An eloquent document of the civil rights movement that remains a work of profound social relevance 25 years after it was first published.

    A classic anthology of short stories by Black writers including James Baldwin, Zora Neale Hurston, and Richard Wright -- edited and with an introduction by Langston Hughes. Originally published in 1967, The Best Short Stories by Black Writers offers a timeless and unforgettable portrait of the tragedy, comedy, triumph, and suffering that were part of African American life from 1899 to 1967.

    The product of a lifetime of struggle and reflection, Cruse's book is a singular amalgam of cultural history, passionate disputation, and deeply considered analysis of the relationship between American blacks and American society. Reviewing black intellectual life from the Harlem Renaissance through the 1960s, Cruse discusses the legacy (and offers memorably acid-edged portraits) of figures such as Paul Robeson, Lorraine Hansberry, and James Baldwin, arguing that their work was marked by a failure to understand the specifically American character of racism in the United States. This supplies the background to Cruse's controversial critique of both integrationism and black nationalism and to his claim that black Americans will only assume a just place within American life when they develop their own distinctive centers of cultural and economic influence. For Cruse's most important accomplishment may well be his rejection of the clich?s of the melting pot in favor of a vision of Americanness as an arena of necessary and vital contention, an open and ongoing struggle.