the Veil. Is
this the life you grudge us, O knightly America? Is this the
life you long to change into the dull red hideousness of
Georgia? Are you so afraid lest peering from this high Pisgah,
between Philistine and Amalekite, we sight the Promised Land?
Where merit is so even and the standard of performance so high, one
hesitates to choose that which is best. "The Dawn of Freedom" is a study
of the Freedmen's Bureau; "Mr. Booker T. Washington and Others" is a
frank criticism of the late orator and leader; "The Meaning of Progress"
is a story of life in Tennessee, told with infinite pathos by one who
has been the country schoolmaster; "The Training of Black Men" is a plea
for liberally educated leadership; while "The Quest of the Golden
Fleece," like one or two related essays, is a faithful portrayal of life
in the black belt. The book, as a whole, is a powerful plea for justice
and the liberty of citizenship.
W. E. Burghardt DuBois is the best example that has so far appeared of
the combination of high scholarship and the peculiarly romantic
temperament of the Negro race. Beneath all the play of logic and
statistic beats the passion of a mighty human heart. For a long time he
was criticised as aloof, reserved, unsympathetic; but more and more, as
the years have passed, has his mission become clearer, his love for his
people stronger. Forced by the pressure of circumstance, gradually has
he been led from the congenial retreat of the scholar into the arena of
social struggle; but for two decades he has remained an outstanding
interpreter of the spiritual life of his people. He is to-day the
foremost leader of the race in America.
VI
WILLIAM STANLEY BRAITHWAITE
The foremost of the poets of the race at present is William Stanley
Braithwaite, of Boston. Mr. Braithwaite is not only the possessor of
unusual talent, but for years he has worked most conscientiously at his
art and taken the time and the pains to master the fundamentals that
others all too often deem unimportant. In 1904 he published a small book
of poems entitled "Lyrics of Life and Love." This was followed four
years later by "The House of Falling Leaves." Within recent years he has
given less and less time to his own verse, becoming more and more
distinguished as a critic in the special field of American poetry. For
several years he has been a regular and valued contributor of literary
criticism to the _Boston Evening Transcript_; he has had verse or
critical essays in the _Forum_, the _Century_, _Scribner's_, the
_Atlantic_, etc.; and in 1916 became editor of the new _Poetry
Review_ of Cambridge. He has collected and edited (publishing chiefly
through Brentano's) "The Book of Elizabethan Verse," "The Book of
Georgian Verse," and "The Book of Restoration Verse"; and he has also
published the "Anthology of Magazine Verse" for each year since 1913. He
is the general editor of "The Contemporary American Poets Series," which
is projected by the Poetry Review Company, and which will be issued in
twelve little books, each giving a sympathetic study of a poet of the
day; he himself is writing the volume on Edwin Arlington Robinson; and
before long it is expected that a novel will appear from his pen. Very
recently (1917) Mr. Braithwaite has brought together in a volume, "The
Poetic Year," the series of articles which he contributed to the
_Transcript_ in 1916-17. The aim was in the form of conversations
between a small group of friends to discuss the poetry of 1916. Says he:
"There were four of us in the little group, and our common love for the
art of poetry suggested a weekly meeting in the grove to discuss the
books we had all agreed upon reading.... I made up my mind to record
these discussions, and the setting as well, with all those other touches
of human character and mood which never fail to enliven and give color
to the serious business of art and life.... I gave fanciful names to my
companions, Greek names which I am persuaded symbolized the spirit of
each. There was nothing Psyche touched but made its soul apparent. Her
wood-lore was beautiful and thorough; the very spirit of flowers, birds
and trees was evoked when she went among them. Our other companion of
her sex was Cassandra, and we gave her this name not because her
forebodings were gloomy, but merely for her prophesying disposition,
which was always building air-castles. The other member besides myself
of our little group was Jason, of the heroic dreams and adventuresome
spirit. He was restless in the bonds of a tranquillity that chafed the
hidden spirit of his being." From the introduction we get something of
the critic's own aims and ideals: "The conversational scheme of the book
may, or may not, interest some readers. Poetry is a human thing, and it
is time for the world--and especially our part of the world--to regard
it as belonging to the people. It sprang from the folk, and passed, when
culture began to flourish, into the possession of a class. Now culture
is passing from a class to the folk, and with it poetry is returning to
its original possessors. It is in the spirit of these words that we
discuss the poetry of the year." Emphasis is here given to this work
because it is the sturdiest achievement of Mr. Braithwaite in the field
in which he has recently become most distinguished, and even the brief
quotations cited are sufficient to give some idea of his graceful,
suggestive prose.
[Illustration: WILLIAM STANLEY BRAITHWAITE]
In a review of this writer's poetry we have to consider especially the
two collections, "Lyrics of Life and Love," and "The House of Falling
Leaves," and the poems that have more recently appeared in the
_Atlantic_, _Scribner's_, and other magazines. It is to be hoped that
before very long he will publish a new edition of his poems. The earlier
volumes are out of print, and a new book could contain the best of them,
as well as what has appeared more recently. "Lyrics of Life and Love"
embodied the best of the poet's early work. The little book contains
eighty pages, and no one of the lyrics takes up more than two pages,
twenty in fact being exactly eight lines in length. This appearance of
fragility, however, is a little deceptive. While Keats and Shelley are
constantly evident as the models in technique, the yearning of more than
one lyric reflects the deeper romantic temper. The bravado and the
tenderness of the old poets are evident again in the two Christmas
pieces, "Holly Berry and Mistletoe," and "Yule-Song: A Memory":
The trees are bare, wild flies the snow,
Hearths are glowing, hearts are merry--
High in the air is the Mistletoe,
Over the door is the Holly Berry.
Never have care how the winds may blow,
Never confess the revel grows weary--
Yule is the time of the Mistletoe,
Yule is the time of the Holly Berry.
* * * * *
December comes, snows come,
Comes the wintry weather;
Faces from away come--
Hearts must be together.
Down the stair-steps of the hours
Yule leaps the hills and towers--
Fill the bowl and hang the holly,
Let the times be jolly.
"The Watchers" is in the spirit of Kingsley's "The Three Fishers":
Two women on the lone wet strand--
(_The wind's out with a will to roam_)
The waves wage war on rocks and sand,
(_And a ship is long due home_.)
The sea sprays in the women's eyes--
(_Hearts can writhe like the sea's wild foam_)
Lower descend the tempestuous skies,
(_For the wind's out with a will to roam_.)
"O daughter, thine eyes be better than mine,"
(_The waves ascend high on yonder dome_)
"North or South is there never a sign?"
(_And a ship is long due home_.)
They watched there all the long night through--
(_The wind's out with a will to roam_)
Wind and rain and sorrow for two--
(_And heaven on the long reach home_.)
The second volume marked a decided advance in technique. When we
remember also the Pre-Raphaelite spirit, with its love of rhythm and
imagery, we are not surprised to find here an appreciation "To Dante
Gabriel Rossetti." Especially has the poet made progress in the handling
of the sonnet, as may be seen in the following:
My thoughts go marching like an armed host
Out of the city of silence, guns and cars;
Troop after troop across my dreams they post
To the invasion of the wind and stars.
O brave array of youth's untamed desire!
With thy bold, dauntless captain Hope to lead
His raw recruits to Fate's opposing fire,
And up the walls of Circumstance to bleed.
How fares the expedition in the end?
When this my heart shall have old age for king
And to the wars no further troop can send,
What final message will the arm'stice bring?
The host gone forth in youth the world to meet,
In age returns--in victory or defeat?
Then there is the epilogue with its heart-cry:
Lord of the mystic star-blown gleams
Whose sweet compassion lifts my dreams;
Lord of life in the lips of the rose
That kiss desire; whence Beauty grows;
Lord of the power inviolate
That keeps immune thy seas from fate,
* * * * *
Lord, Very God of these works of thine,
Hear me, I beseech thee, most divine!
Within very recent years Mr. Braithwaite has attracted unusual attention
among the discerning by a new note of mysticism that has crept into his
verse. This was first observed in "Sandy Star," that appeared in the
_Atlantic_ (July, 1909):
No more from out the sunset,
No more across the foam,
No more across the windy hills
Will Sandy Star come home.
He went away to search it,
With a curse upon his tongue,
And in his hands the staff of life
Made music as it swung.
I wonder if he found it,
And knows the mystery now:
Our Sandy Star who went away
With the secret on his brow.
The same note is in "The Mystery" (or "The Way," as the poet prefers to
call it) that appeared in _Scribner's_ (October, 1915):
He could not tell the way he came
Because his chart was lost:
Yet all his way was paved with flame
From the bourne he crossed.
He did not know the way to go,
Because he had no map:
He followed where the winds blow,--
And the April sap.
He never knew upon his brow
The secret that he bore--
And laughs away the mystery now
The dark's at his door.
Mr. Braithwaite has done well. He is to-day the foremost man of the race
in pure literature. But above any partial or limited consideration,
after years of hard work he now has recognition not only as a poet of
standing, but as the chief sponsor for current American poetry. No
comment on his work could be better than that of the _Transcript_,
November 30, 1915: "He has helped poetry to readers as well as to poets.
One is guilty of no extravagance in saying that the poets we have--and
they may take their place with their peers in any country--and the
gathering deference we pay them, are created largely out of the
stubborn, self-effacing enthusiasm of this one man. In a sense their
distinction is his own. In a sense he has himself written their poetry.
Very much by his toil they may write and be read. Not one of them will
ever write a finer poem than Braithwaite himself has lived already."
VII
OTHER WRITERS
In addition to those who have been mentioned, there have been scores of
writers who would have to be considered if we were dealing with the
literature of the Negro in the widest sense of the term. Not too
clearly, however, can the limitations of our subject be insisted upon.
We are here concerned with distinctly literary or artistic achievement,
and not with work that belongs in the realm of religion, sociology, or
politics. Only briefer mention accordingly can be given to these latter
fields.