“ Sorrow prepares you for joy. It violently sweeps everything out of your house, so that new joy can find space to enter. It shakes the yellow leaves from the bough of your heart, so that fresh, green leaves can grow in their place. It pulls up the rotten roots, so that new roots hidden beneath have room to grow. Whatever sorrow shakes from your heart, far better things will take their place. ” ― Rumi
Representing fifty distinguished American women writers, this collection of autobiographical narratives reflects the diverse intersections of race, class, religion, and sexual identity as they have been experienced in every region of the United States ove
In response to requests from instructors and students for shorter and less expensive composition readers, 40 Model Essays — featuring material adapted from the successful The Compact Reader — offers about half the usual number of readings for about h
Henry Dumas’s fiction is a masterful synthesis of myth and religion, culture and nature, mask and identity. From the Deep South to the simmering streets of Harlem, his characters embark on surreal and mythic quests armed only with wit, words, and wis
Here is the seminal and critical work that helped solidify Haki Madhubuti as an informed, passionate, and caring commentator on Black life, culture, relationships, and the development and stability of the Black community. In Black Men, an integral text fo
A 50th anniversary edition of Margaret Walker's best-selling classic with a foreword by Nikki Giovanni Jubilee tells the true story of Vyry, the child of a white plantation owner and one of his black slaves. Vyry bears witness to the South’s antebellum
During her lifetime, Audre Lorde (1934-1992), author of the landmark Cancer Journals, created a mythic identity for herself that retains its vitality to this day. Drawing from the private archives of the poet's estate and numerous interviews, Alexis De Ve
The pioneering anthology Home Girls features writings by Black feminists and lesbian activists on topics both provocative and profound. Since its initial publication in 1983, it has become an essential text on Black women's lives and writings. This editio
By turns funny, passionate, angry and joyous, does your mama know? reflects the complexity of emotions that accompany a black lesbian’s coming out. These 49 short stories, poems, interviews and essays—fiction and nonfiction—make up a powerful collec
Destined to become a classic in the tradition of the best-selling Black-Eyed Susans/Midnight Birds and Erotique Noire/ Black Erotica. Afrekete gives collective voice to the tradition of black lesbian writing. In the vast and proliferating area of both Afr